President Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran said on Sunday that an interim leadership council established after the killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had begun its work and reaffirmed his earlier pledges to avenge Khamenei’s death.
“The US and Israel should know that nothing will come of this except their own downfall,” Pezeshkian said in a recorded video statement broadcast on state television. “The armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran are acting decisively to crush the foundations of the enemies,” he added.
Iran’s top national security official had earlier said that an interim council would be formed on Sunday to rule the country after Khamenei was assassinated in an Israeli strike.
In comments carried by Iranian state media, Ali Larijani, the security official, said the President, the head of the judiciary and a member of the Council of Guardians, a powerful group of jurists, would temporarily govern until a new leader was chosen.
The move suggested that the Islamic Republic was keen to project a sense of continuity after the death of its longtime ruler, who was at the centre of the country’s theocratic system.
Before he was killed, Khamenei had delegated much of the running of the country to Larijani, a veteran politician and former commander in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps. The rise of Larijani had sidelined Pezeshkian.
“Yesterday Iran fired missiles at the United States and Israel, and they did hurt,” Larijani said on Sunday in a post on social media. “Today we will hit them with a force that they have never experienced before.”
During Iran’s 12-day war with Israel last year, Khamenei named three candidates who could succeed him, but they were never publicly identified. Though Larijani appears to be largely running the country, he is not regarded as a candidate because he is not a senior Shiite cleric — a fundamental qualification for any successor.
Larijani was, however, ensconced in Khamenei’s trusted circle. He was in charge of using lethal force to crush the recent protests demanding the end of Islamic rule, liaising with Iran’s powerful allies, like Russia. He also oversaw nuclear negotiations with Washington, and was tasked with devising plans on what to do if war with the US were to break out.
In the weeks before the assault, the Iranian leadership had been preparing for its political survival, as well as military and security mobilisations.
Those deliberations, described by officials familiar with the planning, touched on a range of matters, including who would manage the country if Khamenei and top officials were killed.
New York Times News Service