Iran has the “legitimate duty and right” to avenge the Israeli-U.S. killing of its longtime supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, declared Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Sunday morning.
“The assassination of the highest political authority of the Islamic Republic of Iran and a prominent leader of Shia Islam worldwide,” he stated, “is perceived as an open declaration of war against Muslims.”
The Islamic regime “considers it its legitimate duty and right to avenge the perpetrators and masterminds of this historic crime,” Pezeshkian added.
Khamenei, 86, was eliminated in a joint U.S.-Israeli airstrike targeting his fortified compound in Tehran on Saturday morning local time.
U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed Khamenei’s death on Saturday evening, calling the dictator “one of the most evil people in history.”
“This is not only justice for the people of Iran, but for all great Americans, and those people from many countries throughout the world, that have been killed or mutilated by Khamenei and his gang of bloodthirsty thugs,” the president wrote on his Truth Social platform.
Ali Larijani, Iran’s most senior defense official, announced on Sunday morning that an “interim leadership council” would be formed to govern the country until Khamenei’s successor is appointed.
Larijani, who heads the Supreme National Security Council, accused Israel and the U.S. of breaking “the heart of the Iranian people” by killing Khamenei, vowing to “put a dagger” in them in response.
