Khamenei

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei attended a mourning ceremony on the eve of the Muslim holy day of Ashura.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has attended a religious ceremony in Tehran, making his first public appearance since the 12 days of conflict between Israel and Iran.

The 85-year-old leader appeared in a video aired by state media on Saturday, which showed dozens of people attending an event at a mosque to mark Ashura, the holiest day of the Shia Muslim calendar.

In the footage, Khamenei is seen waving and nodding to the chanting crowd, which rose to its feet as he entered the mosque.

State TV said the clip was filmed at the Imam Khomeini Mosque in central Tehran.

Khamenei has avoided public appearances since the start of the fighting on June 13, and his speeches have all been prerecorded.

The United States, which joined in the Israeli attacks by bombing three key nuclear sites in Iran on June 22, had sent warnings to Khamenei, with US President Donald Trump saying on social media that Washington knew where the Iranian leader was, but had no plans to kill him, “at least for now”.

On June 26, in prerecorded remarks aired on state television, Khamenei rejected Trump’s calls for Iran’s surrender, and said Tehran had delivered a “slap to America’s face” by striking a US airbase in Qatar

Trump replied, in remarks to reporters and on social media: “Look, you’re a man of great faith. A man who’s highly respected in his country. You have to tell the truth. You got beat to hell.”

Iran has acknowledged that more than 900 people were killed in the war, as well as thousands injured. Iran’s retaliatory missile attacks on Israel killed at least 28 people there.

The ceasefire between the two countries took hold on June 24.

Since then, Iran has confirmed serious damage to its nuclear facilities, and denied access to them for inspectors from the United Nations’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The IAEA’s inspectors had stayed in the Iranian capital throughout the fighting, even as Israel attacked Iranian military sites and killed several of the country’s most senior commanders and top scientists, as well as hundreds of civilians.

However, they left after Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian signed a law suspending cooperation with the IAEA on Wednesday.

IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi on Friday stressed “the crucial importance” of dialogue with Iran to resume monitoring and verification work of its nuclear programme as soon as possible.

Iran was holding talks with the US on its nuclear programme when Israel launched its attacks. The US has been seeking a new agreement after Trump pulled the US out of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which Tehran signed with world powers in 2015.

Iranian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abbas Araghchi separately said on Thursday that the country remains committed to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), dismissing speculation that Iran would leave the international accord.

US president says Iranian Supreme Leader’s alleged ‘anger, hatred, disgust’ led him to drop work on sanctions relief.

President Donald Trump has hit out at Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s claim that Iran won its recent 12-day war with Israel, also saying the United States will “absolutely” bomb the country again if it pursues nuclear weapons.

The US president launched a torrent of abuse at Iran’s Supreme Leader on his Truth Social platform on Friday, claiming he had saved Khamenei from “A VERY UGLY AND IGNOMINIOUS DEATH” and accusing him of “blatantly and foolishly” lying when he claimed “victory” in the war the previous day.

In his first sortie since the Israel-Iran war ended with a ceasefire earlier this week, Khamenei had also said Iran “slapped America in the face” by launching missiles at a major US base in Qatar following US attacks on Iranian nuclear sites at Fordow, Isfahan and Natanz.

In Friday’s post, Trump said he had demanded Israel pull back from “the final knockout”.

“His Country was decimated, his three evil Nuclear Sites were OBLITERATED, and I knew EXACTLY where he was sheltered, and would not let Israel, or the U.S. Armed Forces, by far the Greatest and Most Powerful in the World, terminate his life,” he said.

The question of whether US attacks destroyed Iran’s nuclear capabilities is moot – a leaked intelligence report contradicted Trump’s account of events, suggesting the military’s strikes had set the country back by mere months.

The US president said that Khamenei’s comments, which he described as “a statement of anger, hatred, and disgust”, had led him to drop work on “the possible removal of sanctions, and other things, which would have given a much better chance to Iran at a full, fast, and complete recovery”.

