By Tal Shalev, Jeremy Diamond, Abbas Al Lawati, NCS
(NCS) — Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s hardline supreme leader who dominated the nation for nearly 4 a long time, was killed in Saturday’s joint US-Israeli strikes, Iranian state media confirmed Sunday, prompting celebration amongst Iranians who opposed his rule and fury from pro-regime loyalists.
An Iranian TV broadcaster broke down in tears as he confirmed Khamenei had reached “martyrdom” in a strike that Fars New Agency mentioned hit his compound in Tehran as he was “carrying out his duties.”
The death of the cleric who repressed thousands and thousands as he sought to exert Iran’s affect in the Middle East and past seems more likely to plunge the Islamic Republic into the most critical disaster since its institution, with no clear leader to take his place.
One of Iran’s strongest figures, Ali Larijani, Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, signaled Iran’s defiance on Sunday, vowing to “stab” America in the coronary heart in retaliation.
Here’s what we know:
How did he die?
Satellite pictures from Airbus showed black smoke rising from the supreme leader’s compound in the capital, Tehran, on Saturday. The pictures appeared to indicate that a number of buildings in the compound had been severely broken by strikes.
Initially, Iran’s Foreign Ministry had insisted that Khamenei was “safe and sound,” whilst his death was introduced by each US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“There are many signs” that Iran’s supreme leader is “no longer with us,” Netanyahu had mentioned Saturday night, with out elaborating.
Two Israeli sources instructed NCS that the strikes focused senior figures, together with Khamenei, President Masoud Pezeshkian, and the armed forces’ chief of workers Abdolrahim Mousavi.
Trump mentioned one of the goals of the joint US-Israeli assault was regime change, and he referred to as on the Iranian individuals to stand up in opposition to the authorities.
However, it was unclear whether or not such change would consequence from Khamenei’s death, which appeared more likely to usher in hard-line rule by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, consultants mentioned.
What led to this?
Khamenei’s death comes at a time when Iran is arguably at its weakest since he took energy in the 1989. Decades of Western sanctions had already left the nation remoted and economically battered earlier than US and Israeli strikes in June 2025 dealt his rule a extreme blow.
Just six months later, protests that started over financial grievances shortly turned political, spreading throughout all 31 of the nation’s provinces inside weeks. The regime responded with a brutal crackdown, killing 1000’s of protesters and prompting a world outcry, together with a menace of intervention from the Trump administration.
That intervention got here on Saturday, when Trump mentioned the US navy was endeavor a “massive and ongoing operation to prevent this very wicked, radical dictatorship from threatening America and our core national security interests.”
Who might exchange Khamenei?
Larijani, who been a key adviser to Khamenei, mentioned a short lived management construction comprising of the president, the head of the judiciary would quickly be in place.
Larijani mentioned Iran had assured leaders in the area that it was not after battle with them, however would proceed to focused American bases in Middle Eastern nations.
“It must be made clear once and for all that the Americans cannot bully the Iranian nation,” he mentioned.
According to Iran’s structure, an interim three-member council — consisting of the president, the head of the judiciary and a jurist of the nation’s Guardian Council — can be tasked with finishing up the duties of the leader, till an Assembly of Experts appointed a brand new supreme leader, in response to the Middle East Institute.
Who may lead Iran subsequent stays a thriller, even to those that have eliminated him. In January, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio mentioned that “no one knows” who would take over if Khamenei was eliminated.
Reza Pahlavi, the eldest son of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the final shah of Iran, mentioned any try to appoint a successor to Khamenei “is doomed to fail from the outset.”
How are Iranians reacting?
Cheering may very well be heard in Tehran as information unfold about Khamenei’s demise, however as morning broke on Sunday, 1000’s of individuals gathered in the capital to wave flags and chant “Death to America.”
For protesters who fought for regime change in protests throughout the nation this January, prompting a brutal crackdown, Khamenei wanted to go.
The regime employed unprecedented ranges of violence, with officers framing the demonstrations as a continuation of an Israeli-American conspiracy in opposition to the Islamic Republic.
The protests have been the greatest since the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini whereas in the custody of the spiritual police in 2022.
In one video obtained by NCS from an eyewitness in Tehran on Saturday as experiences of Khamenei’s death circulated, the voices of two ladies might be heard chanting, “Death to the Islamic Republic” and “Long Live the shah,” in Farsi, earlier than cheers and whistles erupt.
In the same video, cheers are heard echoing throughout a residential neighborhood in the metropolis. In cities round the world, members of the Iranian group took to the streets to have a good time a brand new period in Iran.
How might this impression the wider Middle East?
Khamenei’s death has the potential to set off the biggest shift in regional dynamics since the Hamas-led assault on Israel on October 7, 2023, after which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched a sweeping marketing campaign to get rid of actors hostile to his nation throughout the Middle East — together with Iran and its regional proxies.
It’s the second time in lower than a century that the United States has acted to take away an Iranian leader from energy. In 1953, Mohammad Mossadegh, a secular, democratically elected prime minister, was overthrown in an Iranian military coup backed by the CIA and British intelligence after he nationalized the nation’s oil trade.
That occasion restored Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi to the throne and, after the monarch was deposed in the 1979 Islamic revolution, performed a central position in the Islamic Republic’s anti-US narrative. It commonly cited by Khamenei as a logo of US imperialism and the purpose for his mistrust of the West.
Iran is house to a various inhabitants of greater than 90 million, together with Persians, Azeris, Arabs, Baloch and Kurds. Under Khamenei’s decades-long rule, the Islamic Republic largely managed to comprise civil and ethnic unrest.
But with no clear successor, his death would elevate critical issues about the stability of Iran, in addition to the wider area, with potential penalties for the international financial system.
The-NCS-Wire
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