Iranian Mother Recounts Fear and Resilience Amid Renewed Hostilities in Bandar Abbas

Her account unfolds amid renewed hostilities in southern Iran in July, despite official claims of a ceasefire. On July 11, she woke to see two columns of smoke rising from opposite sides of the city: one from Shahid Rajaee Port, Iran's largest commercial port, and the other from the airport, both struck simultaneously. This is the third war she has lived through, having been a child during the eight-year Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s. While many Iranians struggle to grasp the reality of last summer's war or the war this winter, Bandar Abbas has been a target throughout both.

The attacks are now described by media as natural incidents during a ceasefire, but for residents, it is a full-scale war. The February war began with a strike on the Minab school, and the July war with an attack on a soldiers' dormitory in Bampour, where young men, mostly days from completing mandatory military service, were killed in their sleep.