Iran begins farewell to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in US-Israeli airstrike in February
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s coffin (1st from top) kept at state at the Imam Khomeini Mosalla along with the coffins of his other family members killed in the US-Israeli airstrike, on February 28, 2026. (Photo via X)
New Delhi: Iran began a week-long farewell to its assassinated supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on Friday. The ceremonies come four months after he was killed in a joint US-Israeli airstrike on his residential compound on February 28, which was the opening strike of the war between Iran and the US-Israel alliance.
High-ranking delegations from roughly 30 countries attended the opening ceremony at the Imam Khomeini Mosalla (prayer hall) in the Iranian capital. Iran’s foreign ministry says representatives from close to 100 nations are expected to take part before Khamenei’s body is finally laid to rest at the Imam Reza shrine in Mashhad on July 9.
Although Iran invited the prime minister, Narendra Modi, for the funeral, New Delhi will be represented by the junior foreign minister, Pabitra Margherita, and the governor of Bihar, Syed Ata Hasnain, as RNA Media had reported earlier.
However, it is reported that Khamenei’s 56-year-old son, Mojtaba Khamenei, will skip the funeral ceremonies due to security concerns from Israel. The Israeli defence minister, Israel Katz, had said Mojtaba had been “marked for dead” in a recent remark.
Ali Khamenei’s funeral programme, one of the largest logistical undertakings in the Islamic Republic’s history, will stretch across five cities in two countries. Khamenei’s coffin, draped in the colours of the Iranian flag along with a red banner from the shrine of Imam Hussein, will lie in state at the Mosalla complex on July 4 and 5 for public mourning.
Ceremonies follow in the holy city of Qom on July 7. The body will then travel to Najaf and Karbala in neighbouring Iraq for processions at two of Shia Islam’s holiest sites, before returning to Iran for burial in Mashhad, the city of Khamenei’s birth.
Authorities have installed cooling systems at the mourning venues and mobilized government employees, universities and volunteer networks to manage what officials expect will be a gathering of millions. Comparisons are already being drawn to the funerals of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 and Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani in 2020, both of which descended into deadly crowd crushes.
