Where is Ayatollah Khamenei ? Supreme Leader Absent While Iran Faces Deadliest Escalation
New Delhi : As Iran grapples with a series of unprecedented military escalations, a new mystery has gripped the country. Where is Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ? The 86-year-old leader, who wields ultimate authority in Iran, has not been seen or heard from publicly for nearly a week — a silence that has fuelled intense speculation, concern, and unease across the nation.
Tehran has retaliated with missile strikes on an American base in Qatar, and a shaky ceasefire brokered by Donald Trump is now in place. The Iranian media has offered no images or visuals of Khamenei since the hostilities began. Officials close to him claim he has been moved to a secret underground bunker and is refraining from electronic communication to avoid potential assassination attempts — a threat Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly not ruled out, despite Trump’s supposed advisory not to kill the Supreme Leader, according to the New York Times.
Reports suggest that even top Iranian government figures are believed to be cut off from direct contact with him. On Tuesday, the host of a prime-time Iranian state television show asked Mehdi Fazaeli, a senior official from Khamenei’s office, about the Supreme Leader’s whereabouts. People are very worried about the Supreme Leader. Can you tell us how he is?” the anchor asked. But Fazaeli sidestepped the question, saying “We should all be praying. Those tasked with protecting the Supreme Leader were doing their job.
The Iranian newspapers are beginning to voice concern as well. His days-long absence has made all of us who love him very worried,” Mohsen Khalifeh, editor of Khaneman, a daily newspaper. He added that if Khamenei were dead, “his funeral would be the most glorious and historic.
Israel’s sudden air assault on June 13 decimated the top echelon of Iran’s military leadership and claimed the lives of several top nuclear scientists, marking one of the most significant escalations in the Middle East’s history. Iran also retaliated with a barrage of missiles that, for the first time, managed to break through Israel’s layered air defence systems in significant numbers.
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