The U.S. is investigating a strike on a wedding in southern Iran, Vice President J.D. Vance said Thursday, as reports suggest American weapons killed at least five people and injured dozens of others.

“We’re investigating it because obviously we care,” Vance told reporters. “We want to know.”

The strike represents the U.S.’s latest controversial action in its war with Iran, raising questions about its conduct and civilian harm. Washington and Tehran have escalated their attacks this week, ending a lull in hostilities since July.

But Vance said he was “extremely skeptical” about reports coming from Iranian state media, arguing they have “not been a very good scribe about what’s happened in the conflict thus far.”

Iranian state media reported that a residential building in Kuhestak was attacked on Tuesday evening, where a wedding was being celebrated. Among the casualties was a 4-year-old kid. Reuters and the New York Times independently verified footage from the scene and found that a wedding was taking place when the building was struck.

Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it “will respond to these savage crimes with firmness”—and responded to a broader barrage of American attacks by launching missiles and drones at sites used by the U.S. in Middle East states. The Iranian Red Crescent Society, a humanitarian group, also urged a probe from the International Criminal Court to assess potential violations of international law.

The U.S. Central Command said Wednesday it was already looking into reports of the incident but argued that the “U.S. military never targets civilians, unlike the [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps],” referring to Iran’s armed forces branch.

Vance also defended U.S. military action, telling reporters: “If we do make mistakes, again, this is a big difference between us and Iran: when our military makes mistakes, they learn from them to try to get better from them.”

What we know about the strike

On the evening of Sept. 1, CENTCOM reported strikes on military targets, including “air defense sites, radar systems, maritime assets and facilities, mine laying capabilities, and communications sites.”

Iranian media later reported four deaths and at least 68 injured in Kuhestak, a coastal town on the Strait of Hormuz, where trade has been bottlenecked since the start of the U.S.-Iran war in late February. The strikes happened at around 9:30 p.m. local time, per the Red Crescent.

Analyses of footage from the incident conducted by Reuters and the New York Times reveal that wedding guests were gathered in a Kuhestak building. Amid the celebration, what was likely a U.S. munition hit the building and, as the Times put it, “brought down the roof.”

Experts told Reuters and the Times that weapon fragments seen in Iranian media were consistent with what Americans have used.

The attacks on Kuhestak also hit a communications tower roughly 100 m away from the building. A human rights group told the Associated Press that one of the four people initially reported killed—a 16-year-old—was struck by shrapnel near the tower rather than at the wedding. Iranian state television said Thursday that a 22-year-old woman had since died in hospital following the strike, bringing the reported death toll to five.

Axios reported that CENTCOM Commander Adm. Brad Cooper ordered an internal review of the strike. 

Civilian casualties raise concern

The Red Crescent sent a letter to the International Criminal Court Wednesday calling for “an independent, impartial, thorough, and effective investigation,” citing the “civilian character” of the strike’s location.

The organization also argued that under the Rome Statute, intentionally directing attacks on civilians and knowingly launching a clearly excessive attack may constitute “war crimes.” However, both Iran and the U.S. are nonparties to the Rome Statute, so the ICC does not have automatic jurisdiction over them.

Still, “the laws of war state that civilians are protected from military attacks,” Melanie O’Brien, a professor of international law at the University of Western Australia, tells TIME. “A wedding is not a military objective, particularly in a civilian residential building. It is clear that there was a direct missile hit to the home. This would render the attack unlawful.”

It’s also not the U.S.’s first involvement in strikes that hit civilian structures without obvious military use and that endangered or killed civilians. On the first day of the war with Iran on Feb. 28, a U.S. Tomahawk missile hit a primary school in Minab—just 30 km (18 mi) away from Kuhestak—where more than 100 children were killed.

O’Brien, however, says she is skeptical about any result from the U.S.-led investigation of the wedding strike: “The U.S. track record is to only investigate when allegations gain significant public traction, and even when any convictions occur, the penalties are minor or pardons are given.”

President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that Adam Telle, the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works, will temporarily replace Dan Driscoll as the Army’s top civilian leader following Driscoll’s abrupt resignation from the role earlier this week.

