Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei was pulled from the rubble of a hospital in Tehran in the early days of the Iran war, Ayatollah Mohsen Heidari Alekasir told the Qatari-owned Al Araby news outlet in a Thursday interview.
According to Heidari, Khamenei had been injured prior to the outbreak of the Israel-US-Iran war, though he did not elaborate on the supreme leader’s exact condition.
He also denied the claim that Iran’s former supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, had recommended his son to serve as his successor, adding that Mojtaba Khamenei’s election had nothing to do with his father’s position.
During his father’s reign, Mojtaba Khamenei held no exact official political position, Heidari told Al Araby.
Khamenei's lack of public appearance due to danger
He called Khamenei a “shadow man,” and an advisor to whom matters would occasionally be referred when his father did not have enough time to handle them.
Heidari also said Khamenei's lack of public appearances and meetings with Iran’s Assembly of Experts is due to the danger both he and the assembly members face.
It is in their “interest not to hold a large meeting as long as communication or individual meetings could be conducted secretly,” Heidari said.