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Inside the Lamerd carnage: How new US PrSM missiles were tested on children during 40-day war

By Humaira Ahad | Press TV | June 8, 2026

When the lights went out inside the Shahid Naimi Sports Complex, Helma, a fourth grader, and Elham, a fifth grader, were still on the volleyball court.

According to teammates and relatives, the two schoolgirls had been training with the Lamerd youth volleyball team on the evening of February 28, 2026, in Lamerd, a county in the southern Iranian province of Fars.

Only moments earlier, the sports hall had echoed with the sharp blasts of whistles, the rhythm of running drills, and the thud of volleyballs striking the floor.

Then, a US-Israeli missile strike outside the complex plunged the facility into darkness. In the confusion, players, coaches, and children began making their way toward the exits. But they never made it out.

According to residents, hospital personnel, and family members, a second US-Israeli missile detonated above the sports hall moments later, tearing through the roof and unleashing thousands of high-velocity fragments across the court below.

Doctors said Elham was already dead before she reached the hospital. Helma, however, managed to walk to the ambulance on her own.

Eyewitnesses say there was not even a visible bloodstain on her body. Helma told her coach, “It feels like something went into my body.”

She lifted her shirt and showed what appeared to be a small, blade-like object. It did not appear to be a serious wound. Helma appeared to be the furthest from death. But according to her uncle, that small black fragment had penetrated her heart, and around 7:00 p.m. on the same day, the efforts of the medical staff failed to save her life.

Later, the hospital staff described cases in which external wounds appeared minor but internal damage was severe.

Iliya Khatami, a sixth-grade boy, and his coach, Mahmoud Najafi, who were playing football on a grass field nearby, were also killed by the same fragments released from the US missile.

Two-year-old Avina Barzegar has been the youngest casualty of this US-Israeli attack. According to her family, she was martyred in an operating room while still having a pacifier in her mouth.

However, the attacks did not end there. A third missile, launched by the United States and Israel, struck the Lamerd ring road, killing three workers.

Two were on duty at the time, one from Lamerd and another from Mamasani, a county in Iran’s Fars Province, while the third was an Afghan national.

The civilian death toll extended far beyond those workers. Among the dead was a homemaker who had been sitting outside her house when the missile struck.

Also killed were a grocery store clerk, a pedestrian visiting from Norway who happened to be inside a pharmacy, the deputy director of customs at the Lamerd Special Economic Zone, and several university students.

The head of the MRI department at Lamerd Hospital instinctively threw herself over her daughter after hearing the blast. Her daughter survived, but she did not.

The attack, carried out on the first day of the 40-day war of aggression against Iran, killed 24 innocent civilians and injured more than 130 others.

Among the injured was a female student who was left blind. One resident said the fragments entered his body “like blades” and, as in Helma’s case, shattered the bone in his leg even though the external wound appeared barely visible.

The tragedy continues to haunt surviving families. The brother of one of the university students killed in the attack suffered a spinal cord injury and has still not been informed of his sister’s death.

Based on the locations where the US-Israeli missiles detonated, it has been confirmed that they struck densely populated civilian areas with heavy daily foot traffic.

Did the US and Israel use new lethal weapon in these deadly strikes?

The walls, doors, and windows of the city are riddled with large and small pellet holes. Reports suggest that a new missile called the Precision Strike Missile (PrSM) was tested for the first time over the people of Lamerd by the US-Israeli war machine.

The PrSM is a surface-to-surface weapon system capable of striking targets from 60 to 500 kilometres away, far beyond the range of any artillery or conventional missile system.

The missiles are rocket-powered, guided by a GPS-supported inertial navigation system.

PrSM is produced by Lockheed Martin’s Missiles and Fire Control division, an American weapons manufacturer. The company describes PrSM as a “next-generation, long-range precision-strike missile.”

Sharing an image of text on X, Max Blumenthal, the editor and founder of The Grayzone website, wrote, “Lockheed Martin CEO Jim Taiclet tells investors the US-Israeli war on Iran and assaults across the region are a ‘golden opportunity’,” as “Lockheed tested its new Precision Strike Missile on a girl’s volleyball game in Lamerd, Iran, on Feb 28, killing and wounding dozens.”

Describing the lethal weapon, US Central Command (CENTCOM) chief Admiral Brad Cooper said that the PrSM provides the American military with “an unrivalled deep strike capability”.

Each PrSM missile carries 180,000 tungsten pellets. Four missiles mean 720,000 projectiles dispersed over just a small section of Lamerd, a city of only 30,000 people.

That’s the equivalent of 24 tungsten pellets for every man, woman, and child in the city, suggesting that a staggering concentration of firepower was unleashed by the US and Israel on a civilian area.

