Why Khamenei’s funeral keeps changing

The situation triggered a wave of posts across social media platforms, particularly on X, many of them sarcastic, angry or openly celebratory.

One widely shared comment drew a comparison with the authorities’ treatment of families whose relatives were killed during protests.

More than 36,500 Iranians were killed by security forces during the January 8-9 crackdown on nationwide protests, making it the deadliest two-day protest massacre in history, according to documents reviewed by Iran International.

“In the past two months a man named Ali Khamenei did not allow families of people killed on his orders to hold funerals,” one user wrote. “Now for five days the body of that same man has been kept in a refrigerator and they cannot even issue permission for his burial. What goes around comes around.”

Another post mocked the uncertainty surrounding funeral arrangements. “The funeral procession for Khamenei will be held online through the Shad platform,” a user wrote, referring sarcastically to the government-linked education app used by Iranian schools when classes move online during crises.

Some comments echoed remarks previously made by a state television host who had mocked the deaths of protesters.

Public anger erupted last month after a presenter on Ofogh TV, a channel run by the state broadcaster IRIB and affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards, referred to reports that thousands killed during the January crackdown were transported in refrigerated trailers. The program made a multiple choice question about where to keep the bodies of protesters. The show aired a segment posing a multiple-choice question about where the bodies of protesters should be kept.

• 

  Mockery of protest victims on state TV sparks fury in Iran

“Which refrigerator do you think they are keeping Khamenei’s body in?” one user wrote, listing options such as “Netanyahu’s refrigerator,” “an ice-cream factory freezer,” and “the freezers of Antarctica.”

Others used darker language. “The stench of Khamenei’s corpse has spread across the Middle East and they still do not dare bury it,” one user wrote.

Another post said: “Six days have passed and the rotten body of Ali Khamenei is still lying on the ground.”

Some users circulated images of a dead rat with captions claiming sarcastically that the first photo of Khamenei’s body had finally been released.

• 

  Khamenei ‘rat’ taunt spills from social media onto Iran’s campuses

Revenge in digital form

Many posts framed the mockery as a form of symbolic revenge.

“Khamenei left a deep wound in people’s hearts and denied grieving families the right to mourn,” one user wrote. “His agents buried bodies secretly. Now after days his own body is still on the ground.”

Others referenced reports that some families had been asked to pay for the bullets used to kill their relatives in order to receive their bodies.

“I heard Khamenei’s body has started to rot with worms,” one user wrote. “If you don’t have money for bunker-buster bombs, at least bury him.”

Another post revived a Persian saying about burial rites. “They used to say a corpse never stays on the ground,” the user wrote. “Even if someone has no one, eventually the municipality will bury them. But six days have passed and the body of Ali Khamenei is still lying there.”

“Israel said to return the body of Ali Khamenei, the Islamic Republic must pay for the missiles it fired, or his family must admit he was part of a Mossad spy team,” one post read, referring sarcastically to reports that families were sometimes asked to sign papers declaring their children Basij members in order to receive their bodies and permission for burial ceremonies.

Others suggested that authorities might abandon plans for a burial altogether.

“It seems they have given up burying Khamenei,” one user wrote. “Maybe they are waiting for the US Navy to throw the carcass into the sea.”

“Khamenei’s body should be bombed again,” another post said. “I’m still not satisfied.”

Mansoureh Khojasteh Bagherzadeh died one day after her husband. She spent her final day in a coma at a hospital near their residence on Pasteur Avenue in central Tehran, a compound long guarded by the Revolutionary Guards but now destroyed.

Born into a religious family in Mashhad, she married Khamenei in 1964 in a traditional family-arranged ceremony.

The couple had six children: four sons born before the 1979 Revolution and two daughters born afterward. One daughter, Hoda, was killed in the same attack that targeted Khamenei’s home and office.

A life lived in the shadows

Throughout her life, Mansoureh remained one of the most private figures in Iran’s ruling elite. Her public presence was far more limited than that of Fakhr Iran Saghafi, the wife of Ruhollah Khomeini, or Effat Marashi, the wife of the late Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.

