Ali Larijani, Iran’s top national security official and long one of its most powerful leaders, was killed on Tuesday, the Israeli military and Iranian state media said. He was 67, and the Israeli military said he had died in one of its airstrikes.
A veteran politician and the scion of an elite political and religious family, Mr. Larijani had long been a defiant public voice for the government. In recent months, he oversaw a violent crackdown on nationwide protests against Islamic rule that left thousands of people dead. But in the hard-line environment of Iran’s rulers, he was also seen as a pragmatist, able to navigate the country’s factional internal politics and handle its thorniest foreign policy challenges.
His broad experience meant he had built relationships across the country’s power structure, including the military, clerics, elected lawmakers and the office of the supreme leader, and had the clout to bridge the divides between most militant political figures and more moderate ones. Abroad, he led Iran’s dealings with Russia and China, its most powerful allies, oversaw nuclear negotiations with the United States and acted as an emissary to key regional actors, including Oman and Qatar.
Mr. Larijani was last seen in public on Friday at a rally in Tehran for Quds Day, an anti-Israeli, government-sponsored event held on the last day of Ramadan. The demonstration was intended as a show of public support for the government in a country under attack.
But days later, Mr. Larijani joined the list of senior Iranian leaders killed since the United States and Israel launched a military attack against Iran on Feb. 28, a group that includes Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s former supreme leader, the heads of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and armed forces, and the defense minister.
Ali Ardashir Larijani was born in Najaf, Iraq, into a prominent family of clerics. His family left Iran in the 1930s, amid heightened tensions between the clerical class and the ruling Pahlavi dynasty, and returned in the 1960s.
Mr. Larijani was a member of the Revolutionary Guards during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. He rose through the ranks to more senior roles, including as the liaison between the Revolutionary Guards and the Iranian Parliament.
In the late 1980s and 1990s, Mr. Larijani served as the minister of culture and Islamic guidance, and later became head of the state broadcaster, reporting directly to the supreme leader. He was the speaker of Parliament from 2008 to 2020.
Mr. Larijani was involved in many of Iran’s most important negotiations overseas. From 2005 to 2007, he was Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator. Although he was replaced by a hard-liner, he was instrumental in helping seal the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action nuclear deal with the Obama administration and other governments in 2015.
In 2021, he led talks on a comprehensive strategic deal with China, under which Beijing agreed to invest $400 billion in Iran over 25 years in exchange for a steady of supply of discounted oil. The agreement was a crucial lifeline for an Iranian economy that had been severely restricted from international trade by punishing U.S. and European sanctions.
He was seen as a centrist conservative who could attract support from reformists, but when he tried to run for president, in 2021 and 2024, and he was disqualified both times. Perhaps more important, he was a trusted confidante of Ayatollah Khamenei, who deployed him to deal with some of Iran’s most important policy challenges.
In recent months, those responsibilities expanded. Ayatollah Khamenei made Mr. Larijani Iran’s de facto leader in January, placing him in charge of ending the anti-government protests and curbing internal dissent. Mr. Larijani oversaw the use of lethal force and to crush the demonstrations and a sweeping crackdown to suppress political opposition.
Before the war, Ayatollah Khamenei included Mr. Larijani in a small group of officials who were tasked with coming up with a plan for ensuring that the Islamic republic would survive if the supreme leader were killed, according to senior Iranian officials and members of the royal guards.
Mr. Larijani also acted as the public face of the government. Iranian and foreign news media regularly interviewed him, and he was active on social media, posting messages decrying Iran’s enemies, photographs of him meeting with foreign dignitaries and selfies from his mingling with Iranian citizens.
Despite his willingness to use lethal force against Iranians to defend the theocratic government, his death could enable hard-line military leaders to tighten their grip on power, analysts said.
After Ayatollah Khamenei was killed, Mr. Larijani urged the clerics who would appoint the next supreme leader to choose a moderate and unifying candidate to succeed Ayatollah Khamenei. However, Mojtaba Khamenei, Ayatollah Khamenei’s son, was picked to replace his replacement.
Mr. Larijani’s political skills could have helped Iran’s leaders to form a consensus after the war with the United States and Israel ends. His death may make any hope that the military elite will be open to accepting ideas from moderates a more distant prospect.
Ravi Mattu is the managing editor of DealBook, based in London. He joined The New York Times in 2022 from the Financial Times, where he held a number of senior roles in Hong Kong and London.
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