Iran International
Mojtaba Khamenei, long known as the discreet and powerful son of slain Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was announced early Monday as Iran’s new Supreme Leader at a time when the country is at war and Israel has openly vowed to target any successor to his father.
Iran’s Assembly of Experts in a statement introduced Mojtaba Khamenei as the new leader of the Islamic Republic, five days after Iran International first reported that the body had selected him under pressure from the Revolutionary Guards.
For decades Mojtaba operated largely out of public view while building deep ties across the Islamic Republic’s political and security apparatus. His rise marks the formal emergence of a figure who had already been widely regarded as one of the most influential actors behind the scenes of Iran’s ruling establishment.
Mojtaba, the second son of Ali Khamenei, has long been considered the only member of his family with clear political ambitions. His younger brother, Masoud, worked only in administrative roles within their father’s office, while his other two brothers and two sisters are not known to have held political or bureaucratic positions.
Born in 1969 in Mashhad, Mojtaba continued his education in Tehran at the prestigious Alavi High School, which produced many of the Islamic Republic’s elite, including former foreign minister Javad Zarif. The school’s dean, Kamal Kharrazi, later became one of Ali Khamenei’s senior political advisers.
After graduating, Mojtaba began religious studies in Tehran before moving to Qom to pursue seminary education. In recent years, he has taught dars-e kharij — the highest level of jurisprudential instruction and a prerequisite for attaining the rank of mujtahid — at the Qom Seminary.
Mojtaba married Zahra Haddad-Adel, daughter of former parliamentary speaker Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel. Zahra and one of their children were killed in the February 28 attack on Ali Khamenei’s residence. The couple had three children.
Because Mojtaba operated almost entirely behind the scenes under strict security, official information about him remained scarce, and unofficial reporting has often been fragmentary.
He held no formal executive or elected position for much of his career, yet he was widely believed to wield significant influence within the Office of the Supreme Leader and to oversee parts of his father’s administrative network.
Political orientation and policy views
A devoted pupil of Mohammad-Taqi Mesbah-Yazdi, the ideological architect of the ultraconservative Paydari Party, Mojtaba has long been aligned with Iran’s hardline faction. Analysts describe him as an advocate of a “unified state” in which appointed institutions overshadow elected bodies.
This model was implemented most clearly during the presidency of Ebrahim Raisi, when moderate conservatives such as Ali Larijani were marginalized and gradually pushed out of the political arena. Mojtaba has also been widely regarded as a key supporter of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s rise in 2005 and his continuation in power after the disputed 2009 election.
Mesbah-Yazdi, a fierce opponent of republicanism who died in 2021, argued that the Supreme Leader should be appointed without regard for public consent. Mojtaba has embraced this worldview, supporting strong clerical authority and the exclusion of moderates from power.
He has also been widely viewed as the principal political and financial patron of the Paydari Front, whose members see him as the guarantor of the Islamic Republic’s revolutionary identity after his father.
His foreign-policy outlook is deeply distrustful of the West, particularly the United States, and rooted in the doctrine of “resistance.” He strongly supports expanding Iran’s regional influence and strengthening the so-called “Axis of Resistance,” opposing compromise with Western governments.
Position on protests
Although Mojtaba has rarely spoken publicly, political reporting has consistently portrayed him as favoring a forceful, security-driven response to domestic unrest.
During the 2009 Green Movement protests, he was widely identified as one of the key figures overseeing the crackdown. Demonstrators chanted directly against him for the first time, shouting: “Mojtaba, may you die before you see leadership.”
During the protests of 2022, media outlets close to the regime again depicted him as central to maintaining internal stability.
His supporters—including segments of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the paramilitary Basij, hardline clerics in Qom, institutions linked to the Supreme Leader’s Office, and state-aligned media—describe him as devout, discreet, and deeply knowledgeable about security affairs.
Opponents, including much of the public and the political opposition, view him as a symbol of hereditary succession and criticize both his role in crackdowns and his opaque political influence.
IRGC networks
Mojtaba has maintained extensive ties to Iran’s intelligence and military structures. His network dates back to his youth, when he served in the IRGC’s Habib Battalion during the Iran–Iraq War—a unit that later produced many senior commanders, including Esmail Kowsari.
