Within the weeks since Israel’s expansive 12-day struggle, Iran’s Ideal Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has hardly been observed in public.
That absence has inevitably resulted in hypothesis over the 86-year-old’s well being. Nevertheless it additionally left many Center East observers questioning concerning the long run course of the republic, and the way its management will reply to perhaps Iran’s greatest demanding situations because the Iran-Iraq struggle of the Nineteen Eighties.
The assaults via Israel, and later the U.S., struck loads of goals around the nation and resulted within the deaths of over 1,000 other folks, together with lots of Iran’s best army commanders and nuclear scientists.
Nevertheless it used to be all of the extra stark, for the ones in Tehran, for the way it stuck the Islamic Republic via wonder. Certainly, Iran were engaged in good-faith diplomatic talks with the USA.
It used to be, within the phrases of Hassan Rouhani, the previous president and doable successor to Khamenei, a “wake-up call to correct our course and rebuild the foundations of governance.”
However will the chief heed that decision? As a student of Iranian and Center Jap political views, I imagine the war has supplied the chance for the Iranian management to reestablish itself with some perception of regeneration that might appease each the standard conservatives in addition to the ones in search of reform with the home established order.
The ayatollah’s largest catch 22 situation
As Iran civilian and army goals had been being hit via repeated Israeli airstrikes, and intelligence operations had been choosing off senior govt and army officers, Khamenei used to be reportedly commanding from a protected bunker.
Already cognizant of the possible danger to his safety earlier than the most recent war, the ideal chief is understood to have thought to be contingency succession plans and reputedly named doable successors will have to he perish. Those names weren’t publicly launched however had been rumored to not have incorporated his son, Mojtaba Khamenei, however is alleged to have incorporated a few of his closest allies.
Being cloistered from the war and taking into account his doable coming near near dying underscored simply how underneath the highlight Khamenei’s management has turn out to be. One of the crucial global’s longest-serving leaders, and as soon as observed because the unifying axis of the Islamic Republic in addition to heir of the legacy of the Iranian Revolution’s founding father, Ayatollah Khomeini, the ideal chief is now going through uncommon scrutiny from quite a lot of quarters.
An Iranian guy carries a tender lady and issues at a destroyed residential construction focused amid the Iran-Israel 12-day struggle in Tehran, Iran, on July 21, 2025.
Photograph via Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto by means of Getty Photographs
Whilst Khamenei nonetheless earned legit reward from components of his coalition over the dealing with of the struggle, critics have wondered his strategic dealing with of the war with Israel, arguing that the disagreement uncovered Iran’s army vulnerabilities with out turning in significant positive factors – one thing Iran has contested vehemently in its personal analysis of the war.
In the meantime, some level to his complex age and long-standing resistance to switch as stumbling blocks to the rustic’s political and financial revival, with even his closest adviser, Ali Akbar Velayati, suggesting now could be the time for reform.
Reform or redouble?
Given this confluence of unfavorable occasions and perceptions, Khamenei now faces a call. He nonetheless instructions deep loyalty amongst conservative home audiences and the safety established order, but his govt’s status past this is receiving extra critique than ever.
On the identical time, the postwar panorama has created a gap for reform that might shore up the Islamic Republic’s long run, calm social pressures and reopen doorways to international relations and funding.
One trail for Khamanei could be to stay as ideal chief however progressively delegate, signaling managed trade from inside of. Any other, extra dramatic choice would echo Pope Benedict XVI’s precedent: a proper abdication that preserves his non secular and symbolic status, permitting him to handle a ‘Leader Emeritus’ name, whilst moving daily authority to a successor empowered to slowly introduce incremental reform with out publicly diminishing him. Any such staged handover may just let the device adapt, give more youthful elites political area and make allowance coverage shifts to continue with out the perception of dropping credibility.