Future of nuclear programme

Trump’s rant against Khamenei came on the back of bellicose comments earlier that day at a White House news conference. Asked whether he would consider new air strikes if the recent attacks had not succeeded in ending Iran’s nuclear weapons programme, Trump said, “Sure, without question, absolutely.”

He said he would like inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) or another respected source to be able to inspect Iran’s nuclear sites.

But Iran has approved a bill to suspend cooperation with the IAEA, a move widely seen as a direct response to the strikes.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi indicated on Friday that Tehran may reject any request by the agency for visits to Iranian nuclear sites.

“[IAEA Director General] Grossi’s insistence on visiting the bombed sites under the pretext of safeguards is meaningless and possibly even malign in intent,” Araghchi said on X. “Iran reserves the right to take any steps in defence of its interests, its people and its sovereignty.”

Grossi said on Wednesday that ensuring the resumption of IAEA inspections was his top priority, as none had taken place since Israel began bombing on June 13.

Meanwhile, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz indicated on Friday that his country might still be on a war footing with Iran, saying he had instructed the military to prepare an enforcement plan against the country.

The plan “includes maintaining Israel’s air superiority, preventing nuclear advancement and missile production, and responses to Iran for supporting terrorist activities against Israel”, Katz said.

Katz said on Thursday that Israel had wanted to “eliminate” Khamenei and would not have required US permission to do so.

Katz says Israel has ‘green light’ from US to attack Iran again if Tehran makes ‘progress’ with its nuclear programme.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz has said that his country wanted to kill Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during the recent 12-day war between the two sides that ended this week with a ceasefire.

Katz said on Thursday that Israel would not have needed permission from the United States to kill Khamenei, appearing to refute previous media reports that Washington vetoed the assassination.

“We wanted to eliminate Khamenei, but there was no operational opportunity,” said Katz in an interview with Israel’s Channel 13.

Katz claimed that Khamenei knew an attempt on his life was on the cards, and went “underground to very great depths”, breaking off contact with commanders who replaced Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps leaders assassinated in the first wave of Israeli strikes.

Khamenei released video messages during the war, and there is no evidence to confirm that he was cut off from his generals.

Killing Khamenei would have been a major escalation in the conflict. Besides being the de facto head of state in Iran, the supreme leader is a top spiritual authority for millions of Shia Muslims across the world.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump had both suggested at various times that the war could spark regime change, the latter posting on social media last Sunday that the conflict could “MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN”.

Katz’s comments came amid conflicting reports on the extent of destruction wrought on Iran’s nuclear capability, primarily as a result of the US bombing of sites at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan. Khamenei said on Thursday that the US had “exaggerated” the impact of strikes.

The Israeli defence minister said that his country has a “green light” from Trump to launch another attack on Iran if it were deemed to be making “progress” with its nuclear programme.

“I do not see a situation where Iran will restore the nuclear facilities after the attack,” he said.

For his part, Netanyahu said on Thursday that the outcome of the war presented a “window of opportunity” for further formal diplomatic agreements with Arab states.

The conflict ended with a US-brokered ceasefire after Iran responded to the US strikes with a missile attack on Qatar’s Al Udeid Air Base, which houses US troops.

“We have fought with determination against Iran and achieved a great victory. This victory opens the path to dramatically enlarge the peace accords,” Netanyahu said in a video address, in an apparent reference to the Abraham Accords, which established official ties between Israel and several Arab countries in 2020.

Iran also declared victory after the war, saying that it thwarted the Israeli objectives – namely ending Tehran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programmes – and managed to force Netanyahu to end the assault with the missile strikes that left widespread destruction in Israel.

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Thursday that his country had delivered a “slap to America’s face” by striking a U.S. air base in Qatar and warned against further attacks in his first public comments since a ceasefire agreement with Israel.

Khamenei’s prerecorded speech that aired on Iranian state television, his first appearance since June 19, was filled with warnings and threats directed toward the United States and Israel, the Islamic Republic’s longtime adversaries.

