Top Iran security official killed days after goading US and Israel in live interview
Top Iran security official killed days after goading US and Israel in live interview
A senior Iranian leader who warned President Trump last week to “watch out for yourself — lest you be eliminated” was killed in an overnight strike, Israel’s defense minister said Tuesday.
Ali Larijani, head of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran, was hit days after joining Iran President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in the streets of Tehran at a Friday rally marking the pro-Palestinian Quds Day holiday.
“It’s clear they’re running out of steam,” Larijani told a TV interviewer in reference to Operation Epic Fury. “Trump’s problem is that he doesn’t understand that the Iranian nation is mature and determined.”
The 67-year-old Larijani was one of 10 Islamic Republic officials with a $10 million bounty placed on his head Friday by the State Department’s Rewards for Justice program.
In a separate statement, the Israel Defense Forces announced it had killed Gen. Gholam Reza Soleimani, head of the Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij force, in a “targeted strike” on Tehran.
“Amid the internal protests in Iran, and particularly in recent times with their escalation, the Basij forces under Soleimani’s command led key suppression operations involving severe violence, widespread arrests, and the use of force against civilian protesters,” the IDF wrote on X.
“Larijani and the Basij commander were eliminated last night,” Defense Minister Israel Katz said, “and have joined [Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei, the head of the annihilation program, along with all those eliminated from the axis of evil in the depths of hell.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office posted an image of him talking on the phone Tuesday morning, saying in the caption that he was “ordering the elimination of senior Iranian regime officials.”
Iranian state media did not immediately confirm either death, but did publish a handwritten note by Larijani commemorating sailors killed in a US attack whose funeral was expected on Tuesday. The message was also posted on Larijani’s social media accounts.
The strikes deal a further blow to Iran’s theocracy following the Feb. 28 killing of Ali Khamenei and come amid intense speculation about the health and whereabouts of his son and successor, Mojtaba Khamenei.
Larijani was appointed to advise the late supreme leader on strategy in nuclear talks with the Trump administration, in addition to his role on Iran’s top security body.
He had been sanctioned by the Treasury Department in January as Tehran violently suppressed nationwide protests, killing thousands in the process.
“Larijani was one of the first Iranian leaders to call for violence in response to the legitimate demands of the Iranian people,” said the department, identifying him as “responsible for coordinating the response to the protests on behalf of the supreme leader of Iran.”
A regular user of social media, Larijani responded Sunday to the $10 million reward offer by the US by quoting Hussein Ibn Ali, an early Shia Islam leader: “I do not see death as anything but happiness, nor life with the oppressors as anything but torment.”
