A figure who operated in the shadows/ Who is Iran's new leader, Mojtaba Khamenei?

2026-03-04 10:29:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

A figure who operated in the shadows/ Who is Iran's new leader, Mojtaba

Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei, the son of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is the successor to his father, Iran's supreme leader, who was killed on the first day of bombing by the US and Israel. Mojtaba Khamenei was born in 1969 in Mashhad, an important religious center in Iran, about a decade before the Islamic Republic was founded in 1979.

Known for his close ties to the Revolutionary Guard, the 56-year-old first joined the Islamic military forces around 1987, after graduating from high school. He served during the latter part of Iran's long war with Iraq from 1980 to 1988. His father was then appointed supreme leader, replacing the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Mojtaba Khamenei continued to study with the country's most respected clerics in Qom, and taught at a religious seminary himself, forging connections with the religious leadership and earning their respect in part thanks to his father's position. But he was not a well-known figure and has operated largely in the shadows, running the supreme leader's office from behind the scenes, making only occasional appearances in recent decades.

In 2005, after conservative candidate Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected president, reformists accused Mojtaba Khamenei of working with religious leaders and the Revolutionary Guard to ensure the victory of their preferred relatively unknown candidate. Mehdi Karroubi, a reformist and one of Ahmadinejad's opponents, had criticized Mojtaba Khamenei, accusing him of interfering in the election.

In 2024, Iran’s Assembly of Experts convened to plan the succession of the supreme leader. Ayatollah Khamenei said at the time that his son should be excluded from consideration. The Islamic Revolution in 1979 overthrew the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and with it the dynastic transition of power, replacing it with clerical rule. The appointment of the young Khamenei to what was once his father’s role could anger Iranians.

But Khamenei’s election would send a message, some analysts say, that hardliners linked to the Revolutionary Guard remain in power, suggesting that little will change. Mojtaba Khamenei’s wife, Zahra Adel; his mother, Mansoureh Khojasteh Bagherzadeh, and a son were killed along with their father in attacks on Saturday, the Iranian government said. /Retrieved from the New York Times