Launching a major attack alongside Israel against Iran, US President Donald Trump is openly pursuing the goal he once adamantly rejected—regime change.

Trump said that the bombing campaign—which followed a massive military buildup in the Middle East unseen since the 2003 invasion of Iraq—killed Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a US nemesis in power since 1989.

For weeks Trump had suggested a more limited goal of forcing a deal to end Tehran’s contested nuclear program, and joined Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in calling on Iranians to topple the Islamic republic.

“This is the single greatest chance for the Iranian people to take back their Country,” he said in a statement announcing Khamenei’s death, which has not been confirmed by Iran.

Indicating coordination, the son of Iran’s late pro-Western shah, who was overthrown in the 1979 Islamic revolution, released statements near-simultaneously to Trump’s announcements—first confirming the operation and then Khamanei’s death.