What to learn about Iran's Supreme Chief Ayatollah Ali Khamenei

[ad_1] CAIRO (AP) — Iran’s supreme chief, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who crushed inside threats repeatedly throughout greater than three many years in energy, now faces his greatest challenge but.

His archenemy, Israel, has secured free rein over Iran’s skies and is decimating the nation’s army management and nuclear program with its punishing air campaign . Additionally it is threatening his life: Israeli Protection Minister Israel Katz stated Khamenei “can't live on.”

The 86-year-old chief faces a selection. He might escalate Iran’s retaliation towards Israel and danger even heavier damage from Israeli bombardment. Or he might search a diplomatic solution that retains the U.S. out of the battle, and danger having to surrender the nuclear program he has put on the heart of Iranian coverage for years.

In a video handle Wednesday he sounded defiant , vowing “the Iranian nation isn't one to give up” and warning that if the U.S. steps in, it'll convey “irreparable harm to them.”

Right here’s what to learn about Khamenei:

He reworked the Islamic Republic When he rose to energy in 1989, Khamenei needed to overcome deep doubts about his authority as he succeeded the chief of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. A low-level cleric on the time, Khamenei didn’t have his predecessor’s non secular credentials. Together with his thick glasses and plodding fashion, he didn’t have his fiery charisma both.

However Khamenei has dominated thrice longer than the late Khomeini and has formed Iran’s Islamic Republic maybe much more dramatically.

He entrenched the system of rule by the “mullahs,” or Shiite Muslim clerics. That secured his place within the eyes of hardliners because the unquestionable authority — beneath solely that of God. On the similar time, Khamenei constructed the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard into the dominant power in Iran’s army and inside politics.

The Guard boasts Iran’s most elite army and oversees its ballistic missile program. Its worldwide arm, the Quds Pressure, pieced collectively the “Axis of Resistance,” the gathering of pro-Iranian proxies stretching from Yemen to Lebanon that for years gave Iran appreciable energy throughout the area. Khamenei additionally gave the Guard a free hand to construct a community of companies permitting it to dominate Iran’s financial system.

In return, the Guard grew to become his loyal shock power.

He fended off home challenges The primary main risk to Khamenei’s grip was the reform motion that swept right into a parliament majority and the presidency quickly after he grew to become supreme chief. The motion advocated for giving higher energy to elected officers – one thing Khamenei’s hardline supporters feared would result in dismantling the Islamic Republic system.

Khamenei stymied the reformists by rallying the clerical institution. Unelected our bodies run by the mullahs succeeded in shutting down main reforms and barring reform candidates from working in elections.

The Revolutionary Guard and Iran’s different safety businesses crushed waves of protests that adopted the failure of the reform motion. Big nationwide protests erupted in 2009 over allegations of vote-rigging. Below the load of sanctions, financial protests broke out in 2017 and 2019. Extra nationwide protests broke out in 2022 over the death of Mahsa Amini after police detained her for not carrying her necessary headband correctly.

Tons of have been killed in crackdowns on the protests, and a whole bunch extra arrested amid experiences of detainees tortured to dying or raped in jail.

Nonetheless, the successive protests confirmed the strains in Iran’s theocratic system and lay naked widespread resentment of clerical rule, corruption and financial troubles. Attempting to defuse anger, authorities typically eased enforcement of a few of the Islamic Republic’s social restrictions.

He constructed Iran right into a regional energy When Khamenei took energy, Iran was simply rising from its lengthy conflict with Iraq that left the nation battered and remoted.

Over the subsequent three many years, Khamenei turned Iran round into as assertive energy wielding affect throughout the Center East. One main increase was the U.S.’s 2003 ouster of Saddam Hussein, which finally introduced Iranian-allied Shiite politicians and militias to energy in Iraq.

Iraq supplied a linchpin in Iran’s Axis of Resistance, grouping Bashar Assad’s Syria, Lebanon’s Hezbollah, the Palestinian militant group Hamas and the Houthi rebels in Yemen. By 2015, the alliance was at its top, placing Iran on Israel’s doorstep.

The previous two years introduced a dramatic reversal Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, assault on southern Israel introduced an enormous Israeli retaliation on the Gaza Strip. It additionally introduced a turnaround in Israeli coverage. After years of attempting to fend off and tamp down Iran’s allies, Israel made crushing them it’s objective. Hamas has been crippled, although not eradicated, even at the price of the decimation of Gaza.

Israel has equally sidelined Hezbollah — at the least for the second — with weeks of bombardment in Lebanon final 12 months, together with a dramatic assault with booby-trapped pagers and walkie-talkies that surprised the group. A good heavier blow to Hezbollah was the fall in December of Syria’s Bashar Assad when Sunni rebels marched on the capital and eliminated him from energy. Now, a authorities hostile to Iran and Hezbollah guidelines from Damascus.

Iran’s Axis of Resistance is at its lowest ebb ever.

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