He has had a particularly close relationship with Hossein Taeb, former head of the IRGC Intelligence Organization, and has widely been believed to exert influence over its operations. Mohammad Sarafraz, the former head of state television, wrote that Mojtaba and Taeb pressured him to allocate a large share of the broadcaster’s advertising revenue to their networks.
Many Iranian analysts believe Mojtaba has played a decisive role in shaping senior IRGC appointments and key security positions.
Implications of his leadership
With Mojtaba Khamenei now formally assuming the role of Supreme Leader, observers say his leadership could reinforce the dominance of Iran’s hardline institutions and deepen the role of the security establishment within the political system.
His extensive ties to the IRGC and his long-standing influence within the Supreme Leader’s office have given him a unique power base even before holding the title. For years he operated as one of the most consequential figures in Iran’s political hierarchy without occupying a formal public position.
Now, as Supreme Leader, the “shadow prince” of the Islamic Republic has stepped fully into the center of power.
The situation triggered a wave of posts across social media platforms, particularly on X, many of them sarcastic, angry or openly celebratory.
One widely shared comment drew a comparison with the authorities’ treatment of families whose relatives were killed during protests.
More than 36,500 Iranians were killed by security forces during the January 8-9 crackdown on nationwide protests, making it the deadliest two-day protest massacre in history, according to documents reviewed by Iran International.
“In the past two months a man named Ali Khamenei did not allow families of people killed on his orders to hold funerals,” one user wrote. “Now for five days the body of that same man has been kept in a refrigerator and they cannot even issue permission for his burial. What goes around comes around.”
Another post mocked the uncertainty surrounding funeral arrangements. “The funeral procession for Khamenei will be held online through the Shad platform,” a user wrote, referring sarcastically to the government-linked education app used by Iranian schools when classes move online during crises.
Some comments echoed remarks previously made by a state television host who had mocked the deaths of protesters.
Public anger erupted last month after a presenter on Ofogh TV, a channel run by the state broadcaster IRIB and affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, referred to reports that thousands killed during the January crackdown were transported in refrigerated trailers. The program made a multiple choice question about where to keep the bodies of protesters. The show aired a segment posing a multiple-choice question about where the bodies of protesters should be kept.
“Which refrigerator do you think they are keeping Khamenei’s body in?” one user wrote, listing options such as “Netanyahu’s refrigerator,” “an ice-cream factory freezer,” and “the freezers of Antarctica.”
Others used darker language. “The stench of Khamenei’s corpse has spread across the Middle East and they still do not dare bury it,” one user wrote.
Another post said: “Six days have passed and the rotten body of Ali Khamenei is still lying on the ground.”
Some users circulated images of a dead rat with captions claiming sarcastically that the first photo of Khamenei’s body had finally been released.
Revenge in digital form
Many posts framed the mockery as a form of symbolic revenge.
“Khamenei left a deep wound in people’s hearts and denied grieving families the right to mourn,” one user wrote. “His agents buried bodies secretly. Now after days his own body is still on the ground.”
Others referenced reports that some families had been asked to pay for the bullets used to kill their relatives in order to receive their bodies.
“I heard Khamenei’s body has started to rot with worms,” one user wrote. “If you don’t have money for bunker-buster bombs, at least bury him.”
Another post revived a Persian saying about burial rites. “They used to say a corpse never stays on the ground,” the user wrote. “Even if someone has no one, eventually the municipality will bury them. But six days have passed and the body of Ali Khamenei is still lying there.”
“Israel said to return the body of Ali Khamenei, the Islamic Republic must pay for the missiles it fired, or his family must admit he was part of a Mossad spy team,” one post read, referring sarcastically to reports that families were sometimes asked to sign papers declaring their children Basij members in order to receive their bodies and permission for burial ceremonies.
Others suggested that authorities might abandon plans for a burial altogether.
“It seems they have given up burying Khamenei,” one user wrote. “Maybe they are waiting for the US Navy to throw the carcass into the sea.”
“Khamenei’s body should be bombed again,” another post said. “I’m still not satisfied.”