Trump lauded Telle as “a Great Patriot, who is respected by all” in a Truth Social post, saying Telle would take over as acting Army Secretary “effective immediately.”

The news comes after Driscoll, who Trump nominated as Army Secretary last year after returning to the White House, stepped down amid reports of tension between him and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.

Hegseth praised Trump’s announcement on Thursday, calling Telle “strong and whip smart.”

“Huge congrats to Adam,” Hegseth said in a post on X. “He is indeed a great Patriot — and will be an immediate asset to the @USArmy.”

Here’s what to know about Telle.

Telle has overseen the Army Corps of Engineers since last year

Telle was sworn into his current role as the Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works last August, becoming the second person nominated by the President to an Army position in Trump’s second term to be confirmed by the Senate, according to Telle’s biography on the U.S. military’s website.

In that position, Telle has served as a civilian official in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, an agency that builds and maintains infrastructure, including dams. According to his bio, he has had “principal authority to establish policy direction and to provide supervision of all aspects” of the civil works tasks that the agency performs for the Army, including projects aimed at reducing flood and storm damage.

Telle previously worked under multiple Republican senators

Before being appointed to his current role in the Trump Administration, Telle served as the chief of staff to Republican Sen. Bill Hagerty of Tennessee from 2021-2025, according to Legistorm. He previously worked under another Republican, then-Sen. Thad Cochran of Mississippi, for about a decade from 2007-2017, and held various roles in the office, including deputy chief of staff and legislative director, according to Legistorm. While serving in Cochran’s office, he helped with the lawmaker’s work on Hurricane Katrina recovery, according to his Army bio.

Telle also served on the Senate Appropriations Committee’s subcommittee that was responsible for overseeing the Department of Homeland Security’s budget, according to his bio.

Telle served in the first Trump Administration

During Trump’s first term in the Oval Office, Telle served on the White House Office of Legislative Affairs’ Senate team and “was President Trump’s chief liaison to the Senate,” according to his Army bio.

Telle will take over as acting Army Secretary at a tumultuous time

Telle will step into his new role in the Army at a time of turmoil both abroad and within the Department of Defense. 

The war in Iran, which began on Feb. 28, has now stretched on for longer than six months and has sparked backlash from many Americans.

And Telle will also be taking on the new position amid upheaval within the U.S. military’s senior ranks. About 20 military and civilian leaders have been ousted or have resigned since Hegseth took over the Department of Defense, including Driscoll earlier this week. Even some Republicans have criticized Hegseth for the chaos at the agency, including Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who has called on Trump to replace the Defense Secretary.

“[Hegseth] is creating a leadership void at the top of our military ranks,” Tillis said in a social media post this week. “I urge the President to find a new leader at the Pentagon who will retain and empower our military talent rather than diminish it.”

Almost nothing in Werner Herzog’s fractured fairytale Bucking Fastards, playing in competition here at the Venice Film Festival, makes literal sense. But it all makes a kind of sideways sense, especially if, before watching, you can will yourself into a Herzogian brainspace, a place where possibly nonexistent elephants roam the Earth, where ancient cave drawings bear witness to the enduring creativity and wonder of humankind, where mad dreamers insist it’s possible to haul a multi-ton ship over a mountain. In that context, two inseparable sisters who speak only in unison, who are crazily lovesick over the man who has spurned them, and who believe they can dig a literal tunnel into a land of freedom, acceptance, and love: in a world where our deepest desires are so seldom met, how nuts does that really sound?

Real-life sisters Rooney Mara and Kate Mara play Joan and Jean Holbrooke, sisters living in Ireland—they are not, they adamantly insist, twins—who share every emotion, every thought, every waking moment as if they were a single entity. They dress exactly alike, in droopy trenchcoats and modest granny-style skirts; they both wear their long, silky hair parted neatly in the middle and tied partially back, like identical waterfalls. They don’t finish each other’s sentences; instead, they form their thoughts and words in unison and speak as one. It’s an eerie effect the first time you hear it. Even more unsettling, it comes to sound completely normal as the movie wears on.

