Ali Khamenei has dominated Iran’s clerical system for nearly four decades and sidelined all potential rivals—meaning there is no obvious choice for his successor.

Iranian state media has confirmed reports that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Iran’s theocratic ruler since 1989, was killed in a US-Israeli airstrike.

Khamenei’s death came amid the broader US-Israel military campaign against Iran, codenamed “Operation Epic Fury” by US President Donald Trump. As part of the campaign, the United States and Israel struck Tehran and other Iranian cities in what officials from both countries described as a major operation against Iran’s leadership and strategic infrastructure. Missiles and airstrikes reportedly hit targets in central, southern, and eastern parts of Tehran. After strikes on the supreme leader’s compound on Saturday, Israel was quick to announce Khamenei’s death. Trump did so several hours later in a Truth Social post, condemning the former supreme leader as “one of the most evil people in History.”

Khamenei’s Long Shadow over Iran

With Khamenei’s abrupt demise, Iran has entered a historic turning point. The longtime Supreme Leader was not merely a head of state; he was one of the last major figures of the Islamic Republic’s founding generation.

Born in 1939 in the city of Mashhad to a clerical family of Azeri background, he rose through the religious seminaries and became politically active in the anti-Shah movement. He studied in Qom under prominent clerics, including Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and spent years under pressure from the Pahlavi state, including arrests, imprisonment, and internal exile. These early experiences helped shape both his revolutionary credentials and his long-standing distrust of domestic dissent and foreign influence.

After the 1979 revolution, Khamenei quickly entered the new political order. He became a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Council, served in parliament, and was appointed the leader of Tehran’s Friday prayers. In that role, he survived an assassination attempt in June 1981 when a bomb hidden in a tape recorder exploded during a speech, leaving his right arm permanently impaired. Later that year, after the assassination of President Mohammad-Ali Rajai, he was elected Iran’s president and served from 1981 to 1989. After Khomeini’s death in 1989, he was elevated by the Assembly of Experts to succeed his former mentor as Supreme Leader—a position from which he would dominate Iran’s political, military, and ideological direction for the next three and a half decades. The 1981 attack, his presidency, and his 1989 elevation are all points that should be sourced directly.

As Supreme Leader, Khamenei’s rule unfolded in distinct phases. First, he worked to escape the shadow of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, consolidating power by building loyal networks across the state, especially within the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. He later confronted the reformist wave that emerged with Mohammad Khatami’s 1997 election, responding to expanding press freedom, student activism, and intellectual dissent with tighter control, media closures, and repression. In the years that followed, he oversaw the expansion of Iran’s missile and nuclear programs, the deepening of Iran’s regional influence after the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, the suppression of major domestic protest movements, and repeated confrontations with Washington. He grudgingly consented to the 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement, then claimed vindication after the United States’ 2018 withdrawal from it. In his final years, he presided over a string of remarkable domestic and international setbacks—the killing of Quds Force leader Qassem Soleimani in January 2020, the Mahsa Amini protests of 2022–2023, and the disastrous consequences to the “Axis of Resistance” from the October 7 attacks and Israel’s subsequent retaliation.

By the end of his rule, Khamenei exercised near-total control over Iran’s domestic and foreign policy, centralizing strategic decision-making in his own office. Over time, the president—nominally the Iranian head of government—was reduced to an administrative officer, responsible for managing the bureaucracy and implementing decisions rather than serving as an independent executive authority in matters of national security and grand strategy. Under his leadership, Iran’s intelligence services, coercive apparatus, and military institutions, both the Artesh (the regular army) and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), were likewise reshaped and consolidated. The same applies to those responsible for Iran’s regional policy. The senior leadership of these institutions developed during his 37 years in power—meaning that an entire generation of political, security, and military elites matured within a system structured and supervised by him. In that sense, the Iranian leadership experienced a long cycle of recirculation under his authority.

Finally, Khamenei was consistent in suppressing and marginalizing any domestic political figures that might have challenged his stature. After the disputed 2009 presidential election, opposition figures Mir-Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi were placed under house arrest, where they have remained since. Former President Mohammad Khatami continues to face severe political restrictions and media bans. Longtime kingmaker Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who passed away in 2017, saw his influence significantly diminished in the later years of his life. Even Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, once seen as politically aligned with Khamenei, eventually fell out of favor and was sidelined from the core of power. More recently, figures such as Hassan Rouhani and other reformist and centrist politicians have faced political marginalization. In this context, Khamenei has functioned as the central pillar of Iran’s political system—meaning that his absence will create a vacuum that will be extremely difficult for any individual to fill.

Who Will Be Iran’s Next “Supreme Leader”?

