Iran 2026

4-5 July
Calls for killing of Trump at funeral of Iran supreme leader Ali Khamenei
New supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei still absent from public view as his three brothers stand beside father’s coffin
(The Guardian) Beside the coffin of the assassinated former Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei at a packed prayer hall in Tehran on Sunday there were calls for the killing of Donald Trump.
Iran is staging a week of mass funeral processions ⁠for Khamenei, who was killed along with other members of his family on the first day of the US and Israeli war on 28 February. The funeral was delayed because of the war.
The funeral prayers for the former supreme leader and four other family members created a political spectacle at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla that melded grief with calls for revenge.
Mourners Chant ‘Revenge’ at Funeral Prayers for Iran’s Slain Supreme Leader
(NYT) Conspicuously absent was his son and successor, Mojtaba Khamenei, who has not been seen in public since succeeding his father, who was killed at the onset of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran in late February.
His absence has become a point of scrutiny in a political system where public appearances by senior figures often carry symbolic weight and are carefully choreographed to project authority and stability. It has fueled questions about his health and about the country’s internal political dynamics, particularly at a moment of heightened regional tension and uncertainty over Iran’s political future.
Huge Crowds Mass in Tehran for Ayatollah’s State Funeral
(NYT) As days of public mourning ceremonies began, Iranians viewed the casket of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed four months ago at the start of the U.S.-Israeli attacks.
Tens of thousands of people began arriving at dawn at the Grand Mosalla mosque in the capital, Tehran, for the start of six days of public ceremonies. Millions are expected to participate in the funeral as Ayatollah Khamenei’s body is transported to cities across the country.
A diplomatic marathon is also underway in the sidelines of the funeral. President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi are holding a series of bilateral meetings with foreign dignitaries and allies who traveled to Tehran to attend the ceremonies, according to state media and the foreign ministry.
Iranian officials are also meeting with representatives from regional militia groups backed by Iran, including Hamas and Hezbollah, according to government statements. Araghchi in a statement credited the slain supreme leader for the creation of that regional network allied against Israel, known as the “axis of resistance,” saying, “It was based on his teachings that the Islamic republic’s foreign policy took shape” in that form.

4 July
Iran’s regime survived the war and is now savvier, ruthless and more hard-line
After months of strikes by the U.S. and Israel, the Iranian regime has emerged emboldened, contradicting Trump’s claim of accomplishing “regime change.”
(WaPo) The death of Iran’s supreme leader on the opening day of the war raised U.S. and Israeli hopes that the regime he led — and that has held the country in an Islamic vice grip since 1979 — had been pushed to the brink of collapse.
Four months later, however, as Iran stages a belated state funeral for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the burial rites testify instead to the Islamic republic’s survival and mark the ascendance of a new generation of leaders that is more entrenched and hard-line, according to security officials and experts.
Led by Khamenei’s son and successor, Mojtaba — who has remained in hiding since being injured in the same strike that killed his father — the new hierarchy is younger, has better command of the state’s levers of power, has gained insights from the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and is savvier about soft-power tools including diplomacy and online propaganda.
After surviving months of strikes by two of the world’s most potent militaries, the regime has emerged emboldened, officials and experts said, and remains ruthless. It reportedly has carried out a campaign of executions against domestic critics and political opponents even as it continues intermittent strikes in the Persian Gulf and flexes its control over the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran “might be weaker when it comes to its economic situation, its industries, some of its strategic capabilities,” said Raz Zimmt, head of Iran research at the Institute for National Security Studies in Israel. “But the bottom line is that we are facing a new, bolder, self-confident Iran.”
Nearly all of those now in high-ranking positions spent formative years as lieutenants in security agencies or military units responsible for crackdowns on domestic protests, arming proxy militias including Hezbollah and Hamas, and rising through the ranks of elite organizations including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. …
The swift consolidation of power by loyalists contradicts claims by President Donald Trump that the war accomplished “regime change” and empowered pragmatists willing to acquiesce to U.S. demands.
“They have a new group of leaders,” Trump said during the Group of Seven summit in France last month. “Actually, I think they’re smart. … They’re far less radicalized, and I think they’re very, very good.”
Instead, officials and experts said that Trump’s approach — including threats to annihilate Iran’s civilization, a country of more than 90 million — has bolstered hard-liners’ claims that the country is in an existential struggle with the United States and its allies.
Iran Projects Unity to the World While Pursuing a Crackdown at Home
The country’s security service has continued to target civil society and dissidents, including thousands of arrests since the launch of the U.S.-Israeli war in February.
As Iran’s government prepared this week to hold the funeral for its slain supreme leader that is expected to project an image of a country united in grief, its security services kept up a crackdown on dissidents and leaders in civil society.
On Wednesday, Iranian security forces arrested two well-known environmentalists, Houman Jokar and Sepideh Kashani, in their home and confiscated their electronic devices, their lawyer, Hojjat Kermani, told The New York Times. Ms. Kashani’s sister Sima, who has multiple sclerosis, was also arrested, Mr. Kermani said. …
The arrests are just a sliver of an ongoing, severe crackdown against Iranian civil society and dissidents, including the arrest of over 6,000 people since the launch of the U.S.-Israeli war on Feb. 28, according to Amnesty International.

28 June
Iran Risks Peace Talks With U.S. to Maintain Leverage Over Strait
Iran sees its control over the Strait of Hormuz as critical leverage in peace talks with the United States. It seems willing to risk the cease-fire to maintain that power.
The four-day cycle of attacks that Iran set off with the United States over the Strait of Hormuz has risked derailing the newly reached cease-fire in a war both sides are eager to end.
Yet for Iran, analysts say, it was a necessary gambit.
Iran’s newfound power to disrupt traffic through a waterway that is pivotal to the global economy is critical leverage it cannot afford to lose — either at the negotiating table or back at war with the United States.