Iran International
As Iran holds week-long funeral ceremonies for Ali Khamenei, the political dynamics unfolding behind the scenes point to a striking reality: the succession question that dominated elite politics for more than a decade did not end with his death.
The rapid elevation of his son Mojtaba within ten days was intended to close that chapter. Instead, with the new Supreme Leader still absent from public view, it appears to have opened a new one.
Roughly twenty messages attributed to Mojtaba Khamenei since his succession have failed to convince many Iranians that he is truly exercising power.
Efforts by officials and supporters to prove his presence have often been contradictory, deepening rather than resolving the uncertainty.
A growing number of Iran analysts argue that, regardless of Mojtaba’s invisibility, Ali Khamenei has effectively been replaced by a constellation of elite networks built around family ties, wartime relationships dating back to the Iran–Iraq War, and geographic power bases in provinces such as Tehran, Isfahan, Khuzestan and Khorasan.
These networks, spanning civilian officials, senior IRGC commanders, clerics and younger ideological politicians, existed for decades but were ultimately contained by Ali Khamenei’s authority.
One example was the IRGC high command, which repeatedly shifted between officers from Khuzestan and Isfahan during Khamenei’s 38 years in power, before he appointed Hossein Salami from the Golpayegan region in April 2019 in what many saw as an attempt to contain an increasingly damaging rivalry.
The old reformist–conservative divide has largely faded. Following former President Ebrahim Raisi’s “purification” project, Iran’s political landscape is increasingly shaped by competition between what parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf has described as “revolutionaries” and “super-revolutionaries.”
The shift has been so dramatic that even Hossein Shariatmadari, the outspoken editor of the hardline daily Kayhan and long seen as a symbol of uncompromising conservatism, is now warning against threats to national cohesion and criticizing hardliners opposing the agreement with the United States.
The struggle in Tehran is no longer over whether engagement with Washington is acceptable. Instead, competing factions are trying to claim ownership of the decision to negotiate.
Even some hardliners who until late June accused pragmatists such as Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi of seeking talks with “the killer of Khamenei” now argue that Iran must secure its financial interests through an understanding with Washington, even if that requires delaying decisions on parts of its nuclear program.
The most uncompromising factions inside and around the IRGC have argued that Iran’s priority should now be preserving its missile program as its remaining strategic asset.
Yet figures including MP Esmail Kowsary and Supreme National Security Council secretary Mohammad Bagher Zolghadr continue to insist Iran must also seek revenge for Khamenei’s killing.
In Mojtaba Khamenei’s continued absence, networks that once operated beneath Ali Khamenei’s centralized and uncompromising decision-making appear to be competing to define the future direction of the Islamic Republic — and to claim ownership of the very diplomatic opening many of them opposed only days earlier.
