For 36 years, the question of who ultimately ruled Iran had one answer: Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. While Iran has an elected president and parliament, that power rests with the supreme religious leader, who has the final say on all foreign and domestic policies and is the commander-in-chief of Iran’s regular army and Revolutionary Guard Corps. Whenever the United States confronted Iran, American policymakers knew it was Khamenei who would make the final decision.
- Three months after succeeding his father as Iran’s supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei has yet to be seen in public. All eyes will be on his upcoming funeral to see if he makes an appearance.
- With the supreme leader taking a smaller role, other powerful stakeholders in the Iranian regime have become more independent and open, vying for a place in the new system.
- It is not yet clear what exactly the new system will be. One possibility is a less religious but still authoritarian and nationalist regime.
They are no longer sure, however. Joint air strikes between the US and Israel on the first day of the war, four months ended Khamenei’s rule, and on July 4, the former supreme leader will be given a public funeral in Tehran. And while Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei’s second son officially succeeded his father as supreme leader on March 4, he has not been seen in public since then, reportedly still suffering from severe leg and facial injuries in the same airstrike that killed his father on February 28. No current video, audio recordings, or photos have been released since then – only written information read by the anchor on state television or published on its Telegraph channel. Iranian TV networks they have even decided airing videos generated by an AI giving a speech.
How Mojtaba Khamenei remains disabled is unknown. US officials believe that Khamenei is really live and participate in making decisions but when he somehow doesn’t show up for his father’s funeral, it will start to raise questions: Can anyone really fill the Ayatollah’s shoes? Could the tumultuous transition from father to son lead to an Iran that is at once less secular but more nationalist and authoritarian than ever? And most importantly: Who really rules Iran today?
Iran’s unique governance structure — civilian leaders, but a mullah who holds ultimate power — has been a source of contention in past rounds of diplomatic talks with the United States. Even when the “moderates” who favored better relations with the West were in power, any decision had to be signed by the supreme leader, whose real opinion was not always immediately visible.
Nothing has changed in the transition from father to son regarding the official powers held by Iran’s supreme leader. But while Khamenei has been participating in the current cease-fire talks between the United States and Iran, including approving mediators. to have a direct conversation and Americans last month in a statement published by the regular weigh special talking pointshe still doesn’t seem to play as big a role as his father did in such situations. “There is evidence that the power exercised by the supreme leader has diminished significantly,” said Hussein Banai, an expert on Iranian politics and a professor at Indiana University Bloomington, said.
In particular, he noted that the head of state usually plays the role of “headquarters”, getting all government groups on the same page to deliver a unified message. Iranian politics has never been fully unified: There are multiple centers of power, including the religious establishment, the elected government, and the military, as well as competing factions within those centers. But when the leader weighed in, everyone compared his message to hers.
Whatever the current status of Mojtaba Khamenei, that seems to be non existent at the moment. “The president says what he wants, the speaker says what he wants,” Banai said. “There is no coordination whatsoever.”
Combined with the large number of senior citizens killed by the airstrikes, there is a shortage of power in Tehran right now.
“Everyone is fighting for their place in this next iteration of the Islamic Republic,” said Sanam Vakil, director of the Middle East program at Chatham House.
On the civilian side of the government, there is President Masoud Pezeshkian, a moderate who took power in 2024 after his predecessor was killed in a plane crash. While officially the second most powerful leader in Iran, Pezeshkian saw his power and influence were reduced during the war. As an advocate of diplomacy, his position could improve if the talks provide economic relief for the Iranians.
Most prominent in the public eye in recent weeks is Mohammed Ghalibaf, the speaker of Iran’s parliament, who presided over Iran’s parliament. delegates who negotiate and the United States and appear regularly in the media to explain the government’s positions. As a publicity-loving conservative known as a perennial presidential candidate and linked to bad real estate deals, Ghalibaf. He may have found his calling as a move by the Iranian government to communicate with the Trump administration. More than anyone else in the government, he has seen his public and international standing rise as a result of the war.