The 86-year-old, a skilled orator known for his forceful addresses to the country’s more than 90 million people, appeared more tired than he had just a week ago, speaking in a hoarse voice and occasionally stumbling over his words.

The supreme leader downplayed U.S. strikes on three Iranian nuclear sites Sunday using bunker-buster bombs and cruise missiles, saying that President Trump — who said the attack “completely and fully obliterated” Iran’s nuclear program — had exaggerated its impact.

“They could not achieve anything significant,” Khamenei said. Missing from his more than 10-minute video message was any mention of Iran’s nuclear program and the status of their facilities and centrifuges after extensive U.S. and Israeli strikes.

His characterization of Monday’s strike on the U.S. air base in Qatar contrasted with U.S. accounts of it as a limited attack with no casualties.

The White House responded to Khamenei’s video, accusing him of trying to “save face.”

“Any commonsense, open-minded person knows the truth about the precision strikes on Saturday night,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Thursday. “They were wildly successful.”

U.N. nuclear watchdog confirms damage to Iran sites

The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, International Atomic Energy Agency Director Rafael Grossi, reiterated Thursday that the damage done by Israeli and U.S. strikes at Iranian nuclear facilities “is very, very, very considerable” and that he can only assume the centrifuges are not operational.

“I think annihilated is too much, but it suffered enormous damage,” Grossi told French broadcaster RFI. The IAEA has not been allowed to visit any of the Iranian facilities to do an independent assessment of the damage.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Esmail Baghaei, also conceded Wednesday that “our nuclear installations have been badly damaged, that’s for sure.”

Khamenei has not been seen in public since taking shelter in a secret location after the outbreak of the war on June 13, when Israel attacked Iranian nuclear facilities and targeted top military commanders and scientists.

After Sunday’s attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, Trump was able to help negotiate a ceasefire that came into effect Tuesday.

Iranian leader warns U.S. against further attacks

Khamenei claimed the U.S. had only intervened in the war because “it felt that if it did not intervene, the Zionist regime would be utterly destroyed.”

“It entered the war to save them, yet it gained nothing,” he said.

He said his country’s attack Monday on the U.S. base in Qatar was significant, since it shows Iran “has access to important U.S. centers in the region and can act against them whenever it deems necessary.”

“The Islamic Republic was victorious and, in retaliation, delivered a hand slap to America’s face,” he said, adding, “This action can be repeated in the future.”

“Should any aggression occur, the enemy will definitely pay a heavy price,” he said.

Trump has dismissed the retaliatory attack as a “very weak response,” saying that the U.S. had been warned by Iran in advance and emphasizing that there had been no casualties.

With the ceasefire, life slowly returns to normal in Iran

On Thursday, Iran partially reopened its airspace, which had been closed since the war began, and shops in Tehran’s capital began to reopen, with traffic returning to the streets.

Majid Akhavan, spokesperson for the Ministry of Roads and Urban Development, said Iran had reopened its airspace for the eastern half of the country to domestic and international flights, including those transiting Iranian airspace.

Earlier this week, Tehran said 606 people had been killed in the conflict in Iran, with 5,332 people wounded. The Washington-based Human Rights Activists group released figures Wednesday suggesting Israeli strikes on Iran had killed at least 1,054 and wounded 4,476.

The group, which has provided detailed casualty figures from multiple rounds of unrest in Iran, said 417 of those killed were civilians and 318 were security forces.

At least 28 people were killed in Israel and more than 1,000 wounded, according to officials there. During the 12-day war, Iran fired more than 550 missiles at Israel with a 90% interception rate, according to new statistics released by Israeli authorities Thursday. Israel, meantime, hit more than 720 Iranian military infrastructure targets and eight nuclear-related sites, Israel said.

Trump has also asserted that American and Iranian officials will talk next week, giving rise to cautious hope for longer-term peace.

