The Islamic regime is still in power in Iran, and that’s bad news for the Iranian people and the world at large. There is, however, good news: It is not at all clear who is in charge of the Islamic Republic of Iran at this point, and that could well herald the regime’s coming demise.
The new supreme leader, 56-year-old nepo baby Mojtaba Khamenei, still hasn’t appeared in public since he ascended to his exalted position, and now what Reuters described Saturday as “three people close to his inner circle” are confirming what has been rumored for weeks: Khamenei was severely injured in the airstrike that killed his father. He is so badly hurt that he may never be able to assume the full duties of his position, and all lovers of freedom can hope that his condition is a metaphor for the condition of the Islamic Republic as a whole.
The three insiders, who asked to remain anonymous so as to avoid ending up in Tehran’s notorious and blood-spattered Evin Prison, said that Khamenei was “still recovering from severe facial and leg injuries.” It seems that Mojtaba’s “face was disfigured in the attack on the supreme leader’s compound in central Tehran and he suffered a significant injury to one or both legs.”
These “insiders” hastened to assure the world that these serious injuries didn’t mean that Baby Supremo wasn’t performing his duties. The younger Khamenei, they insisted, was “nonetheless recovering from his wounds and remains mentally sharp.” Mojtaba is even “taking part in meetings with senior officials via audio conferencing and is engaged in decision-making on major issues including the war and negotiations with Washington.”
Well, maybe. Reuters noted that Khamenei’s “whereabouts, condition and ability to rule still largely remain a mystery to the public, with no photo, video or audio recording of him published since the air attack and his subsequent appointment as his father’s replacement on March 8.”
Yet we have heard from him, after a manner of speaking. Fox News reported Saturday that “despite his weakened condition, Khamenei vowed to put up resistance in a defiant written statement Thursday.” In this written statement, he supposedly said: “Iran is not seeking war but will not forfeit its rights and considers all resistance fronts as a unified entity.”
Terrific, but Secretary of War Pete Hegseth was quick to point out not just that the emperor had no clothes, but that he hadn’t even been seen at all: “It was a written statement,” Hegseth pointed out. “Iran has plenty of cameras and plenty of voice recorders. Why a written statement? I think you know why. His father, dead. He’s scared, he’s injured, he’s on the run and he lacks legitimacy. It’s a mess for them. Who’s in charge? Iran may not even know.”
Certainly the Iranian leadership doesn’t seem to be in any hurry to answer that question. Reuters said that Iran’s mission to the United Nations “did not respond to Reuters questions about the extent of Khamenei’s injuries or the reason he has not yet appeared in any images or recordings, and “there has been no official Iranian statement on the extent of Khamenei’s injuries.”
The Islamic regime did, however, admit that Khamenei was hurt: “a newsreader on state television described him as a ‘janbaz,’ a term used for those badly wounded in war, after he was named supreme leader.” Some say he has lost a leg. Nevertheless, one of the insiders who spilled the beans to Reuters remained optimistic, saying that “images of the supreme leader could be expected to be released within one or two months and that he might even appear in public then, although all three sources stressed he would only emerge when his health and the security situation allowed.”
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It’s hard to imagine that all of this could be an elaborate deception from this most deceptive of regimes, as the mullahs would like nothing better than to present a hale and hearty supreme leader to a watching world. On the other hand, Mojtaba Khamenei could be dead, and all this talk about his facial injuries and how he lost a leg is just an attempt to buy time for a regime that has lost a great deal of its leadership in the American and Israeli airstrikes.
The longsuffering Iranian people, meanwhile, are keeping their spirits up: “Khamenei’s absence is widely discussed on Iranian social media and in messaging app groups, when the country’s patchy internet allows, with conspiracy theories widespread about his condition and who is running the country. One popular meme circulating online is a picture of an empty chair under a spotlight with the slogan ‘Where is Mojtaba?’”
Where indeed. We can hope, for the sake of the Iranian people, that soon the definitive answer will emerge, and that wherever he is, he is not wielding power in Tehran or anywhere else.
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