Joan and Jean have fallen for a single man, their handsome rapscallion neighbor Gareth Mulroney (a saucy, salacious Orlando Bloom). It’s love at first sight—or is that sights?—when he bursts into their local church, a tankard of beer in hand, stirring up nothing but trouble. Afterward, they breathlessly wait for him to emerge through the church doors. Their eyes gleaming like double constellations, they proposition him: “I’d love to show you my inner cowgirl!” they tell him, the words tumbling out more like a song than a sentence. He’s charmed, intrigued; he’s horny. The trio land in bed, with Gareth in the middle flanked by his semi-nude cutie cowgirls, who ooh and ahh over him adoringly. They’re Goldilocks and he’s their just-right. This is how a sex scene, as imagined by Herzog, plays out.

But their bliss is short-lived. That meet-cute and its aftermath are relayed in flashback as the sisters huddle together in a courtroom, essentially defending themselves against charges of stalking. Gareth, after dallying with Joan and Jean for a time, has thrown them over and taken a wife. They can’t believe it—in their futile rage, they set the interior of his car on fire. (Their procurement of the gasoline they use to do so is a cracked mini-adventure by itself.) They also set the postbox outside his house aflame. Before the bewigged judge, Gareth’s lawyer tries to argue that the relationship was purely sexual. Joan and Jean justify their actions plaintively. “It was love!” they cry in unison, and later, “I am never going to stop loving him!”

But there’s no hope. Their linked hearts are broken, and the court case has brought them both fame and embarrassment. A kind villager (John Kavanagh) takes pity on them, knowing that the best thing for them is to get away. He offers them the use of a flat he doesn’t need, located in another town. He urges them not to open the door to strangers, people who want only to take advantage of them. From there, Bucking Fastard becomes a set of wriggly vignettes more than a linear story. There’s a sleazy neighbor (Malcolm Adams) who attempts to take, and post on the Internet, pictures of them undressing. (They put their heads together and cook up a giggly-devious plan to outwit him.) A kind social worker, played by Domhnall Gleeson, tries to show them how to collaborate in the task of opening a tin of sardines. But soon even their cozy flat comes to feel like a prison: they strike out on an adventure, going to live with an aunt who loves them (Marion O’Dwyer) and who encourages them to explore a mysterious cave near her country property, one whose twists and turns ignite their two-for-one imaginations. A fox named Cupid, with a perpetually alarmed-looking face, becomes their mascot. Through it all, they continue to mourn their lost love. But perhaps they can find a new one?

What does any of this mean? Though the story was inspired by real-life twins from York, England, Freda and Greta Chaplin—who spoke in unison and, like Jean and Joan, did everything together—the meandering storyline is pure, sweet, gaga Herzog. The picture’s most radiant sequences take place in the girls’ beloved cave, where they toil for years to dig their way, admittedly nonsensically, to a better life. Herzog and his frequent cinematographer Peter Zeitlinger film the two of them, within a halo of light as they dutifully chip through a rocky passageway—their twin images are as luminous as a delicately carved shell cameo.

The Mara sisters are brilliant here, their eyes as hungry and haunted as those of an orphan in a Keane painting. You laugh with them, not at them, when they take revenge on that peeping tom. But there’s also something deeply touching about their refusal to give up on love. There’s a metaphorical idea shimmering beneath the surface of Bucking Fastard: it’s as if, through this strange and somewhat simple story, Herzog were trying to explore the things women want but don’t dare demand. Here, those longings are voiced in stereo. And yes, men can sometimes drive you crazy. What can you do?

The ending of Bucking Fastard might be considered a flaw; it’s hard to know exactly what has happened, or what it means. But then, an ambiguous ending is one we’re free to write ourselves. How can you not want the best for these dreamy, heartbroken girls, who at one point race through their cave in matching gauzy white gowns, like freedom-loving butterflies? You’ll want to believe that their hearts have at last found a home—a cave not of forgotten dreams, but of remembered ones, made sweeter with every recounting.