Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been Iran’s hardline spiritual guide and top political authority since 1989, when he succeeded Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini as supreme leader.
Here is a look at his life in key dates:
July 17, 1939: Khamenei is born in the shrine city of Mashhad to parents from Iran’s Azeri minority.
1957: Meets Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who will emerge as a key influence.
1977: After several stays in prison due to his opposition to the shah, he is exiled to Iranshahr, a remote desert city close to the Pakistan border. He returns to Mashhad in 1979 for the Islamic Revolution.
1979: His rapid ascent to power begins when he is named deputy defence minister and subsequently head of the elite Revolutionary Guards by Khomeini.
1981: Becomes the first cleric to be elected president of the Islamic republic. Re-elected in 1985.
June 27, 1981: Survives a bomb attack by the outlawed People’s Mujahedeen group in a Tehran mosque, but his right hand is never the same. Learns to write with his left.
June 4, 1989: Upon the death of Khomeini, he is elected supreme leader just a year after the end of the war with Iraq (1980-1988).
January 2005: Confirms the ‘death sentence’ fatwa handed down on writer Salman Rushdie by Khomeini.
September 8, 2014: Undergoes prostate surgery after two decades of speculation about his health.
July 14, 2015: Supports the Vienna accord with world powers on Iran’s nuclear programme.
January 17, 2020: Leads Friday prayers in Tehran for the first time since 2012. Uses the occasion to condemn anti-government protests.
October 3, 2022: Blames the United States and Israel for fomenting the widespread nationwide unrest sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini.
June 13-24, 2025: Going into hiding during the 12-day war with Israel, which the United States briefly joins, but emerges from the conflict unscathed.
January 17, 2026: Says ‘Iran must break the back of the seditionists’ as the clerical authorities brutally repress the biggest protests against the Islamic republic in more than three years.
February 28, 2026: Killed in the wave of strikes launched by the United States and Israel.
