By SCM REPORTER
IRAN has a new Supreme Leader tonight after the regime’s secret council reportedly elected Mojtaba Khamenei to succeed his assassinated father.
The 56-year-old cleric—long the “shadow man” of Tehran—was swept into power following a high-stakes vote by the Assembly of Experts, according to the state-linked Mehr News Agency.
The move marks a historic shift to hereditary rule in the Islamic Republic, effectively turning the revolutionary state into a new Iranian dynasty.
Sources say the decision was fast-tracked under “heavy pressure” from the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), who want a hardline loyalist at the helm as the country reels from a devastating war with Israel and the US.
One member of the Assembly, Hosseinali Eshkevari, confirmed the result, declaring: “The name of Khamenei will continue.”
But the appointment is a massive gamble. Mojtaba, the second son of the late Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has never held elected office and lacks the top-tier religious credentials usually required for the job.
His rise comes at a moment of extreme peril. His father was killed just over a week ago in a precision US-Israeli airstrike on February 28—a strike that decapitated the regime’s leadership and sparked a regional firestorm.
Israel has already issued a chilling warning to the new leader, with military spokesmen vowing to “target anyone” who takes up the mantle of the Supreme Leadership.
Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump has branded the succession “unacceptable,” insisting the US will have a “decisive role” in Iran’s future.
Insiders claim the vote took place in a “tense and unnatural” atmosphere, with some clerics forced to dial in via video link because of ongoing bombing raids. Opponents of the move fear that installing a “Prince” will spark fresh fury among an Iranian public already exhausted by war and decades of clerical rule.
Mojtaba Khamenei has spent decades as his father’s “gatekeeper.” He is believed to have controlled vast sums of the family’s wealth and maintained a direct line to the IRGC’s elite intelligence units.
The election follows the “February 28 Strike” where Ali Khamenei and several top generals were killed. Iran is currently operating under a “Sacred Defence” protocol, with its military already launching retaliatory strikes against Israel and US assets in the Gulf.
Critics point out that Mojtaba is not a “Grand Ayatollah.” To make him Supreme Leader, the regime has had to bypass traditional religious hierarchies, relying instead on raw military backing from the Revolutionary Guards.
With Mojtaba at the helm, analysts expect no softening of Iran’s stance.
He is viewed as even more of a hardliner than his father, particularly regarding Iran’s nuclear ambitions and its “Axis of Resistance” proxies across the Middle East.
