US-Israel war on Iran: Donald Trump says Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is dead – latest reports | US-Israel war on Iran
Donald Trump says Ali Khamenei is dead
Donald Trump has said that Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei – “one of the most evil people in history” – is dead.
“This is not only justice for the people of Iran, but for all Great Americans,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
He said of Khamenei: “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.”
“This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country,” Trump went on.
Washington is hearing that many among the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, military and other security and police forces “no longer want to fight”, Trump claimed. He suggested he would now be willing to give them “immunity”.
Significantly, the US president also said that “heavy and pinpoint bombing” would continue “uninterrupted throughout the week or, as long as necessary to achieve our objective”.
We still do not have independent verification, and Trump has not given any evidence for this statement of Khamenei’s death.
Here is what the US president posted on Truth Social in full:
Khamenei, one of the most evil people in History, is dead. 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. 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. This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country. We are hearing that many of their IRGC, Military, and other Security and Police Forces, no longer want to fight, and are looking for Immunity from us. As I said last night, “Now they can have Immunity, later they only get Death!” Hopefully, the IRGC and Police will peacefully merge with the Iranian Patriots, and work together as a unit to bring back the Country to the Greatness it deserves. That process should soon be starting in that, not only the death of Khamenei but the Country has been, in only one day, very much destroyed and, even, obliterated. The heavy and pinpoint bombing, however, will continue, uninterrupted throughout the week or, as long as necessary to achieve our objective of PEACE THROUGHOUT THE MIDDLE EAST AND, INDEED, THE WORLD!
Key events
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Marjorie Taylor Greene: ‘This is not what we thought MAGA was supposed to be. Shame!’
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One person dead and 22 injured after Iranian strike on Tel Aviv
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Death toll in Israeli attack on Iranian girls’ elementary school rises to 108
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Four people injured after ‘incident’ at Dubai’s airport that caused ‘minor damage’
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Donald Trump says Ali Khamenei is dead
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UN secretary general ‘not in a position’ to confirm reports on Iran’s supreme leader
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People in Tehran celebrating, witness says
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Iranian missile hits Tel Aviv. Seven people injured, officials say
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Iranian state-linked media denies that Khamenei is dead
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Trump says he feels reports that Khamenei is dead are correct and ‘a lot of’ Iran’s senior leadership killed in strikes
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Zohran Mamdani denounces ‘catastrophic escalation in an illegal war of aggression’
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Iran official warns of ‘mental warfare’ after Israeli reports of Khamenei’s death
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Kamala Harris: ‘Donald Trump is dragging the United States into a war the American people do not want’
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Iran supreme leader is dead – unconfirmed reports say
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‘I can go long or end Iran conflict in two or three days,’ Trump says
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Trump spoke to leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE and Nato chief, White House says
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Netanyahu calls on Iranians to ‘flood the streets’ and seize ‘opportunity’ to topple regime
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Signs show that Khamenei is ‘no longer with us’, says Netanyahu
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‘The American people are being lied to again’, Bernie Sanders says
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Netanyahu speaks after US-Iraeli strikes on Iran
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Iran requests emergency IAEA meeting over ‘wrongful acts of aggressors’
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Erdoğan says US-Israeli strikes on Iran violate its sovereignty
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Kuwait says three army personnel injured in earlier attack on base
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IDF issues evacuation order for Iran’s Isfahan industrial zone
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US military says ‘minimal damage’ and no American casualties in Iran retaliation
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Macron urges diplomacy and says France was not involved in strikes on Iran
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Iran says supreme leader and president ‘safe and sound’
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201 people killed and 747 injured in Iran, media reports
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Death toll rises to 85 after strike on Iranian school
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US secretary of state Rubio briefed Democratic and Republican ‘gang of eight’ on strikes, says White House
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Iran closing Strait of Hormuz, EU naval officials reported as saying
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UN security council to hold emergency meeting
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Netanyahu and Trump hold phone call
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Iran supreme leader and president still alive, says foreign minister
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Maps: US-Israeli joint military operation in Iran, and Tehran’s retaliatory strikes
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Regime change in Iran is ‘mission impossible’, says Tehran foreign minister
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Summary of developments so far
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British planes ‘in the sky’ in Middle East protecting our people, interests and allies, says Starmer
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Reactions from US lawmakers after Trump strikes Iran
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UK, Germany and France condemn Iranian attacks
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Pictured: Tehran compound of Iran’s supreme leader heavily damaged
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Analysis: Trump’s unprovoked attack on Iran has no mandate – or legal basis
