Name: How Ayatollah Ali Khamenei became supreme leader of Iran | BBC News
Uploaded: 2026-03-01T23:01:21.000Z
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In Iran and across the world, some people have been celebrating the news of the killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Witnesses say some Iranians took to the streets in Tehran, the nearby city of Karaj and the central city of Isfahan to celebrate after reports of Khamenei's death emerged.

These are scenes on the streets of North London.

In Gold is Green, Iranians rallied on Saturday evening.

The street was brought to a standstill and eyewitnesses described it as pandemonium and jubilation.

There are similar scenes in Los Angeles as well.

Hundreds waved pre revolutionary Iranian flags as news spread of the death of Iran's leader, who had been in power for almost four decades.

Well, since being selected as Iran's supreme leader by a council of clerics in 1989, Ayatollah Khomeini has maintained a firm grip on Iran's politics and its armed forces, often suppressing challenges to the ruling system through the use of violence.

Our diplomatic correspondent Caroline Hawley has this assessment of his time as leader.

Ayatollah Khamenei had the final say on everything in Iran.

The most powerful figure in the country who saw himself as God's representative on earth, he came to power in 1989 after the death of Ayatollah Khomeini, who'd founded the Islamic Republic ten years earlier.

Becoming political and religious leader for life, Ali Khamenei is said to have been his preferred choice of successor.

And he continued its antagonism towards the West.

He'd grown up in the holy city of Mashhad and became a cleric at a young age, but

And as Supreme Leader, he had to build his power base.

He did so by aligning himself with Iran's hard line military force, the revolutionary guard.

In 1997, when a moderate cleric, Mohammad Khatami, was elected president, Ayatollah Khamenei overruled his attempts to reform the system.

It was he, not the president, who would decide the Nation's fate.

In 2009 came the first major challenge to his regime.

Mass protests in response to a presidential election that many Iranians felt was stolen by the system in favor of a conservative candidate.

The regime responded with deadly force, crushing the demonstrations, provoking international alarm.

Then came an even bigger threat to the Islamic Republic.

An uprising led by women challenging one of the pillars of the regime, the compulsory hijab.

It was sparked by the death of a young woman in custody, and

again, the response was a brutal crackdown.

Ayatollah Khamenei blamed the unrest, as he always did on outsiders, Iran's old enemies, the U.S.

But he was becoming increasingly unpopular.

Economic protests, which broke out in December 2025, quickly spiralled into nationwide fury at decades of repression by the regime headed by him.

They chanted death to the dictator, referring to Ayatollah Khamenei.

With thousands killed in the uprising, hatred of him only grew.

One hugely unpopular policy of his rule was Iran's sponsorship of a network of proxy forces, chief of them Hezbollah, in Lebanon, meant to act as a deterrent to any Israeli attack.

But what Iran called the axis of resistance was dramatically weakened in the wake of the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel, leaving Iran critically exposed.

For the outside world, Iran's nuclear program was a constant concern that prompted crisis after crisis.

In 2015, Ayatollah Khamenei had authorized a deal that would curb the regime's nuclear activities in return for the lifting of sanctions.

In the years since the deal was signed, Iran's aggression only increased.

But Donald Trump then pulled out of the agreement in 2018 during his first presidency.

And the following year, Iran began ramping up its production of enriched uranium to a level close to weapons grade.

It always claimed it wanted the program for civilian purposes, not a bomb.

But Israel and the US didn't believe it and bombed key nuclear sites last June.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was an ideologue who refused to yield to the pressure bearing down on him from outside the country and within.

To the end, he remained a hard line defender of the Islamic Republic at great cost to so many Iranians increasingly desperate to be free from his rule.

Well, let's get a little bit more insight now.

Joining me is Hesham Shawish from BBC Monitoring, who has been looking at how Iran's allies have been reacting.

Hicham, thank you very much for joining us.

What's the regional reaction from Iran aligned groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas?

So the potential intervention of pro Iran groups around the region is something that people observers will be really assessing right now.

It was one of Iran's points of leverage in the current confrontation and a point of leverage in the negotiations between the US And Iran in Oman and Geneva.

In terms of Hezbollah, we have to remember that the group did not intervene in last summer's confrontation between Israel, the US and Iran, the 12 day conflict.

Its military capabilities have been seriously diminished following the war between Hezbollah and Israel between October 2023 and November 2024 and it's pressure both regionally and domestically to rein in its military direction.

And despite all of the rhetoric and the bravado from its leader, Sheikh Naim Qasim, recently he's delivered frequent speeches.

The main focus of the group has been its political standing.

The group has been focusing on its social welfare programs, on reconstruction and also on shoring up its electoral base ahead of parliamentary elections in Lebanon in May.

So it's really quite a big focus to the group.

And we have heard in BBC monitoring of Hezbollah infighting due to, you know, demands that the leader of Hezbollah take a stronger military stance against against Israel's attacks in Lebanon over the past year or so.

It seems that despite the group issuing a warning last week it said that it wouldn't intervene if Iran was was attacked.

But a red line would be if Khamenei was targeted or if the US Was seeking to was seeking the downfall of the whole Iranian leadership and Hezbollah.

Unnamed Hezbollah source told AFP last week that in the event of the Iranian leadership being taken down, then Israel would inevitably expand its scope to target the group or expand its attacks against the group in Lebanon, which would trigger a response.

And Hashem, what does the war coverage look like across Arab media right now?

They've really been focusing on the statements of condemnation from Iranian officials and also what Tehran's response could be.

They're really focusing also on the transition of power.

Many outlets have highlighted the threats being traded between Washington and Tehran as well as the possible Iranian response and also demonstrations taking place in Iran throughout the day.

Thank you very much indeed for that update.