On April 3, 2026, airstrikes damaged buildings at Shahid Beheshti University.

On February 28, 2026, the United States and Israel launched military operations against Iran. Over thirty universities and academic centers were among the sites hit by US and Israeli airstrikes. The attack on Shahid Beheshti severely damaged the Laser and Plasma Research Institute, an educational and health research laboratory.

Scholars at Risk is concerned about military violence against higher education facilities in armed conflict. Parties to a conflict may only attack legitimate military targets; where a party suspects that a civilian facility — such as a university building — is being used for military purposes, that party has a duty to take every action practicable to verify that this suspicion is correct before initiating an attack. In the event of such an attack, parties must take all practicable precautions to avoid or minimize damage to civilian facilities. Further, parties must refrain from launching attacks which may be expected to cause disproportionate damage to civilian facilities.

Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/30/world/middleeast/iran-universities-strikes.html https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202604/1358264.shtml https://countercurrents.org/2026/04/us-israel-strike-at-universities-health-facilities-in-iran/ https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/4/7/top-university-says-us-israel-attack-targeted-irans-progress-ai-learning https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2026/04/09/world/middleeast/us-israel-strikes-iran-structures-damage.html