Iran fires new missiles as Khamenei’s son takes charge

2026-03-09 - 02:24

Israel’s Iron Dome intercepts an Iranian missile over Jerusalem as tensions continue to escalate across the Middle East. (EPA Images pic) TEHRAN: Iran fired missiles at Israel early Monday in the name of the Islamic republic’s new leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, who was selected to succeed his slain father despite threats by the United States and Israel to target him next. Nine days after US-Israeli strikes killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and plunged the Middle East into war, Shiite clerics convened to choose the country’s third supreme leader since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. An announcer on state television solemnly read a statement from the 88-member Assembly of Experts next to a picture of the new 56-year-old leader, who bears a striking resemblance to his father. Mojtaba Khamenei “is appointed and introduced as the third leader of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic of Iran, based on the decisive vote of the respected representatives of the Assembly of Experts”, the statement said. It said the clerical body “did not hesitate for a minute” in choosing a new leader despite “the brutal aggression of the criminal America and the evil Zionist regime”. State media soon afterwards showed a projectile said to be launched at Israel bearing the slogan, “At Your Command, Sayyid Mojtaba”, using an Islamic honorific. Explosions were also heard early Monday in Qatar, home to a major US air base. The war came weeks after Iranian security forces crushed nationwide protests against the government, killing thousands. The younger Khamenei is considered a fellow hardliner who will pursue his father’s rejection of dissent. US President Donald Trump had previously dismissed the younger Khamenei as a “lightweight”, and insisted again Sunday that he should have a say in appointing a new leader. “If he doesn’t get approval from us he’s not going to last long,” he told ABC News before the announcement was made. Israel’s military had also warned any successor that “we will not hesitate to target you”. Oil price spikes As Iran retaliates against its oil-rich Gulf Arab neighbours, the benchmark price for a barrel of crude soared beyond US$100 for the first time since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine four years ago. Trump dismissed the price spike, a politically sensitive issue in the United States, as a “small price to pay” for removing the alleged threat of Iran’s nuclear program. But markets in Japan and South Korea, both heavily dependent on energy imports, opened the week sharply lower on Monday. In a sign that the United States does not expect a quick end to the war, the state department ordered non-emergency staff to leave Saudi Arabia, days after a drone hit the US embassy. Few expect major changes under the younger Khamenei, a trained cleric close to the Revolutionary Guards, the ideological arm of the military. The Guards quickly pledged support for the new leader, who comes into the role with far less experience than his father, who had been president under the first supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The Guards Corps said in a statement it was “ready for complete obedience and self-sacrifice in carrying out the divine commands” of the younger Khamenei. Iran was founded on opposition to dynastic monarchies after the toppling of the pro-Western shah in 1979.