It is impossible to state with any confidence who will succeed Khamenei as Iran’s supreme leader. What follows will largely depend on what remains of the Islamic Republic as a political entity in the post-war environment, as well as on the condition of its senior political leadership. If the Islamic Republic does not collapse institutionally—and if widespread protests do not erupt in the streets, with people attempting to seize state institutions—then the central question becomes how the regime would transition into a new era of leadership, and who would be best-positioned to succeed Khamenei. However, in large part because of the role Khamenei played in dominating Iran’s political scene and sidelining potential rivals, this question has no obvious answer.

There has long been speculation that Khamenei at one point favored his son, Mojtaba Khamenei, as a possible successor. However, such speculation was never formally confirmed. After 2021, hardline “principlist” president and Khamenei devotee Ebrahim Raisi emerged as the most likely successor, but this plan abruptly collapsed after Raisi’s death in a helicopter crash in May 2024. With Raisi gone and the younger Khamenei no longer widely viewed as a leading candidate, the succession landscape has become uncertain. Some Iranian reports have suggested that members of Khamenei’s family, including his daughter-in-law—Mojtaba’s wife—were casualties in the recent strikes, though such reports remain unverified.

In the absence of such central political figures, it appears that Iran’s future will largely rest within the hands of the IRGC—and on the absence of a dominant clerical figure capable of rallying the security and coercive apparatus around himself, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps could choose to assume direct control. The Islamic Republic, which has functioned as a clerical system with armed institutions serving as its executors, would effectively reverse its structure: men with guns could take control of political authority, while clerical figures would serve to legitimize that power.

This scenario is plausible given the IRGC’s entrenched position within Iran’s domestic power structure. The IRGC maintains influence over large segments of the security and intelligence apparatus, possesses significant independent financial networks, and benefits from substantial state resources. These structural advantages provide it with the institutional capacity to intervene decisively. However, this is dependent on the context of the ongoing war. If a significant number of senior IRGC commanders and security officials are eliminated in the ongoing strike—by no means a minor possibility, given Israel’s focus on eliminating them during the 12-Day War in June 2025—it could result in the weakening of the IRGC, limiting its ability to consolidate power cohesively.

Another scenario, therefore, would be the emergence of alternative principlist figures—potentially with the backing of segments of the IRGC. While Raisi and the younger Khamenei no longer are no longer viable central successors, other hardline or principlist figures may retain influence within conservative circles and could attempt to position themselves in a succession process supported by parts of the security establishment. One of those figures could be Alireza Arafi, a cleric who is a member of the Assembly of Experts and previously served on the Guardian Council. He has also held senior clerical and political positions and has been regarded as aligned with conservative and principlist currents close to the Supreme Leader. His name has occasionally been mentioned in discussions about potential succession.

The challenge for figures such as Arafi, or any other cleric attempting to assume leadership during a turbulent transition, would be the need for a strong security vanguard to ensure a smooth consolidation of power in a country whose population has become thoroughly disaffected with the clerical system. In a period of instability, clerical authority alone would likely not suffice. Such a transition would require coordination and backing from the security and coercive apparatus—which poses the same problems as an IRGC takeover amid the ongoing war. 

A slightly more hopeful possibility is that the decline of hardline, security-oriented leadership circles could create space for more pragmatic factions within the Islamic Republic. Figures associated with the Larijani family, particularly Ali Larijani and his brother Sadeq Amoli Larijani, have historically been regarded as influential within the system. Ali Larijani has long held senior positions, including Speaker of Parliament and senior advisory roles. Former President Hassan Rouhani could also be viewed as part of the more pragmatic current within the political establishment.

In this context, aside from the total collapse of the Islamic Republic and the end of the Khamenei era, the best that ordinary Iranians can likely hope for would be a managed transition of power within the existing system—potentially shifting influence from more hardline, principlist factions toward relatively more pragmatic elements. Such a shift, if it occurs, could be indirectly shaped by the high-value targeting operations conducted by the United States and Israel. Decision-makers in both countries might take note.

About the Author: Arman Mahmoudian

Dr. Arman Mahmoudian is a research fellow at the USF Global and National Security Institute. He is also an adjunct professor at the University of South Florida’s Judy Genshaft Honors College, teaching courses on Russia, the Middle East, and International Security. He holds a PhD in Politics and International Affairs from the University of South Florida. He earned his Master’s in International Relations in Russia and his Bachelor’s in Law in Iran. In addition to his professional roles and publications, he is a member of the editorial board at the Joint Special Operations University. His research and commentary on Middle Eastern and Russian affairs have been featured in leading outlets, including Foreign Policy, The National Interest, the Stimson Center, the Atlantic Council, the Gulf International Forum, and other platforms. Follow him on LinkedIn and X @MahmoudianArman.

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