It is a fair bet that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s ‘so-called supreme leader’ in the words of president Trump, didn’t expect it to end like this. Holed up in a bunker somewhere in Tehran, exchanging messages with a small and ever-diminishing group of allies, and impotently raging against the West, namely America and Israel.
Khamenei is no longer master of his own destiny
What can the 86-year-old Khamenei, plagued by ill-health in recent years, really be thinking? He has ruled Iran with an iron fist for more than three decades, but is now reduced to cowering for his life underground. Just as humiliating must be the realisation that he owes his life to the ‘Great Satan’, America.
Donald Trump said a few days ago that the Americans knew exactly where Khamenei was ‘hiding’, that he was an easy target but would not be killed, ‘at least for now’. Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not commented directly on reports that Trump rejected an Israeli plan to assassinate the Iranian leader, only saying that Israel will do ‘what we need to do’.
In other words, Khamenei is no longer master of his own destiny. The regime he has led for so long is at the mercy of forces beyond his control. Israeli jets can strike anywhere in Iran at will. Israel’s Defence Ministry said yesterday that it had hit more Iranian government targets, including the notorious Evin prison in the capital Tehran. The prison is a symbol of the regime’s repression and wider crackdown on political dissent. It houses political prisoners, human rights campaigners and foreign nationals accused of spying. The successful attack on Evin is a hugely damaging blow to a regime that relies on fear for imposing order on a restive population.
Israel also hit the security headquarters of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guards, another critical pillar of the regime. It follows Israeli strikes in recent days on other government institutions, including the state television headquarters in Tehran and police buildings.
Iran faces an existential crisis unlike anything since the 1979 revolution that brought the mullahs to power. Not even the bloody and costly war with Iraq in the 1980s posed such a direct threat to the rule of the clerics. How long Khamenei and his once-feared lieutenants in the military and security police can maintain even the semblance of control over events is increasingly open to question.
The regime is vulnerable. No one symbolises this more so than the supreme leader himself. He is a leader who cannot show his face in public, restricted to releasing just two pre-recorded videos in which he was seen in front of a brown curtain, with the Iranian flag next to him. It is hardly a projection of power or control.
No one really knows who is taking the key decisions behind the scenes or to what extent the country’s command structure is functioning after the killing of so many of its senior leaders by Israel.
Khamenei has reportedly been naming potential successors should he be killed. The supreme leader has enormous powers in theory. He is commander-in-chief of the armed forces, the head of the judiciary, the legislature and the executive branch. He is also Iran’s most senior guardian of the Shia faith. Normally the process of appointing a supreme leader drags on for months, with senior clerics picking and choosing names. Khamenei, it would appear, is eager for a quick orderly transition aimed at preserving his legacy. This is fantasy politics. This is no longer something in his power to decide.
Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba, also a cleric and close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, was long rumoured to be a front-runner for power. A dynastic succession would have been hugely controversial in the Islamic republic of Iran, even before recent events. The idea of Khamenei’s son inheriting the top job must now be dead in the water. Just as unlikely is a revival of monarchical rule in Iran.
Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi, the eldest son of the last shah of Iran, told a press conference in Paris yesterday that he is ready to lead Iran. He blamed Khamenei for the ‘devastating conflict’ and said that this was Iran’s ‘Berlin Wall’ moment, with the regime defeated and teetering on the edge of collapse. These are strong words indeed. Pahlavi is good on rhetoric but has few meaningful policy ideas. Ordinary Iranians resent his gilded life in exile. Plenty remember his father’s repressive reign, including the brutal activities of the secret police. Evin prison, lest anyone needs reminding, was built during the shah’s time in power.
The question of who leads Iran has never been the ostensible or stated aim of military action. It does, however, remain under discussion as one of the many imponderables thrown up by the latest events. President Trump weighed in on the possibility of regime change on Sunday. He posted on social media: ‘It’s not politically correct to use the term, ‘Regime Change’ but if the current Iranian regime is unable to MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN, why wouldn’t there be a Regime change???’
The remarks caused the inevitable flurry of speculation. This misses the wider and more significant reality: regime change is already underway in Iran. Khamenei may remain the leader but only in name. He is old and unwell, and even if he survives the immediate crisis, his aura of absolute power and authority has melted away. He is at the mercy of his enemies at home and abroad. No one can know who, or what, will replace Khamenei – or exactly how and when – but his time in supreme charge of Iran is surely done.
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