Why the United States and Israel Chose Saturday to Carry Out Strikes on Iran and Target Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei”
Israel said that Ali Khamenei was killed along with several senior officials, including Ali Shamkhani, the influential former secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, and Mohammad Pakpour, a commander in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Two Iranian sources told Reuters that Khamenei had met on Saturday with Shamkhani and Supreme National Security Council Secretary Ali Larijani at a secure location shortly before the strikes began. A senior Israeli official also told Reuters that Khamenei’s body had been recovered.
U.S. President Donald Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform that Iran’s top leader was killed after intelligence services tracked his movements. “He was unable to avoid our Intelligence and Highly Sophisticated Tracking Systems and, working closely with Israel, there was not a thing he, or the other leaders that have been killed along with him, could do,” Trump wrote.
The joint U.S. and Israeli air and naval strikes across Iran have pushed the Middle East into a volatile and unpredictable new phase of conflict. Iran has responded with retaliatory attacks against Israel and nearby Gulf Arab states.
Two U.S. sources and another U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said confirmation of Khamenei’s meeting with senior advisers triggered the Israeli-U.S. military operation. According to one U.S. official, the strike plan required hitting Khamenei first to preserve the element of surprise, amid concerns he might go into hiding if given the chance.
One source said Khamenei had initially been expected to hold the meeting Saturday evening in Tehran. However, Israeli intelligence detected that the gathering had been moved to Saturday morning, prompting the operation to be accelerated.
While the exact location of the meeting was not immediately confirmed, Khamenei’s high-security compound in Tehran was targeted at the outset of the operation. Satellite imagery reviewed by Reuters indicated that the compound was destroyed.
The broader impact of Khamenei’s death remains uncertain. However, in a pre-strike assessment, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency reportedly concluded that he could be succeeded by hardliners within the IRGC, according to two sources briefed on the intelligence.