Not even 24 hours had passed since the bombing on the first day of the war when the Islamic Republic rushed to scare away the specter of the power vacuum. This Sunday, a week later, several clerics from the Assembly of Experts, the body in charge of this task, have assured that the leader has already been chosen, although they have not announced who it is. Shortly after, the president of the United States assured the American network ABC that if the appointee has “his approval”, “he will not last long.”
“The leadership election has already been carried out and the leader has been appointed,” one of the 88 religious members who sit in the Assembly of Experts, Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda, an ultra-conservative cleric considered close to the hardline of the Islamic Republic, told the semi-official Tasnim agency. Also a member of that forum, Mohammad Mehdi Mirbagheri, confirmed this in a video broadcast by the semi-official Fars agency. In it he assures that a “firm ruling” on Khamenei’s successor has already been reached.
Another member of the clerical body, Mohsen Heidary, told the semi-official agency ISNA that “the most suitable candidate, approved by the majority of the Assembly of Experts,” has been chosen. Heidari has said – also in a video – that the candidate has been selected based on an instruction from Ayatollah Khamenei: which recommended that the top leader of Iran be someone “hated by the enemy.”
Last Thursday, Trump alluded to Mojtaba Khamenei, the dead leader’s second son, whom he said was an “unacceptable” candidate. He then claimed to participate in the election of the new Iranian supreme leader.
The appointment of Seyed Mojtaba Khamenei – Seyed is the treatment for the direct descendants of the Prophet Muhammad – in continuity with his father’s policies. Khamenei Jr. maintains ties with the hardest wing of the Revolutionary Guard and, in general, with the military and security apparatus that constitute the hard core of power in Iran.
Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda has since assured that the public announcement of who will be Khamenei’s successor will fall to the secretary of the Assembly of Experts, Ayatollah Hashem Hosseini Bushehri. The day before, some of the most prominent names of the Assembly of Experts, such as the religious and marja (source of emulation for the Shiites) Naser Makarem Shirazi had demanded to accelerate the definitive appointment of the leader of the regime to avoid, as he said, contradictory messages, reports Ali Falahi.
These pressures increased this Saturday, the same day that the president, the moderate Masud Pezeshkián, found himself disavowed by the country’s military and security apparatus, after ensuring in a televised speech that his country would no longer attack neighboring states and even apologizing for it.
When both the military establishment and the National Security Council had already denied Pezeshkián – and the Iranian president himself had backed down -, the ultra-conservative parliamentarian Hamid Rasaei urged the end of the provisional Leadership Council. This tripartite body appointed last Sunday, one day after Khamenei’s death, assumes the functions of the supreme leader until the appointment of his successor. One of its three members is Pezeshkián.
Israeli threats
Hours before Ayatollah Alamolhoda assured that the Assembly of Experts has reached the quorum Regarding the new leader, the Persian account of the Israeli army in On Tuesday, Israel claimed to have attacked a building in Tehran that was hosting an Assembly meeting precisely to elect a successor.
Since that attack, “the 88 members of the Assembly of Experts have not met in person, but have voted remotely,” Ali Alfoneh, a researcher at the Institute of Arab Gulf States, explains by email from Washington.
The process now being finalized, as stated by the members of the Assembly of Experts, has only been carried out once since 1979, when the Islamic Republic was established. It was ten years later, when its founder, Ruhollah Khomeini, died and Khamenei, as a cleric that the supreme leader should have, was hastily elected. His son Mojtaba does not have them either, which is not considered an insurmountable obstacle to his possible promotion.
What did raise doubts about the viability of his election, at least until now, was his relationship to the deceased leader. If appointed to replace his progenitor, the Iranian political system would acquire a hereditary air, which would pose undesirable similarities in the eyes of the Islamic Republic with the overthrown Pahlavi monarchy. Ali Khamenei himself opposed that possibility during his lifetime.
Favorite
“I would not be surprised if the Assembly had elected Mojtaba Khamenei,” emphasizes Ali Alfoneh. This expert emphasizes that, although the son of the late leader “does not meet all the constitutional requirements for the position” – for example, very high credentials as a cleric -, and “hereditary leadership is generally abhorrent for a regime that opposes the monarchy”, Mojtaba Khamenei has other advantages.
“His election would not only reflect the support of the Revolutionary Guard for his candidacy, but would also signal continuity and a message of clear challenge to the United States and Israel: If you kill one Khamenei, we will elect another,” Alfoneh summarizes.
Otherwise, little is known about him, this specialist emphasizes. The son of the deceased leader “has never given interviews and only appears in public twice a year: in the Revolution Day parade, on February 11, and in the Al Quds (Jerusalem) Day parade, which is the last Friday of the month of Ramadan.”
The election of other candidates whose names have also been mentioned as possible successors to Ali Khamenei “would convey different messages to Iranians and the outside world,” the researcher emphasizes.
For example, “the smiling and eloquent Hassan Khomeini,” grandson of the founder of the Islamic Republic, “not only has a powerful surname, but would also signal a possible attempt by the regime to ease internal tensions and accommodate elements of its loyal reformist opposition,” he explains.
The “gray eminence” that is Ayatollah Alireza Arafi [miembro del Consejo de Liderazgo provisional]“who compensates for his lack of charisma with considerable bureaucratic and institutional skills,” would represent, Alfoneh points out, “the technocratic continuity within the establishment clerical”.