The first missile exploded over the residential neighbourhood of Isar, the second a little farther away in the residential area of Tolkhandaq, the third again over Isar, and the fourth above an elementary school and the Shahid Naeimi sports hall. The reported impact extended beyond the sheer volume of munitions used.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Esmaeil Baghaei, stated that the “American forces fired PrSM at a residential neighbourhood in Lamerd, directly hitting a sports hall filled with civilians, including teenage volleyball players, women, men, and a helpless two-year-old girl.”

“There is no longer any doubt that this was not an accident, not ‘collateral damage,’ but a premeditated decision by the US regime to test its new weapon system on Iranian civilians in a residential area. Such a cold-blooded act constitutes a clear and despicable war crime,” he said in a social media post on May 25.

McKenzie Intelligence also said that Lamerd was “within the extended range” of the missile and “US Central Command has admitted to using PrSM in strikes from the desert of an unnamed Gulf country against Iran in the early phases of the conflict.”

Western media analysis of PrSM

Subsequent reporting and analyses, including by Western media outlets, have also identified the munition used in Lamerd as the PrSM. These findings have drawn further attention to the weapon’s deadly airburst design and its effects in populated civilian areas.

The Times, a British daily, ran an investigation stating that it verified videos of two strikes in Lamerd, as well as aftermath footage from the US-Israeli attacks.

The reporters of the daily and munitions experts found that the “weapon features, explosions and damage are consistent with a short-range PrSM ballistic missile, which is designed to detonate just above its target and blast small tungsten pellets outward.”

The New York Times reported that it examined video and satellite imagery from Lamerd and assessed the characteristics of the strikes.

The analysis concluded that a PrSM missile, an airburst capable weapon designed to detonate above its target and disperse tungsten fragments across a wide area, was “likely” used in Lamerd.

Post-strike imagery showed distributed pockmark patterns rather than large crater formation, a characteristic attributed in the analysis to fragmentation dispersal.

Separate video analysis by the Washington Post reviewed satellite imagery and ground-level footage, concluding that observed damage patterns were consistent with airburst detonation rather than direct-impact high-explosive warheads.

Mapping the targets of the US-Israeli attack

The Shahid Naimi Sports Complex was hosting routine evening training sessions on February 28, when multiple youth teams and school groups were present inside the facility.

According to residents, the indoor hall was being used by a girls’ volleyball team while a separate section of the complex and the adjacent open field were occupied by a boys’ football group.

At the time of the strike, the complex was hosting a girls’ volleyball practice session alongside a boys’ football training activity in adjacent areas of the facility.

Coaches and school staff were supervising regular pre-competition training activities for students preparing for provincial tournaments.

The facility, identified in local mapping platforms and municipal records as a civilian recreational and educational facility, was used regularly by school sports programs and youth training teams before the US-Israeli strike.

It was located within a broader residential zone of Lamerd, with pedestrian access routes connecting nearby homes, small commercial units, and a ring road within a short distance of the complex.

According to accounts from survivor testimonies, the first US-Israeli strike occurred in proximity to a nearby installation or open area outside the immediate sports hall structure.

This initial blast was described by witnesses as causing a sudden power disruption inside the gymnasium, resulting in immediate darkness and confusion among those present. Training activities were abruptly halted as athletes and coaches attempted to locate exits.

The second US-Israeli strike, which occurred shortly thereafter, is reported to have detonated above or immediately adjacent to the sports hall structure.

Eyewitness descriptions suggest an airburst pattern, with fragments dispersing across the roof and interior space of the facility. Panic ensued inside the hall, with children attempting to evacuate through limited exits in low-visibility conditions.

The speed of the sequence of US-Israeli strikes, according to residents, left almost no time for evacuation.

A third impact was reported in the Lamerd ring road area, approximately a short distance from the sports complex, affecting a separate cluster of civilian movement and vehicles.

This third US-Israeli strike has been described by eyewitnesses as having caused widespread destruction over a populated roadside zone.

Medical and municipal sources said the fragmentation injuries were so widespread that they affected individuals inside vehicles, outside shops, and within nearby residential courtyards.

After more than three months, the fragments of the US PrSM remain visible in shattered homes, perforated walls, and lives permanently altered by loss.

For the families of Helma, Elham, Avina, and the other victims, the United States and Israel killed their children in places where they should have been the safest, sports halls, neighbourhoods, and family spaces where ordinary life was unfolding.

June 8, 2026 - Posted by aletho | War Crimes, Wars for Israel | Human rights, Iran, Israel, United States, Zionism