However there additionally stays the truth that Khamenei’s dependable conservative fans command a powerful pull with home audiences. And the ones factions, particularly after the most recent war, will likely be much less susceptible to believe reform and way more enthusiastic about cracking down on doable knowledge leaks that led Israel to habits such exact operations towards army elites within the first position.
But given the location of the federal government, reform is inevitably at the schedule once more. And one of the reforms being quietly mentioned come with loosening web restrictions, specifically on in style social media platforms extensively utilized by Iran’s huge and younger inhabitants.
Get entry to to virtual areas has turn out to be now not only a cultural and financial factor however a marker of generational tradition. Within the wake of the 2022 demise of Mahsa Amini, whose detention via morality police and next demise resulted in in style protests, Iran’s leaders have confronted calls to revise the federal government’s strict morality regulations. If the federal government made reforms to that finish, that have already been unofficially and anecdotally reported in puts, it might lend a hand ease tensions with girls and more youthful Iranians with out essentially difficult the device’s foundations.
At the global entrance, Iran has already begun to recalibrate its international coverage, as mirrored in its accession to the BRICS workforce of countries in 2024. This transfer suggests a want to turn out to be much less isolationist and to interact extra actively at the international level. Additional steps may just come with in search of club in different global establishments and organizations in alternate for commitments on regional and international problems, together with enhanced cooperation with nuclear watchdogs and regulatory our bodies.
If a hit, that would possibly free up long-stalled funding alternatives and industry partnerships, serving to to restore an financial system hit via years of U.S.-imposed sanctions and isolation. Every of those steps, whilst modest in isolation, may just sign a broader shift – now not in a complete in a single day transformation, however a wary adaptation that displays a willingness to evolve.
The million-dollar query
That is all associated with probably the most urgent global query of Iran’s nuclear program, which stays unresolved regardless of the hot war and reported serious injury from U.S. bunker-busting moves. Tehran continues to insist that its nuclear ambitions are purely non violent and civilian in nature and could be detest to desert this system.
For the Islamic Republic, this system is greater than a strategic deterrent; it stands as a marker of nationwide delight and technological development. Whether or not underneath the present ideal chief or a long run successor, the problem will stay central to the id and long-term imaginative and prescient of the state.
Iran’s Ideal Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei holds a gathering with senior officers at his place of dwelling in Tehran, Iran, on April 15, 2025.
Photograph via Iranian Chief Press Place of work/Handout/Anadolu by means of Getty Photographs
Regardless of threats to drag out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty throughout the hot war with Israel, Iran stays a signatory and maintains that its nuclear program operates inside the bounds of global regulation.
But any transfer towards larger transparency or cooperation will have to be weighed towards previous revel in. The 2015 nuclear settlement, as soon as hailed as a diplomatic leap forward, in the long run collapsed after the USA unilaterally withdrew and reimposed financial sanctions on Tehran throughout President Donald Trump’s first time period. Within the aftermath of the Iran deal’s fall, Iran used to be focused via a sequence of covert operations and army moves extensively attributed to Israel and even – in relation to assassinated normal Qassem Soleimani – the U.S. Those occasions have bolstered skepticism inside of Tehran’s management concerning the reliability of Western commitments and the prices of compromise.
As such, whilst a extra open and cooperative posture may just in principle result in eased sanctions, renewed industry and a trail to global legitimacy, it additionally dangers undermining Iran’s self-styled mantle of resistance to American and Israel regional coverage. For any reformist shift to realize traction, it must reconcile Iran’s want for financial restoration with the crucial of holding ideological credibility at house and projecting resilience in a foreign country.
All of this will likely weigh on Khamenei, who has general say in all international and home coverage issues. Opting for to reform whilst nonetheless alive and in energy may just permit him to form his legacy on his personal phrases, holding the core of the Islamic Revolution whilst gently steerage the rustic towards essential trade.
In doing so, he might also discover a uncommon stability between custom and modernity that speaks to each dependable conservatives and a era hungry for reform. The struggle, sarcastically, could have offered Khamenei with the chance to string that needle. The large query now could be will he.
