Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is dead, Iranian state media said Sunday after a series of coordinated strikes by the US and Israel.
Ayatollah Khamenei, the Supreme Leader of Iran, was killed on the 28th of February, 2026.
Khamenei, 86, who had ruled the country since 1989, was killed at his office in Tehran.
The assassination of Khamenei has turned the geopolitics of the Middle East upside down.
Announcement follows a day of unprecedented military operations. Early on Saturday, Israeli strikes targeted Iranian installations in what the country deemed “preventive” actions.
What they are saying
Soon, the US Central Command affirmed “major combat operations” were launched against Iran for its WMD program. By late afternoon, when US and Israeli officials claimed Khamenei was dead, Tehran did so officially hours later.
- Satellite images displayed heavy damage suffered by Supreme Leader’s compound. State media reported that more than 200 Iranians were killed right after the incident. This included about 80 children when a school got hit.
- Tehran retaliated against the strikes with missile and drone attacks on Israel, as well as strikes on US bases in the Gulf, including Bahrain, Qatar, and the UAE. While the counteroffensive was unfolding, air raid sirens sounded in Tel Aviv.
- The President of the USA, Donald Trump framed the operation as essential to neutralising a threat to national security presented by Iran’s ballistic missile and nuclear programs.
Iran has announced a period of forty-day public mourning. According to US representatives, damages and casualties were at a minimum on their side. Investors reassess geopolitical risks as Muscat stocks tumble after the incident, sending shockwaves to regional markets.
What you should know
Ali Hosseini Khamenei was born in Mashhad to one of the city’s clerical families, took classes at the hawza in Mashhad, and when he moved to Qom in 1958, became a student of Ruhollah Khomeini. He opposed Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and was arrested six times before the 1979 revolution.
He also got exiled for three years. Khamenei, partially paralyzed from an assassination attempt, survived in 1981. He was the president of Iran from 1981 to 1989, strengthening relationships with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) while heading up the country during the Iran–Iraq War.
After the demise of Khomeini, the Assembly of Experts elected him as the Supreme Leader, a position he occupied for 36 years and six months. He became the longest-serving Iranian head of state after the Shah.
