Iran’s supreme leader killed in major attack by US and Israel

By Associated Press

DUBAI: Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in a major attack by Israel and the United States, Iranian state media confirmed early Sunday, throwing the future of the Islamic Republic into doubt and raising the risk of regional instability.

President Donald Trump announced the death hours earlier, saying it gave Iranians their “greatest chance” to “take back” their country.

State media reported that the 86-year-old was killed in an airstrike targeting his compound in downtown Tehran. Satellite photos from Airbus showed that the site was heavily bombed.

His death at his office “showed that he consistently stood among the people and at the forefront of his responsibilities, confronting what officials call global arrogance,” state TV said.

“Khamenei, one of the most evil people in History, is dead,” Trump wrote in a social media post. He warned of “heavy and pinpoint bombing” that he said would continue throughout the week and even beyond, part of a lethal assault the U.S. has justified as necessary to disable the country’s nuclear capabilities.

Iran, which responded to the strikes with its own counterassault, warned of retribution, with the Cabinet saying that this “great crime will never go unanswered.” The paramilitary Revolutionary Guard threatened to launch its “most intense offensive operation” ever targeting Israeli and American bases.

The attack opened a stunning new chapter in U.S. intervention in Iran, carried the potential for retaliatory violence and a wider war, and represented a startling flex of military might for an American president who swept into office on an “America First” platform and vowed to keep out of “forever wars.”

The killing of Khamenei in the second Trump administration assault on Iran in eight months appeared certain to create a leadership vacuum given the absence of a known successor and because the 86-year-old supreme leader had final say on all major policies during his decades in power. He led Iran’s clerical establishment and the Revolutionary Guard, the two main centers of power in the governing theocracy.

Iran quickly formed a council to govern the country until a new supreme leader is chosen.

State media also reported the deaths of the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and a top security adviser to Khamenei in airstrikes. Maj. Gen. Mohammad Pakpour took over as the Guard’s top commander after Israel killed its past commander in the 12-day war last June. The adviser, Ali Shamkhani, had long been a figurehead within Iran’s security establishment, IRNA said.

As reports trickled out about Khamenei’s death, eyewitnesses in Tehran told The Associated Press that some residents were rejoicing, cheering from rooftops, blowing whistles and letting out ululations.

Mourners raised a black mourning flag over the Imam Reza shrine in Mashhad, Iran’s second-largest city and a major pilgrimage site for Shiite Muslims. The Iranian government declared 40 days of public mourning and a seven-day nationwide public holiday to commemorate Khamenei’s death.

Citing unidentified sources, the semiofficial Fars news agency, believed to be close to the Revolutionary Guard, reported that several relatives of Khamenei were also killed, including a daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law and grandchild.

Strikes were planned for months

The joint U.S.-Israel operation, which officials say was planned for months, took place Saturday during the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan and at the start of the Iranian workweek. It followed stilted negotiations and warnings from Trump, who last year trumpeted his administration’s success in incapacitating the country’s nuclear program but nonetheless cast the latest round as necessary to head off its potential resurgence.

About 12 hours after the attacks began, the U.S. military reported no U.S. casualties and minimal damage at U.S. bases despite “hundreds of Iranian missile and drone attacks.” It said targets in Iran included Revolutionary Guard command facilities, air defense systems, missile and drone launch sites, and military airfields.

Israel, for its part, said it had killed the commander of the Revolutionary Guard Corps and the country’s defense minister, as well as the secretary of the Iranian Security Council, a close adviser to Khamenei.

Khamenei “was unable to avoid our Intelligence and Highly Sophisticated Tracking Systems and, working closely with Israel, there was not a thing he, or the other leaders that have been killed along with him, could do,” Trump said. “This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country.”

An Iranian diplomat told the United Nations Security Council that hundreds of civilians were killed and wounded in the strikes. Iran retaliated by firing missiles and drones toward Israel and at U.S. military bases in the region, and exchanges of fire continued into the night.

Some of the first strikes on Iran appeared to hit near the offices of Khamenei, the second leader of the Islamic Republic who succeeded Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Israeli officials confirmed the death, followed by Trump.

Democrats decried that Trump had taken action without congressional authorization. White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt said the administration had briefed several Republican and Democratic leaders in Congress in advance.

Tensions soared as US built up military forces

Tensions have soared in recent weeks as the Trump administration built up the largest force of American warships and aircraft in the Middle East in decades. The president insisted he wanted a deal to constrain Iran’s nuclear program while the country struggled with growing dissent following nationwide protests.

Though Trump had pronounced the Iranian nuclear program obliterated in strikes last year, the country was rebuilding infrastructure that it had lost, according to a senior U.S. official who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss Trump’s decision-making process. The official said intelligence showed that Iran had developed the capability to produce its own high-quality centrifuges, an important step in developing the highly enriched uranium needed for weapons.

Iran responded to the latest strikes by launching missiles and drones toward Israel and targeting U.S. military installations in Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar. The Israeli military said Iran fired dozens of missiles at Israel, with many intercepted. The Magen David Adom rescue service said Saturday night that a woman in the Tel Aviv area died after being wounded in an Iranian missile attack.