So little was publicly known about her that when news of her death spread, Iranian media initially struggled to locate a reliable photograph. Some outlets mistakenly published a picture of Ategheh Rajai, the outspoken wife of another late president, Mohammad-Ali Rajai.

Her public voice survives almost entirely through two interviews: one with Mahjoubah magazine in the early 1990s and another with Jomhouri Eslami in 1983, shortly after Khamenei survived an assassination attempt. Most quotations attributed to her in later years originate from these two sources.

“It was not a romantic thing,” she said of their union. “His grandmother came to our house to propose.”

She portrayed her main role as maintaining a stable home life while her husband pursued political and religious work, stressing that she considered full hijab the appropriate attire outside the home, while dress inside could be more flexible but still follow Islamic principles.

Why she remained invisible

Her absence from public life reflected not only personal preference but also the political culture surrounding Iran’s leadership.

Khamenei largely kept his family out of public view for a mixture of religious, cultural, and security reasons. A deeply traditional cleric, he rarely allowed his wife or daughters to appear publicly, and even his sons were long shielded from public scrutiny.

Although she was never formally described as Iran’s “First Lady,” the symbolic status of the Supreme Leader’s spouse occasionally surfaced in public debate.

When Jamileh Alamolhoda, the wife of the late president Ebrahim Raisi, briefly used the title in a television interview, Iranian media reported that the description was later clarified after criticism from conservative circles that the title belonged to the Supreme Leader’s household.

She will be buried beside her husband at the Imam Reza Shrine in Mashhad, according to state media reports.

That contrast, several Iran experts told Iran International, exposes a widening divide between Western progressive activism and the lived experience of many Iranians.

Analysts say the reaction among many Iranians is not about ideological loyalty but about seeing any weakening of the Islamic Republic as a rare opportunity to escape decades of repression.

“War is violent, it's terrible and it has started. The people of Iran didn't choose this war — the Islamic government, the Islamic Republic government, chose this war,” said Siavash Rokni, an Iran pop culture expert.

“Iranians will use any opportunity to bypass the Islamic Republic to assure the fall of the Islamic Republic and the institution of a democracy,” Rokni said.

Anti-war protests taking shape in Western capitals have often featured placards supporting the very regime responsible for killing scores of Iranians, with demonstrators holding images of the now-former Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei — the man ultimately responsible for the killings.

Rokni said one cannot claim to oppose war while supporting the regime responsible for such violence.

This week, clips of Iranians dancing to the Village People’s “Y.M.C.A.” in the exaggerated arm-pumping style popularized by Trump went viral following the confirmed death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

The cultural irony is striking. “Y.M.C.A.” was released in late 1978 and was charting in early 1979 — the same period Iran’s Islamic Revolution culminated in the fall of the Shah and the rise of the Islamic Republic.

Now, decades later, the disco anthem has resurfaced as a soundtrack for some celebrating what they see as the potential unraveling of that same regime.

Celebrations were reported not only inside Iran but also in diaspora hubs including Los Angeles and London, underscoring that the reaction extended beyond Iran’s borders but largely among Iranians themselves.

Iran International has reviewed footage received directly from inside Iran in the hours following the strikes.

In one clip, explosions can be seen in the background with plumes of smoke rising over Tehran as an Iranian man says: “Thank you Mr. President, thank President Trump, we love you.”

In another video, a woman shouts “Trump!” followed by cheers, clapping and the sound of what appears to be a vuvuzela-style horn as a group of Iranians celebrate.

In a separate clip filmed inside Iran, a woman says in Farsi: “Bibi, we are happy, Netanyahu, Israel, Trump...death to Terrorist, thank you for helping us Hooray.”

Another video, recorded after the bombing of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s headquarters, shows a group of young people flashing peace signs as they welcome the joint US-Israel military strikes.

Khorso Isfahani, an Iran analyst with NUFDI, framed the reaction not as celebration of war itself but as the culmination of decades of struggle.

“Iranians have been on the front line of fighting against Islamist fascist occupation of Iran for the past five decades. We have sacrificed so many lives, but it has always been an uphill battle. Finally the moment has arrived and we are celebrating it.”