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World leaders react to attacks
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Iran will ‘teach aggressors lesson they deserve’, says Tehran foreign minister
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Iran missile strikes Kuwait base hosting Italian troops, official says
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Oman foreign minister ‘dismayed’ by attacks, tells US ‘this is not your war’
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Saudi Arabia condemns Iran attacks against Gulf nations
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40 killed in girls’ school in Iran after US-Israel attack, state media says
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Bahrain authorities evacuate people from US base location
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Airlines that have cancelled flights to the region
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British Airways cancels flights to Tel Aviv and Bahrain
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What we know so far
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Iran’s supreme leader and president were targets of attack – reports
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Analysis: Yet another mid-talks attack jeopardises chances of Iran taking Trump seriously
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Foreign office issues warning to British nationals in region amid attacks
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One person killed in Abu Dhabi, says UAE defence ministry
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Iran targets US bases in Kuwait, UAE, Qatar and Bahrain
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US navy fleet ‘subject to missile attack’ in Bahrain
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Iran launch missiles at US base in Bahrain – report
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Gulf countries close airspace
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Iranian officials ‘main target’ of US-Israel strikes – reports
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‘No red lines’ in Iran’s response to attacks, says official
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Flights suspended and airspaces closed in region
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What we know so far
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Netanyahu: Attacks on Iran to remove ‘existential threat’
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Netanyahu: US-Israel attacks against Iran will allow Iranians to topple Ayatollah regime
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‘Take over your government’, Trump tells Iranian people
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Iran launched missiles at Israel, says IDF
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Schools and workplaces closed in Jerusalem until Monday
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‘We are going to raze their missile industry to the ground’ – Trump
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Lay down your arms or ‘face certain death’, Trump tells Revolutionary Guards
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US military has launched ‘major combat operations’ in Iran – Trump
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Mobile phone services cut in Iran
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Blasts heard in several cities – reports
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Images show smoke rising from Tehran
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Iran closes its airspace
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Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is not in Tehran
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Loud blasts and columns of smoke in Tehran, report AFP journalists
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Israel strikes Iran
Marjorie Taylor Greene: ‘This is not what we thought MAGA was supposed to be. Shame!’
Robert Mackey
Marjorie Taylor Greene, the former Republican congresswoman from Georgia, has denounced the attack on Iran as a betrayal of Donald Trump’s MAGA movement in a series of social media posts on Saturday.
“I did not campaign for this. I did not donate money for this. I did not vote for this, in elections or Congress. This is heartbreaking and tragic. And how many more innocent will die? What about our own military? This is not what we thought MAGA was supposed to be. Shame!” Greene wrote in one post, which included video of a ruined school, where dozens of children were killed in a strike according to Iranian authorities.
Greene, who broke with the president and resigned over her support for a law that required the justice department to release files from the investigations into Jeffrey Epstein, the late sex offender Trump socialized with for nearly two decades, also posted a longer statement denouncing the attack on X, illustrated by a screenshot of a Republican campaign plea from 2024 urging voters to “Vote the pro-peace ticket. Vote Trump-Vance”.
Above that image of the two men she campaigned for, Greene wrote:
We said “No More Foreign Wars, No More Regime Change!” We said it on rally stage after rally stage, speech after speech. Trump, Vance, basically the entire admin campaigned on it and promised to put America FIRST and Make America Great Again. My generation has been let down, abused, and used by our government our entire adult lives and our children’s generation is literally being abandoned. Thousands and thousands of Americans from my generation have been killed and injured in never ending pointless foreign wars and we said no more. But we are freeing the Iranian people. Please. There are 93 million people in Iran, let them liberate themselves. But Iran is on the verge of having nuclear weapons. Yeah sure. We have been spoon fed that line for decades and Trump told us all that his bombing this past summer completely wiped it all out. It’s always a lie and it’s always America Last. But it feels like the worst betrayal this time because it comes from the very man and the admin who we all believed was different and said no more.
Later in the day, Greene shared posts from other social media skeptics of the attack who noted that, even as Trump cited Iran’s nuclear program as a cause of war, the White House website still includes a page from last June headlined: “Iran’s Nuclear Facilities Have Been Obliterated — and Suggestions Otherwise are Fake News”, and argued that the attack was an attempt to distract the American people from the scandal of the president’s long friendship with the late ex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
One of the posts Green shared on Saturday read, in all-caps: “EVEN IF YOU START A NUCLEAR WAR, WE WILL CRAWL OUT OF THE ASHES AS SEVEN-LEGGED MUTANTS DEMANDING THE RELEASE OF THE EPSTEIN FILES.”
One person dead and 22 injured after Iranian strike on Tel Aviv
Fran Lawther
One person has died and 22 others are injured after an Iranian missile strike hit a building in Tel Aviv, according to media reports.
Tel Aviv district’s fire and rescue commander said the building partially collapsed after the attack and that a fire had broken, according to Haaretz. Eight people were reportedly rescued and search efforts continue.
