{"id":191889,"date":"2026-07-06T02:24:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-06T02:24:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/191889\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T02:24:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-06T02:24:11","slug":"three-sons-of-irans-slain-leader-khamenei-appear-at-funeral-not-his-successor-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/191889\/","title":{"rendered":"Three sons of Iran’s slain leader Khamenei appear at funeral, not his successor"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tehran, Iran
Reuters<\/a><\/p>\n

Three sons of slain Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei prayed beside his coffin and those of four other family members on Sunday, but Mojtaba, the son who succeeded him as Iran\u2019s supreme leader, did not make an appearance.<\/p>\n

State TV showed Mostafa, Meysam and Masoud Khamenei praying behind the coffins laid out in the vast courtyard of Tehran\u2019s Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla, a sprawling religious complex.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, Iran\u2019s Parliament speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf and Chief Justice of Iran Gholam-hossein Mohseni Ejei with officials attend a prayer during a public farewell ceremony to pay their respects to late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed on on 28th February in Israeli and US. airstrikes, at the Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla, in Tehran, Iran, on 5th July, 2026. PICTURE: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader\/ Handout via Reuters<\/p>\n

Their father, alongside several other members of the family, was killed in an airstrike when the United States and Israel launched a war on Iran on 28th February.<\/p>\n

The conflict, which raged for several weeks before the sides reached a shaky ceasefire, has caused death and destruction across the region and left Iran\u2019s theocratic government, backed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, in power.<\/p>\n

In a show of public devotion to the state and revolutionary zeal, the Islamic Republic is staging a week of mass funeral processions for Khamenei, including taking his remains to Shi\u2019ite religious sites in neighbouring Iraq.<\/p>\n

After a day lying in state indoors for senior Iranian leaders and foreign officials to visit, Khamenei\u2019s coffin was displayed outdoors on Saturday under glass, along with those of his daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law and 14-month-old granddaughter.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, tens of thousands more mourners, including soldiers, seminary students and ordinary men and women filed into the Mosalla to pay their respects to Khamenei and his family, waving flags emblazoned with promises of revenge against America and Israel.<\/p>\n

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Others prayed in unison at the complex named after Iran\u2019s first supreme leader Khomeini, whom Khamenei succeeded in 1989.<\/p>\n

The farewell ceremony was extended by about an hour to 10pm due to the high number of people taking part, state media reported.<\/p>\n

No sightings of Mojtaba
There has still been no public sighting or image released of Mojtaba, said to have been injured in the attack that killed his father and the other family members on 28th February, when Israel and the US bombed Iranian targets at the start of the war.<\/p>\n

Mojtaba Khamenei\u2019s face was disfigured and he suffered a significant injury to one or both legs, people close to his inner circle told Reuters.<\/p>\n

One disappointed mourner said she had hoped to see the new supreme leader during the funeral events.<\/p>\n

\u201cUntil the last moment, before the prayer began, I kept telling those around me that I hoped [Mojtaba Khamenei] himself would come. That was our only wish,\u201d a young woman wearing makeup and sunglasses told the semi-official Tasnim news agency in an interview.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian with officials attend a prayer during a public farewell ceremony to pay their respects to late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed on 28th February in Israeli and US airstrikes, at the Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla, in Tehran, Iran, on 5th July, 2026. PICTURE: Office of the Iranian Supreme Leader\/ Handout via Reuters<\/p>\n

A ceasefire has suspended the four-month-old war under an agreement with Washington that Iran\u2019s authorities say will ultimately bring huge economic benefits, in line with what they describe as a victory over a superpower.<\/p>\n

During the war, more than 3,000 people were killed, including many of Iran\u2019s most senior politicians and military commanders. Military bases and major infrastructure projects were destroyed causing billions of dollars in damage.<\/p>\n

But Iran successfully struck US bases in the region, inflicted pain on the Gulf Arab countries that host them, and asserted its control of the Strait of Hormuz, causing a spike in global energy prices, which US President Donald Trump said led him to push faster for peace.<\/p>\n

The interim deal reached last month includes the unfreezing of billions of dollars in Iranian assets held abroad, and waivers from financial sanctions that had brought Iran\u2019s economy to its knees.<\/p>\n

Trump told the Axios news website that peace talks had been paused for a week for the events surrounding the funeral.<\/p>\n

On Sunday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf prayed behind the coffins. Masoud Khamenei was seen crying and wiping his tears with a keffiyeh \u2013 the chequered scarf that is a symbol in Iran of militant revolutionary ideals and solidarity with Palestinians \u2013 as an imam recited funeral prayers.<\/p>\n

Iranians flock to central Tehran
Crowds of Iranians, many weeping and some beating their chests, have thronged the Mosalla, including overnight. The Iranian metro railway network said it had clocked seven million trips from late on Saturday to Sunday morning as people flocked to the centre.<\/p>\n

After what authorities are billing as a massive procession in central Tehran on Monday, the remains will be taken to the seminary city of Qom, the centre of Iran\u2019s Shi\u2019ite hierarchy, for ceremonies on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

His body will be moved by land in a special vehicle, Iran\u2019s state media cited an official as saying.<\/p>\n

From there the body will be flown to Iraq for ceremonies in the Shi\u2019ite holy \u2060shrine cities of \u200bNajaf and Kerbala on Wednesday. It will return to Iran on Thursday for another \u200bprocession in Mashhad, to be buried near the tomb of another of the medieval Shi\u2019ite imams.<\/p>\n

Authorities plan to mobilise millions of people for big processions over the coming days, offering transport, food and lodging.<\/p>\n

\u2013 With NAYERA ABDALLAH AND TALA RAMADAN\u00a0in Dubai, United Arab Emirates<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tehran, IranReuters Three sons of slain Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei prayed beside his coffin and those of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191890,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[89,54855,38,51858,34,5484,57232,3620,57233,9181,2289,57234,1590,69,15823],"class_list":["post-191889","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-iran","tag-ayatollah-ali-khamenei","tag-ayatollah-ali-khamenei-funeral","tag-donald-trump","tag-imam-khomeini-grand-mosalla","tag-iran","tag-islamic-revolutionary-guards-corps","tag-masoud-khamenei","tag-masoud-pezeshkian","tag-meysam-khamenei","tag-mohammad-baqer-qalibaf","tag-mojtaba-khamenei","tag-mostafa-khamenei","tag-shiite","tag-tehran","tag-us-iran-ceasefire"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116870661345291149","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191889","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191890"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}