Iran’s top security official, Ali Larijani, had a reputation of being able to bridge the country’s hard-line military elements and more moderate political factions. His killing in an Israeli airstrike on Tuesday could open the way for the military to tighten its grip over the ruling system.
Mr. Larijani, the head of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran, was the de facto leader of the country after U.S.-Israeli airstrikes killed the upper echelons of government and the military early in the war. He was known to be trusted by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader who was killed at the start of the U.S.-Israeli campaign late last month.
Mr. Larijani’s responsibilities had grown steadily over the past few months, including overseeing the brutal crackdown on antigovernment protesters in January. He also liaised with allies and neighbors, and prepared Iran for a military confrontation with the United States.
Though he was a veteran conservative politician, Mr. Larijani had a reputation as a relative pragmatist within a system increasingly dominated by hard-liners. Internally, he had pushed for a moderate new supreme leader to replace Ayatollah Khamenei, The New York Times reported this week.
He lost that argument, however, and the ayatollah’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, was chosen to replace his father.
Referring to Mr. Larijani’s killing, “It means even further militarization of the system,” said Hamidreza Azizi, an expert on Iranian security issues at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, a research organization. Mr. Larijani’s skills would have been essential for creating consensus among elites in the aftermath of the war, Mr. Azizi noted.
“Now that it seems everything is in the hands of the military elite, it’s very difficult to imagine how and if they can come up with some ideas, or if they can show enough flexibility, to accept the ideas of the other side to end the war,” he said.
Mr. Azizi also expressed confusion over Israel’s strategy in eliminating Iran’s senior political figures.
“This process of elite-thinning, every layer that you remove, the next layer is going to be more hard-line,” Mr. Azizi said.
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