The second son of Iran’s late supreme leader — Mojtaba Khamenei — has been named as his successor, Iranian state television reported. Almost nine days ago, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in US-Israeli airstrikes. The 56-year-old is a moderate cleric who has spent decades cultivating influence within Iran’s security apparatus.
The 88-member clerical body, which selected the country’s new supreme leader in a statement, said Mojtaba Khamenei “is appointed and presented as the third leader of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic of Iran by a decisive vote of respected representatives of the Assembly of Experts.” Despite the “brutal aggression of criminal America and the evil Zionist regime,” the Assembly of Leadership Experts said it “did not hesitate for a minute” in choosing a new leader.
In a post on X, the Iranian government said: “Ayatollah Seyed Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei was appointed and introduced as the third #leader of the Islamic Republic of #Iran following a decisive vote by the Assembly of Experts.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) pledged allegiance to the country’s third supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, saying in a statement: “The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps… is ready for total obedience and self-sacrifice in carrying out the divine orders of the Guardians’ then-lawyer, His Eminence Khameyya Khameyyed Ayyy.”
All about Mojtaba Khamenei’s family
In 1999, Mojtaba Khamenei married Zahra Haddad-Adel, daughter of Iranian conservative politician and former Speaker of the Parliament Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel. According to the source, it was a strategic alliance “between the office of the supreme leader and the conservative technocratic-cultural faction within the political establishment.” Zahra Haddad-Adel was one of three daughters among the four children of Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel with Tayyebeh Mahrouzadeh.
A member of the Islamic Republic Party, Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel served in several government positions, including Deputy Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance (1979) and Deputy Minister of Education (1982–1993).
Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel emerged as a leading figure in the Iranian conservative movement during this period. He served as an advisor to Ali Khamenei. He is currently the Executive Director of the Encyclopaedia Islamica Foundation. He even played a significant role in the establishment of the National Science Olympiads in Iran.
Gholam-Ali Haddad-Adel Zahra’s daughter was killed in the same joint US-Israel airstrike that claimed the lives of her father-in-law and mother-in-law, among other family members, according to France 24.
Mojtaba Khamenei and Zahra Haddad-Adel reportedly have three children, but few details about his family are publicly known.