Iran has not acknowledged that any such talks would take place, though U.S. Mideast envoy Steve Witkoff has said there has been direct and indirect communication between the countries. A sixth round of U.S.-Iran negotiations was scheduled for earlier this month in Oman but was canceled after Israel attacked Iran.

Iran has insisted that it will not give up its nuclear program. In a vote underscoring the tough path ahead, its parliament agreed Wednesday to fast-track a proposal that would effectively stop the country’s cooperation with the IAEA, which has monitored the program for years.

Amiri and Rising write for the Associated Press. The AP’s John Leicester in Paris and Natalie Melzer in Nahariya, Israel, and Aamer Madhani in Washington contributed to this report.

The Russian president says Iran’s nuclear programme continues and society remains united behind political leadership.

Russian President Vladimir Putin declined to comment on speculation that Israel or the United States may try to assassinate Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and continued to push for a political solution to the Iran-Israel conflict during a meeting with international journalists.

“If I may, I hope that this will be the most correct answer to your question. I do not even want to discuss this possibility. I do not want to,” he said in response to questions about Khamenei on Thursday from the sidelines of the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said earlier this week that the conflict could lead to regime change in Iran, where Israeli attacks have targeted senior military leaders and top nuclear scientists.

Israeli strikes have killed at least 585 people, among them 239 civilians, since last Friday, according to a US-based Iranian human rights group.

US President Donald Trump earlier said that Washington knew the location of Khamenei. He said the US would not act for now, although he has not ruled out the possibility that the US may join Israel’s attack on Iran.

Despite the threats from Netanyahu, Putin said that Iranian society remains united behind its government.

“We see that today in Iran, with all the complexity of the internal political processes taking place there … that there is a consolidation of society around the country’s political leadership,” he said.

The Russian leader has presented himself in recent days as a possible mediator between the two sides, although his overtures have been rebuffed by world leaders like Trump due to Moscow’s close ties with Tehran.

Despite the roadblocks, Putin has continued to push for a peaceful resolution that would need to ensure Iran’s “peaceful nuclear activities” and the “interests of Israel from the point of view of the unconditional security of the Jewish state”.

“This is a delicate issue, and of course, we need to be very careful here, but in my opinion, a solution can be found,” he said.

Russia has yet to supply Iran with weapons, despite signing a strategic partnership in January, he said, although it continues to help with Iran’s nuclear programme. Tehran says this programme is designed for civilian use and has consistently denied seeking a bomb, but Israel claims Iran intends to build a nuclear weapon.

Putin said Tehran’s nuclear programme continues underground despite the recent Israeli air strikes.

“These underground factories, they exist, nothing has happened to them,” Putin said.

Putin also said that more than 200 Russians continue to work at the Russian-built Bushehr nuclear power plant in southern Iran. The group is safe, he said, after Moscow “agreed with the leadership of Israel that their security would be ensured”.

June 17 (UPI) — Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is an “easy target,” and Iran should surrender unconditionally, President Donald Trump said Tuesday before Iran’s leader countered with his own warning, “the battle begins.”

As Iran fired two hypersonic missile barrages into Israel on Tuesday night, Khamenei wrote in a post on X, “In the name of the noble Haidar, the battle begins,” along with an image of fire raining down on an ancient city.

In a separate X account, he wrote in English, “We must give a strong response to the terrorist Zionist regime. We will show the Zionists no mercy.”

There were no injuries reported in Iran’s attacks, as Israel Defense Forces issued an evacuation order before a new wave of airstrikes in Tehran.

Earlier Tuesday, Trump urged Khamenei to surrender.

“We know exactly where the so-called ‘Supreme Leader’ is hiding,” Trump said in a Truth Social post.

“He is an easy target but is safe there — we are not going to take him out (kill!), at least not for now,” Trump continued.

“But we don’t want missiles shot at civilians or American soldiers,” he said, adding, “Our patience is wearing thin.”

