Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in an Israeli strike against the country Saturday, Israeli officials said.
President Donald Trump said he ordered the U.S. military to launch an unauthorized strike on Iran early Saturday morning in tandem with Israeli strikes.
But it wound up being the Israelis who were able to confirm that the Ayatollah had been killed, as a senior Israeli official told Reuters and several other outlets that Khamenei is dead and his body had been found.
Khamenei had ruled the country since 1989 and was a key figure in the movement to overthrow the Shah in the 1979 Iranian revolution. For decades, he held all ultimate authority over every branch of the Iranian government, Iran’s military, and the judiciary in the Shi’ite Islamic republic.
In a video statement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also said there were signs that he had been killed.
“This morning we destroyed the compound of the tyrant Khamenei,” Netanyahu said, adding that for more than 30 years Khamenei had “dispatched terrorism across the world, made his own people miserable, and worked constantly and tirelessly on a program to annihilate the state of Israel”.
“There are many signs that this tyrant is no longer. This morning we eliminated senior officials in the ayatollahs’ regime, Revolutionary Guards commanders, senior figures in the nuclear programme – and we will continue. In the next few days, we will hit thousands more targets of the terror regime,” Netanyahu said.
Reuters additionally has reported that both Iran’s defense minister and the commander of its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps have been killed.
Trump has so far opted not to directly confirm Khamenei’s death.
When asked when he would get confirmation of his status, Trump told NBC News, “I’ve spoken to a lot of people beyond, and we feel certain, we feel, we feel that that is a correct story.”
“The people that make all the decisions, most of them are gone,” he said, adding that “a large amount of leadership” in Iran had also been killed.
There has been no update on any scheduled comments on the Ayatollah’s death from the White House.
Trump is at his Mar-a-Lago golf club “monitoring the situation” and keeping tabs on the war he started, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said after Trump was caught partying as he launched his war on Iran overnight.
The White House released some photos of Trump and his administration watching the operation unfold from Palm Beach, Florida.
Protests against the Ayatollah had erupted across Iran late last year, resulting in the largest protest movement in the country since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Khamenei had ordered a crackdown on the protests, and tens of thousands of people were killed as a result.
The future of Iran’s governing force remains unclear, as Khamenei’s death does not automatically mean the Iranian regime will collapse.
The Islamic Republic is based on the idea that the Ayatollah is God’s representative on Earth, representing a pope-like leader of millions of Shiite Muslims across the world. Khamenei’s death could very well trigger a fierce response globally, not just in Iran, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Just over a week ago, Khamenei had warned that Iran was prepared to retaliate against any American strike.
“More dangerous than the American warship is the weapon that can send it to the bottom of the sea,” he said, adding that the U.S. “may be struck so hard that it cannot get back up.”
In the wake of U.S. and Israeli strikes, Tehran has retaliated across the Middle East, including in cities with significant U.S. military presence.
Trump has vowed to eliminate the country’s nuclear program—which he insisted had been completely “obliterated” several months ago— and bring regime change to the country.
In his video announcing the war, he told the Iranian people to take over their government.
“When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be, probably, your only chance for generations,” the president said. “For many years, you have asked for America’s help, but you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight. Now you have a president who is giving you what you want, so let’s see how you respond.”
“America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny and to unleash the prosperous and glorious future that is close within your reach. This is the moment for action. Do not let it pass,” he added.
As the president drags the country into its first full-scale military operation since 2003, he told Americans that U.S. troops may die in the process.
“The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost, and we may have casualties, that often happens in war,” he said in a video he posted early on Saturday morning, wearing no tie and a white USA trucker hat.
The post Israel Beats Trump to the Mic With Major War Update appeared first on The Daily Beast.
