
Virtually a week after Israel’s shock strike on Iran, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei claimed Wednesday that Iran will certainly “NOT abandonment,” as Israel looks for to remove its nuclear program.
” Battle will certainly be met battle, battle with battle, and strike with strike. Iran will certainly not send to any type of needs or determines,” Khamenei claimed in remarks lugged by Tasnim, Iran’s semi-official state information firm.
His comments comply with a phone call from Head of state Donald Trump to give up.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei waves throughout the 36th wedding anniversary of the fatality of the leader of Iran’s 1979 Islamic Transformation, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, at Khomeini’s temple in southerly Tehran, Iran, June 4, 2025.
Workplace Of The Iranian Supreme Leader using Reuters
Khamenei, that has actually led Iran for over 35 years, has actually entered into concealing following Israel’s shock attack.
Israeli Head Of State Benjamin Netanyahu has actually not dismissed targeting Khamenei amidst the dispute, which has actually seen both nations perform day-to-day airborne assaults.
Below’s what to find out about the ultimate leader:
When did Khamenei involve power?
Khamenei, 86, has actually led Iran because the fatality in 1989 of its beginning supreme leader, Ruhollah Khomeini, that had actually led Iran for ten years after falling the nation’s last shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
Khomeini disregarded his prospective follower, Hossein-Ali Montazeri, and rather offered the placement to Khamenei, that was chosen as the brand-new ultimate leader by the Setting up of Specialists complying with Khomeini’s fatality.
Prior to his decadeslong regulation as the ultimate leader, Khamenei worked as head of state of Iran from 1981 to 1989.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei pays attention to the nationwide anthem as Flying force police officers admire throughout their conference in Tehran, Iran, Feb. 7, 2025.
Workplace Of The Iranian Supreme Leader using Reuters, Record
The ultimate leader is “properly Iran’s leader permanently, per the constitution,” according to the D.C.-based brain trust Council on Foreign Relations.
” Iran’s constitution marks the workplace as president and manages it substantial control under the concept that political authority derive from spiritual authority,” the company claimed, keeping in mind the placement’s powers consist of “establishing nationwide plans and managing their execution, along with regulating the militaries and designating army principals and the heads of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and cops.”
What takes place if Khamenei is gotten rid of or toppled?
Israel’s shock procedure struck at the heart of Iran’s nuclear program, striking crucial centers and eliminating a number of nuclear researchers along with upper-level army leaders, according to Israeli authorities.
ABC Information and various other electrical outlets reported today that Trump turned down an Israeli strategy to execute Iran’s ultimate leader, worried that it would certainly intensify the recurring dispute.

Israel’s Head of state Benjamin Netanyahu revealing the launch of a targeted army procedure versus Iran in a video clip declaration, June 13, 2025.
GPO/AFP using Getty Pictures
Netanyahu informed ABC Information on Monday that targeting Khamenei would certainly finish, not intensify, the recurring battle. Asked if Israel would certainly target the ultimate leader, Netanyahu claimed that Israel was “doing what we require to do.”
Israeli Protection Priest Israel Katz alerted in a declaration the complying with day that Khamenei’s destiny might be comparable to that of performed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein if he remains to “devote battle criminal activities and fire rockets at Israeli people.”
It is vague that will certainly do well Khamenei in case of his fatality, as no follower has actually been openly called. It is additionally vague if a follower will certainly have the exact same level of authority he has in the regimen, according to Ray Takeyh, an elderly other for Center East research studies with the Council on Foreign Relations, that claimed throughout a press briefing on the conflict that “various other facilities of power will certainly have their very own authorities and the regimen will certainly be far more disorderly in its decision-making.”
Maryam Rajavi, the president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran– a union of unorthodox Iranian teams– informed European legislators on Wednesday that Israel’s shock strike stands for “the start of an essential brand-new phase, both in Iran’s interior situation and the more comprehensive characteristics of the area.” Just “regimen modification by the individuals of Iran and the arranged resisters” can make sure local tranquility, she claimed.
The concern currently, Takeyh claimed throughout journalism rundown, is, “Can the culture bewilder the state also in its damaged problem?”
” I do not have the solution to that concern,” he claimed. “I believe it would certainly be as well artful to supply a solution to that concern.”
That is Reza Pahlavi?

Royal Prince of Iran Reza Pahlavi, child of Iate Iranian Shah Mohamad-Reza Pahlavi, participates in an interview arranged by the Geneva Organization of United Nations Correspondents (ACANU), at the European head office of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, Feb. 17, 2025.
Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone using AP
Reza Pahlavi, the ousted crown royal prince of Iran that stays in the USA, has actually been supporting for a nonreligious autonomous Iran. He is the child of Iran’s last shah, that was deposed by the 1979 Iranian Transformation.
In current days, Pahlavi, 64, has actually gotten in touch with Iranians to rise versus the federal government in Tehran.
” We are picking up virtually a state of collapse by the regimen– by individuals starting to issue, by family members of the regimen flying, by the leader himself concealing in a below ground passage,” Pahlavi informed ABC Information Reside on Tuesday. “I believe that this is a possibility that we have actually never ever had this much in the previous 4 years, and this is the very best possibility for us to ultimately conquer this regimen and do away with it.”
Pahlavi said on X that there is a “prepare for Iran’s future” must the Islamic Republic autumn.
” We are gotten ready for the very first hundred days after the autumn, for the transitional duration, and for the facility of a nationwide and autonomous federal government– by the Iranian individuals and for the Iranian individuals,” he claimed in an article on Tuesday.