David Patrikarakos, a British journalist of part-Iranian origin, said many Western activists fail to grasp that context.

“A lot of people, generally not Iranian — generally unable to find Iran on the map — feel fit to pronounce upon this,” he said, describing much of the protest movement as “signaling your virtue” while “paying no attention to the suffering and the thoughts of people inside Iran.”

He added that for many Iranians, support for Trump or Netanyahu is not ideological devotion but circumstantial.

For those celebrating, analysts say, the moment is not about endorsing war itself but about the possibility that it may mark an inflection point in a decades-long fight for political change.

Iran’s clerical body, the Assembly of Experts, has elected Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the late Ali Khamenei, as the Islamic Republic’s new Supreme Leader, according to his informed sources who spoke to Iran International on condition of anonymity.

The decision marks one of the most consequential moments in the history of the Islamic Republic, effectively transferring power within the same family for the first time since the 1979 revolution.

But who exactly is Mojtaba Khamenei?

Continue reading

The decision marks one of the most consequential moments in the history of the Islamic Republic, effectively transferring power within the same family for the first time since the 1979 revolution.

But who exactly is Mojtaba Khamenei?

A powerful figure behind the scenes

Mojtaba Khamenei, 55, has long been considered one of the most influential figures inside Iran’s ruling system despite rarely appearing in public or holding formal political office.

For years he operated from within the Office of the Supreme Leader, serving as a gatekeeper and power broker around his father. His position has often been compared to the role played by Ahmad Khomeini, the son of Islamic Republic’s founder Ruhollah Khomeini, who served as a key aide and confidant during the early years of the revolutionary state.

Analysts say Mojtaba gradually built influence across the regime’s political, security and clerical institutions.

Dr. Eric Mandel, director of the Middle East Political and Information Network (MEPIN), told Iran International that Mojtaba has long been a central but opaque figure in Tehran’s power structure.

“Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has long operated behind the scenes in Tehran, building deep ties with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and consolidating influence within the regime’s power structure. He is widely viewed as one of the architects of the regime’s repression," Mandel said.

Author and Iran analyst Arash Azizi told Iran International Mojtaba is viewed with deep suspicion. "This is why he has been a bete noire of democratic movements at least since 2009 when he was rumored to have helped orchestrate the repression. He is also known to be a favorite of some sections of the establishment such as those close to Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf who has ambitions of becoming Iran’s strongman."

Ties to Iran’s security establishment

A key source of Mojtaba’s influence lies in his close connections to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

During the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, Mojtaba served in the Habib Battalion, a unit made up largely of volunteers connected to the Islamic Republic’s emerging revolutionary networks. The battalion operated under forces linked to the IRGC and took part in several major battles of the war.

Service in the Habib Battalion proved significant for Mojtaba. Many of the men who fought alongside him later rose to senior positions in Iran’s security and intelligence apparatus, including figures who would go on to lead parts of the IRGC’s intelligence organization and security commands responsible for protecting the regime.

Those wartime relationships are widely believed to have helped Mojtaba build lasting connections inside Iran’s powerful security establishment.

Over the years, opposition figures and political rivals have accused Mojtaba of playing a role in shaping election outcomes and coordinating crackdowns on dissent.

Questions over religious credentials

Iran’s constitution requires the Supreme Leader to possess deep knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence and be recognized as a senior religious authority.

Mojtaba, however, is not widely considered to be among the highest-ranking clerics in Iran. He studied in the seminaries of Qom under several prominent conservative scholars but does not hold the rank of ayatollah.

Despite that, Iran’s political system has historically shown flexibility when elite consensus forms around a candidate.

A controversial succession

Mojtaba’s elevation is likely to intensify criticism that the Islamic Republic founded as a revolutionary Islamic system is evolving toward dynastic rule.

For years speculation about his succession drew comparisons to hereditary monarchies.

For a man who has spent decades operating largely in the shadows of Iran’s power structure, Mojtaba Khamenei now finds himself at the center of one of the most consequential periods in the country’s modern history.