But the extent to which citizens can speak up for the Iranian regime as a whole in these negotiations is perhaps Iran’s single biggest question after the actual status of Mojtaba Khamenei. On the military side, the most important figure to rise may be Ahmad Vahidi, the commander-in-chief of the revolutionary guard, who has repeatedly defeated moderates in seeking a quick deal to end the war. According to reported by the Wall Street Journalit was Vahidi who pressed Iran to launch new missile strikes in June, despite concerns that it would jeopardize ongoing ceasefire talks with the United States. Vahidi is under US sanctions due to the government’s crackdown on protests and is wanted by Interpol for his alleged role in the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Argentina. But he is not always averse to cutting deals with the Americans: He is said to have participated in the conversation and the Reagan administration in the 1980s, which was known in the United States as Iran-Contra.
With different voices and groups fighting for influence, the question is who exactly is in charge of the Iranian system. “The system controls the system,” Vakil said. “I know we all want to think that there is one person who has power or authority. There is no commander-in-chief. It is a system that commands collectively at this time.” All of this could add up to an even more unpredictable Iran going forward.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that the new leaders of Iran are “more reasonable” than their predecessors and senior US officials claim to promote productivity relations with their Iranian counterparts. But Iran’s leadership has also shown repeatedly in recent weeks that it is willing to risk detonating the talks with force when it feels its red lines are being crossed, whether it’s Israel’s invasion of Lebanon or threats to Tehran’s control of the Strait of Hormuz.
What will the new regime of Iran be like?
At some point, the world will gain more clarity on Mojtaba Khamenei’s true role, and a new system will click into place. When the power struggle shakes out, the regime will probably be less democratic than Iran under the Ayatollahs and certainly less inclined to trust the United States. But it is likely that an Iran will emerge that is less ideological, religious, and revolutionary — and may yet be more violent — than what we have seen since 1979.
In a recent article in Foreign Affairs, Iranian-American scholars Narges Bajoghli and Vali Nasr. said that Iran’s new leaders are more “technological”.many of whom came of age during the brutal Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s rather than the opposition to the Shah of the 1970s, may be more willing to engage in direct talks with the United States than the more radical group led by Ali Khamenei, but may be more dangerous in power.
The biggest changes may come on the inside. Iran’s strict religious laws had already been relaxed slightly before the war. Although wearing the hijab is still legally required for Iranian women, the law is not widely enforced by many others women have been going without hijab since the “woman, life, freedom” protests in 2022. Some experts expect the Iranian government, especially if the supreme leader eventually plays a silent role, to promote a more secular form of authoritarian nationalism. That may be already underway – in front of women are partially or even exposed in pro-government rallies it was one of the most amazing events of this war.
Vakil said the government is likely to continue to point to religion as a justification for its policies, but in times of crisis and instability the government will have to choose its battles, which may mean “tolerating women walking around wearing whatever they want.” What it will not mean, given the extreme positions that men like Ghalibaf and Vahidi have taken during the past large protests, is tolerating opposition or opposition to the political system itself. Hopes, expressed by the leaders of the United States and Israel at the beginning of this war, that it will cause public violence or the collapse of the governmentit is clearly not fulfilled.
The revolution is now nearly 50 years old, and change was finally coming to Iran, whether the war happened or not. It was already clear in the last years of Ali Khamenei’s life that the system he led was under stress due to economic stagnation, international isolation, and public dissatisfaction from the people, many of whom have no memory of the 1979 revolution. The transition to his successor was expected to be a a test of whether the government can reform itself live another generation. Thanks to US and Israeli airstrikes, the transition is happening on an accelerated timeline.
The regime has shown that it can survive – and certainly win – a battle with stronger opponents. But the number of people who long for a return to normality may not get it for a while, given that the uncertainty of the ceasefire. Internal divisions and rivalries that were extinguished during war can re-emerge now that fighting has often ceased.
Right now, many Iranians are wondering if Mojtaba Khamenei is in any shape to fulfill his father’s role of 36 years. But the bigger question may be whether, in Iran’s new political reality, that role will last much longer.
