Judging from videos and public statements, neither historic building was hit by a missile directly, but the shock wave from nearby blasts and possibly some missile debris shattered glass and brought down tiles and masonry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Video from the scene showed that Golestan Palace\u2019s celebrated hall of mirrors had been shattered, with shards of intricate mirrorwork scattered across its floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The palace is a world heritage site under the protection of the UN\u2019s cultural body, Unesco, which issued a statement<\/a> of concern after it was damaged on 2 March, saying it had \u201ccommunicated to all parties concerned the geographical coordinates of sites on the world heritage list\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Iran\u2019s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, criticised Unesco<\/a> for not being more vociferous, saying on social media: \u201cIts silence is unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Araghchi blamed the damage on Israel, which he accused of \u201cbombing Iranian historical monuments dating as far back as the 14th century\u201d. \u201cIt\u2019s natural that a regime that won\u2019t last a century hates nations with ancient pasts,\u201d\u00a0he added on X<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the damaged sites was Falak-ol-Aflak Castle in the city of Khorramabad, in Lorestan province. According to the head of the province\u2019s heritage department, Ata Hassanpour, a strike hit the castle\u2019s perimeter on Sunday, destroying his department\u2019s offices as well as adjacent archaeological and anthropological museums, and injuring five members of staff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFortunately, the main structure of Falak-ol-Aflak Castle was not damaged,\u201d Hassanpour said in a statement posted on the Telegram messaging platform.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cultural treasures in Kurdistan province in north-west Iran were also affected, according to local media. In Sanandaj, the country\u2019s second biggest Kurdish city, reports said the 19th-century Salar Saeed and Asef Vaziri mansions, which serve as Kurdish museums and heritage sites, had suffered damage to their doors and intricate stained-glass windows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the past few days, there have been major explosions in the centre of Isfahan, Iran\u2019s capital, in three historical eras, where much of the architecture dates back to the Safavid dynasty era, from the 16th to 18th centuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chehel Sotoon suffered the worst impact, but broken windows and doors, as well as dislodged tilework, have been reported in the Ali Qapu Palace and several mosques around the vast Naqsh-e Jahan Square. Videos filmed by residents from inside the square showed plumes of smoke rising from nearby airstrikes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Isfahan governor, Mehdi Jamalinejad, said the damage had been inflicted even after coordinates of the historic sites had been circulated among the warring parties and after blue shield signs \u2013 denoting historical treasures under the 1954 Hague convention<\/a> for the protection of cultural objects in war \u2013 had been put on the roofs of important buildings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIsfahan is not an ordinary city, it\u2019s a museum without a roof,\u201d Jamalinejad said in a speech posted on social media. \u201cIn none of the previous eras, not in the Afghan wars, not in the Moghul conquest, not even during the \u2018sacred defence\u2019 [the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war] was this ever done.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThis is a declaration of war on a civilisation,\u201d he added. \u201cAn enemy that has no culture pays no heed to symbols of culture. A country that has no history has no respect for signs of history. A country that has no identity sets no value for identity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n An Iranian geologist who worked in Isfahan for many years said in a message forwarded to the Guardian that the ancient capital was particularly vulnerable. \u201cIsfahan has long been attacked from below, by land subsidence that is destroying the Safavid-era structures, and now from above, by the Americans,\u201d the geologist said. \u201cIsfahan seems to have fewer friends than ever today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The US Committee of the Blue Shield, a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to upholding the Hague convention, issued a statement<\/a> saying that Iran\u2019s historic sites \u201cbelong not only to the Iranian people, but to all of humanity\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The organisation said it was \u201cdisturbed\u201d by the US defence secretary\u2019s declaration on the third day of the war that there would be no \u201cstupid\u201d rules of engagement, and warned that ignoring international and US laws on the conduct of hostilities could lead to the \u201ccommission of war crimes\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe destruction of cultural heritage is irreversible,\u201d the statement said. \u201cIt erases identity, history, and the shared memory of civilisations. No military or political objective justifies the wilful or negligent destruction of humanity\u2019s common inheritance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/d048715e343c118f9848a79751c8e4ed95816724\/533_0_5000_4000\/master\/5000.jpg?width=445&dpr=1&s=none&crop=none\")
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