Does a viral video show Downtism Cafe in Tehran being destroyed by a U.S.-Israeli airstrike? No, that's not true: The video appeared on the internet 25 days before the most recent military escalation in the region. It showed the consequences of a fire, not a strike.
The claim appeared in a post published on X (archived here, here and here) on March 13, 2026, then spread by other accounts, such as Quds News Network. The original post began:
CafeDowntism--a cherished haven in Tehran where individuals with autism and Down syndrome found purpose and community--was reduced to rubble by a US-Israeli airstrike.
This is what the video attached to the post looked like at the time of writing:
(Image source: PressTV post on X.com.)
Downtism Cafe opened on May 1, 2018 (archived here), known as a place employing people with autism and Down syndrome (archived here).
The footage had nothing to do with American or Israeli strikes: It first appeared on the internet on Feb. 3, 2026. The cafe's account on Instagram was one of the first to post the clip (archived here) that day. As translated to English by Chrome, that post's caption read:
The cafe where we children with autism and Down syndrome worked and had jobs was reduced to ashes today...
That was followed by a date translated by Chrome as "February 14, 1404." What appeared to be a glitch of automatic translation was a reference to the local calendar (archived here), which is different from the Gregorian calendar observed in most Western countries. For example, not only is Iran's current year different, the beginning and end of months do not overlap with Western ones. That is why the post said "today" was Bahman 14, 1404.
As of this writing, Downtism Cafe can still be found on Google Maps (archived here) in Tehran, but it is marked as "permanently closed." The two most recent comments, published roughly a month ago, said the cafe was destroyed by fire, not by a strike:
(Image source: Google Maps.)
The most recent round of escalation in the region didn't start until Feb. 28, 2026 (archived here).
The account (archived here and here) that posted the claim reviewed in this fact check belonged to Press TV, an Iranian government-owned media outlet known for promoting Iran's narratives (archived here).
