The attack on Shajareh Tayyebeh Elementary School in Minab during the Ramadan War (2026) was one of the most prominent incidents associated with the U.S.–Israeli military offensive against Iran. Owing to the deaths of children, particularly female students, the event received extensive coverage in both domestic and international media. This study aims to examine how the incident was represented and to identify the dominant news frames employed by news channels on the indigenous Iranian messaging platforms Bale and Eitaa. To analyze the data, the study adopts an inductive approach combining thematic analysis and frame analysis. The dataset consists of 596 news items published by four highly followed news channels between 28 February 2026 and 8 April 2026. The data were analyzed through open coding, the extraction of subthemes and overarching themes, and the subsequent identification of dominant news frames.

The findings reveal three principal frames in the representation of the incident: the “Child-Girl Victim” frame, the “Violation of Innocence” frame, and the “Moral Justice-Seeking and Legal Accountability” frame. Among these, the “Child-Girl Victim” frame emerged as the dominant narrative, shaping media coverage through the emphasis on the victims’ innocence, vulnerability, and feminine identity. This framing contributed to a form of “emotion-based feminine framing,” in which symbolic attributes associated with femininity were employed to amplify the emotional impact of the news. The results further indicate that this representation was accompanied by the depersonalization of individual victims, the marginalization of male student casualties, and inconsistencies in reported casualty figures. Overall, public understanding of the incident was constructed less around its military and political dimensions than around the emotional experiences of the victims and the perceived necessity of condemning and holding the perpetrators accountable.