In case anyone was in any doubt, US secretary of state Marco Rubio has canceled his trip to Israel early next week, the state department said, pointing to “the current situation”.
Death toll in Israeli attack on Iranian girls’ elementary school rises to 108
The Mizan news agency, quoting the Minab prosecutor’s office, has reported that the number of casualties at the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ elementary school in Minab, Iran, has risen to 108.
Here’s my colleague Jason Burke’s profile of Ali Khamenei, the hardline cleric who ruled Iran since 1989.
Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of the last shah of Iran, has welcomed reports of the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
In a post on social media, he wrote:
Ali Khamenei, the bloodthirsty Zahhak [a powerful evil figure in Persian mythology] of our time, the killer of tens of thousands of Iran’s bravest sons and daughters, has been erased from the pages of history. With his death, the Islamic Republic has effectively come to an end and will soon be consigned to the dustbin of history.
Pahlavi has lived in exile in the US since his father was overthrown during the 1979 Iranian revolution.
He urged Iranian officials not to appoint a successor to Khamenei, and warned the military, security and police forces that it was their “last chance” to join the people, saying:
Any attempt by the remnants of the regime to appoint a successor to Khamenei is doomed to failure from the outset. Whoever they place in his stead will have neither legitimacy nor survival; and without doubt, they will also be complicit in the crimes of this regime.
To the military, security, and police forces: Any effort to prop up a collapsing regime is condemned to defeat. This is your last chance to join the people; to help ensure Iran’s stable transition to a free and prosperous future; and to have a share in building that future. …
This marks the beginning of our great national celebration; but it is not the end of the road,.
The White House earlier called a lid on Donald Trump’s public schedule, so it’s unlikely that he will make an official public appearance for the rest of the day.
Four people injured after ‘incident’ at Dubai’s airport that caused ‘minor damage’
Four people were injured after an incident occurred at Dubai international airport, the Dubai media office has said, as Iran continued to launch retaliatory strikes on US bases in the region.
“Dubai Airports confirms that a concourse at Dubai International (DXB) sustained minor damage in an incident, which was quickly contained,” the media office said on X, without giving further details.
Donald Trump says Ali Khamenei is dead
Donald Trump has said that Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei – “one of the most evil people in history” – is dead.
“This is not only justice for the people of Iran, but for all Great Americans,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social.
He said of Khamenei: “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.”
“This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country,” Trump went on.
Washington is hearing that many among the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, military and other security and police forces “no longer want to fight”, Trump claimed. He suggested he would now be willing to give them “immunity”.
Significantly, the US president also said that “heavy and pinpoint bombing” would continue “uninterrupted throughout the week or, as long as necessary to achieve our objective”.
We still do not have independent verification, and Trump has not given any evidence for this statement of Khamenei’s death.
Here is what the US president posted on Truth Social in full:
Khamenei, one of the most evil people in History, is dead. 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. 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. This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country. We are hearing that many of their IRGC, Military, and other Security and Police Forces, no longer want to fight, and are looking for Immunity from us. As I said last night, “Now they can have Immunity, later they only get Death!” Hopefully, the IRGC and Police will peacefully merge with the Iranian Patriots, and work together as a unit to bring back the Country to the Greatness it deserves. That process should soon be starting in that, not only the death of Khamenei but the Country has been, in only one day, very much destroyed and, even, obliterated. The heavy and pinpoint bombing, however, will continue, uninterrupted throughout the week or, as long as necessary to achieve our objective of PEACE THROUGHOUT THE MIDDLE EAST AND, INDEED, THE WORLD!
Hundreds of protesters have gathered around the White House after the US and Israel launched a joint attack on Iran. Several dozen demonstrations opposing the strikes were planned in cities across the United States as part of a national day of action today.
Social media footage of the scene outside the White House shows a separate demonstration in support of the attack, with people holding American flags or Lion and Sun Iranian flags, many with pictures of Reza Pahlavi – the exiled son of Iran’s last shah.
Donald Trump has spoken with the leaders of the UK, Kuwait and Turkey, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt has said in a post on social media.
Downing Street confirmed that Trump and Keir Starmer had discussed the situation in the Middle East over the phone this evening. It said:
The prime minister set out that the UK was taking part in coordinated regional defensive operations to protect British people and regional partners following Iran’s indiscriminate retaliatory strikes on allies in the region.
Earlier, Leavitt confirmed that Trump had spoken to the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE, as well as Nato secretary general Mark Rutte about the strikes on Iran.
UN secretary general ‘not in a position’ to confirm reports on Iran’s supreme leader
UN secretary general António Guterres addressed the UN security council at an emergency meeting a few moments ago. He said he is “not in a position to confirm” Israeli media reports that Iran’s supreme leader had been killed.
Guterres also said he “deeply regrets” that the opportunity for diplomacy had been “squandered” over Iran.
