Iran Confirms Khamenei Is Dead. The Succession Crisis Has Already Begun.

In Westwood, Los Angeles — the heart of what locals call Tehrangeles — fireworks cracked over Wilshire Boulevard before dawn. A woman who'd emigrated from Tehran a decade ago brought her husband, infant son, and mother to the street. She told the LA Times she hoped the shah's dynasty would return. Around her, hundreds waved pre-revolution Iranian flags and held up posters of Donald Trump.

Six thousand miles east, Iranian state television was reading a very different script. At approximately 2 a.m. local time on Sunday, the broadcast confirmed what Trump had announced hours earlier on Truth Social: Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of Iran since 1989, was dead. Killed in the opening salvos of a joint U.S.-Israeli strike campaign that's still underway.

The government declared 40 days of national mourning. State media used the word "martyrdom."

We reported earlier when Iran was still denying the death and the evidence was a mix of Israeli intelligence claims and diplomatic hedging. That ambiguity is gone now. The question isn't whether Khamenei is dead. It's what happens next.

What we know

Trump broke the news first. "Khamenei, one of the most evil people in History, is dead," he wrote on Truth Social. He called it "the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country." He also said the strikes wouldn't stop.

He wasn't bluffing. U.S. Central Command confirmed Saturday night that operations were still underway, posting on X: "The Iranian regime was warned. CENTCOM is now delivering swift and decisive action as directed." Targets include IRGC command-and-control facilities, air defense systems, missile launch sites, and military airfields.

Trump told NBC News that "the people that make all the decisions, most of them are gone." He told CBS a diplomatic solution is now "easily" possible — "much easier now than it was a day ago, obviously, because they are getting beat up badly."

Iran's response has been to keep fighting. The Strait of Hormuz was reportedly closed by IRGC naval forces. Ships transiting the waterway received VHF messages: no passage allowed. Oil shipments paused. The global energy market held its breath.

The succession question

Iran's constitution is clear on paper. Article 111 says when the Supreme Leader dies, the Assembly of Experts — an 88-member body of senior clerics — must immediately convene and appoint a successor.

In practice, nothing about this is simple.

The Assembly's chairman is 92-year-old Ayatollah Mohammad-Ali Movahedi Kermani. Several members may not have survived the strikes. It's unclear whether the body can even physically convene in a country being actively bombed.

Before his death, Khamenei reportedly designated three potential successors. Their names haven't been publicly confirmed. The most discussed candidates include his son Mojtaba Khamenei, who ran the Office of the Supreme Leader but held no formal political role, and Hassan Khomeini, grandson of the Islamic Republic's founder.

Mojtaba faces a constitutional problem. The Supreme Leader is supposed to have political and religious qualifications. Analysts at the Washington Institute have noted Mojtaba lacks the formal political track record. Hassan Khomeini carries the revolutionary lineage but has been blocked before — Iran International reported the Guardian Council barred him from running for the Assembly of Experts in previous elections.

Then there's the IRGC wildcard.

The generals

A CIA assessment leaked to Reuters before the strikes predicted exactly this scenario: even if Khamenei died, hardline IRGC elements would fill the vacuum. The assessment warned that what replaces Khamenei could be worse — a military junta with a clerical figurehead.

Forbes reported four possible trajectories. The most likely: the IRGC security apparatus coalesces around collective leadership while a compliant cleric is installed as Supreme Leader. Nobody's clearly in charge of deciding when the missiles stop.

Key figures are missing from the picture. IRGC Commander-in-Chief Hossein Salami and Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri — the two highest-ranking military officials after Khamenei — were reportedly targeted. Their status is unknown. Ali Larijani, a former IRGC commander now running the Supreme National Security Council, had been effectively managing critical affairs since January. Whether he survived is also unclear.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio acknowledged during a Senate hearing in January that "no one knows who would take over" if Khamenei died. That was hypothetical then. It's operational now.

Two funerals

The world is reacting in split screen.

In the diaspora, the mood is euphoric. Fox News quoted Iranian-American commentator Lisa Daftari: "Iranian people all over the world, from Los Angeles to Tehran, are on the streets celebrating in sheer jubilation over the dawn of a new and free Iran." In London, crowds gathered with the same pre-revolution flags. The Daily Mail described "hundreds of jubilant Persians."

Inside Iran, state media frames a martyrdom narrative. Forty days of mourning. Defiance. The missiles keep flying even without their commander.

World leaders have been cautious. AP reported that governments were "much quicker to condemn the U.S. and Israeli strikes initially on Saturday morning, raising concerns about international law violations, than to respond to Khamenei's death." China expressed "deep concern." Most Western allies stayed quiet. The South China Morning Post noted the global divide: celebration in some capitals, alarm in others.

A former NATO commander told Fortune that Iran is now on "death ground" — Sun Tzu's term for a position where an army fights because retreat isn't possible. The strikes targeted naval assets in the Persian Gulf, potentially degrading Iran's ability to enforce its Hormuz closure. Trump vowed to obliterate Iran's navy entirely.

What comes next

The 86-year-old ayatollah ruled Iran for 36 years. His death creates the first succession crisis since Khomeini died in 1989 — except this time, the country is under active bombardment, its military command structure is fractured, and the constitutional process for choosing a new leader may be physically impossible to execute.

The IRGC doesn't need a Supreme Leader to launch missiles. That much is clear from the last 24 hours. But it does need one to negotiate, to surrender, or to pivot. Without clear authority at the top, Iran's war machine runs on autopilot — which might be the most dangerous outcome of all.

The celebrations in Westwood might be premature. The mourning in Tehran might be performative. What's certain is that the Islamic Republic just lost the only leader most of its citizens have ever known, and no one — not the Assembly of Experts, not the IRGC, not the CIA, not Donald Trump — knows what fills that void.