New Yorkers respond to death of Ayatollah Khamenei

As U.S. politicians and protesters strongly condemned the country’s major attack on Iran, New Yorkers of Iranian descent on Sunday expressed a mix of joy and concern following the death of Ayatollah Khamenei in U.S. and Israeli military strikes.

Milad Hour, 40, said he drove from his home in Connecticut to the Ravagh Persan Grill on Madison Ave. at Flatiron, where Persian flags adorned the grounds, “in celebration”, noting: “They killed Khamenei. So we are very happy about that.”

“It’s a little complicated,” acknowledged Hour, who teaches marketing at Fairfield University, has lived in the United States for about seven years and has participated in protests in his native Iran. “We are asking the United States or Israel to attack Iran when we are Iranians. Because the problem is…we don’t see them as the government,” he explained, adding: “They are extremists.”

Hour said he was perplexed by the condolences from his liberal friends.

“What I don’t understand is that I get a lot of messages,” he says. “I mean, I hear from a lot of people who are liberal, from a liberal party, but what they’re saying is we’re really sorry for this problem that you’re in right now, this situation that [the] The United States attacks Iran.

“The fact is…we’re happy about it because we asked for help,” Hour said.

Mayor Mamdani, in an article on X, called the attack a “catastrophic escalation in an illegal war of aggression.”

About 400 protesters marched from Times Square to Columbus Circle on Saturday to show their opposition to the attacks.

“We are celebrating,” said Yosef Baheri, 38. Baheri, who holds a Ph.D. student in computer science at Stony Brook University, an Iranian Jew who came to the United States four years ago.

Baheri was thrown in jail for three days for protesting the Iranian regime in 2009, during which time government agents broke two of his fingers, he said.

“I believe it is for peace and for the benefit of all Americans, all Jews, everywhere,” Baheri said.

“Thank you, America. God bless America. God bless Donald J. Trump,” he exclaimed.

Khamenei, 87, in power for more than three decades, was seen by critics as a repressive authoritarian responsible for the massacre of thousands of protesters and other human rights abuses.

Some at the restaurant had a more measured response.

Sepehr Zunoubi, 17, a high school student born in the United States but whose parents are from Tehran, entered the restaurant after visiting New York University.

Sepehr has said he wants the regime to end, but he believes outside military action could undermine Iranian autonomy and pave the way for U.S. and Israeli control of the country.

“At the moment it’s really not clear to give a solid answer. But I’m not very confident in this decision yet,” Sepehr said. “I would like to see this play out and see how we’re going to, you know, work towards a democracy there. I think that’s what we want most.”

“I can’t say for sure that the Persians inside Iran feel the same way I do right now, so I can’t really speak for them,” Sepehr said. “But I can speak for my own perspective. I basically think it’s a good step in the right direction, but I just have to see it executed.”

“Hopefully the country can return to the democracy we had before,” he said.