In a subsequent post, Trump simply stated, “Unconditional surrender!” in all capital letters.

Trump said he hasn’t reached out to Iranian leaders and isn’t “in the mood” to negotiate with them, ABC News reported.

He said Israel has “complete and total control of the skies over Iran” due to “American-made, conceived and manufactured” arms.

Trump posted his comments after Israeli and Iranian forces continued exchanging aerial assaults during the fifth day of the active war between the two nations.

The president met with military advisers shortly after returning early from the G7 conference in Canada on Tuesday due to the situation in the Middle East.

Israeli forces are targeting ballistic missile launch sites and command centers in central Iran.

“We’ve struck deep, hitting Iran’s nuclear ballistic capabilities,” Israel Defense Forces said in a statement.

“We have delivered significant blows to the Iranian regime, and as such, they have been pushed back into central Iran,” the IDF statement says.

“They are now focusing their efforts on conducting missile fire from the area of Isfahan.”

Meanwhile, Iranian officials have issued warnings to civilians in Tel Aviv and Haifa to evacuate because they are targeted for a “punitive operation.”

“The operations carried out so far have merely been warnings for deterrence,” Iran’s commander-in-chief Abdolrahim Mousavi said on Tuesday. “A punitive operation will be executed soon.”

He referred to the Israeli cities as “occupied territories” and said residents should leave them “for their own safety and not to become victims of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu’s barbaric actions.”

The U.S. embassy in Israel announced it will close Wednesday for three days due to the escalating conflict.

“As a result of the current security situation and ongoing conflict between Israel and Iran, the U.S. Embassy has directed that all U.S. government employees and their family members continue to shelter in place and near their residences until further notice.”

The embassy, located in Jerusalem, said it had no information to assist private U.S. citizens who want to leave the country, adding that Israel’s largest airport, Ben Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv, is closed.

Negotiations between Washington and Tehran looking shaky as Iran resists US negotiator Witkoff’s ‘red line’.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has derided demands from the United States that it halt nuclear enrichment as negotiations between the two countries hang in the balance.

“Saying things like ‘We will not allow Iran to enrich uranium’ is nonsense. No one [in Iran] is waiting for others’ permission,” said Khamenei in a speech reported by the country’s semi-official Mehr News Agency on Tuesday.

He added that he did not know whether talks would “bring results”.

Since mid-April, Washington and Tehran have held four rounds of Omani-mediated talks aimed at getting Iran to limit its nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief.

However, repeated clashes between the pair have thrown the next round of negotiations, which the news agency Reuters said were expected to take place in Rome at the weekend, into doubt.

US President Donald Trump ditched the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action signed by Iran and world powers during his last term in office. Intent on striking a new deal since his return to power in January, he has revived his “maximum pressure” approach against Iran, warning last week that talks needed to “move quickly or something bad is going to happen”.

Tehran confirmed on Tuesday that it has received and is reviewing a US proposal, but Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi had said the previous day that talks would fail if Washington insisted that Tehran refrained from domestic enrichment of uranium, which the US says is a possible pathway to developing nuclear bombs.

Iran currently enriches uranium to 60 percent, far above the 3.67-percent limit set in the 2015 deal but below the 90 percent needed for a nuclear warhead. It has repeatedly insisted its programme is for peaceful purposes and is “non-negotiable”.

However, US negotiator Steve Witkoff has dubbed the continuation of the programme a “red line”. On Sunday, he reiterated that the US “cannot allow even 1 percent of an enrichment capability”.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Sunday that a deal ensuring Iran would not have nuclear weapons was “within reach”.

However, he underlined, Iran would continue enriching uranium “with or without a deal”.

In addressing the talks regarding Iran’s peaceful nuclear program, our U.S. interlocutors are naturally free to publicly state whatever they deem fit to ward off Special Interest groups; malign actors which set the agendas of at least previous Administrations.

Iran can only…

— Seyed Abbas Araghchi (@araghchi) May 18, 2025