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Top Iranian security official Ali Larijani was killed in overnight strikes, Israel said Tuesday, marking a significant moment for the Islamic Republic in the conflict.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz said in a statement that Larijani was “eliminated.” There was no immediate confirmation out of Iran on his apparent killing.
Larijani, the head of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, was among the most senior leaders of the regime still alive in Iran after top leaders — including Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei — were killed at the start of the war. He was one of the regime’s most experienced insiders and deeply trusted by the late Khamenei. He was also among a very small group of people who could manage both the war and the politics around it.
He was a hardliner who understood negotiation, and also a system loyalist who understood limits.
Larijani had been a defiant voice since the war began and warned only a week ago, in a message aimed at President Trump, that the Iranian people “do not fear your empty threats; even those greater than you have failed to erase them… so beware lest you be the ones who disappear.”
He last appeared in public on Friday at a demonstration for al-Quds Day, an annual event in support of Palestinians. It was an act of defiance as he walked through crowds in Tehran in the middle of the conflict.
Why Larijani’s death is significant
Larijani was a former Revolutionary Guards officer who went on to run state broadcasting, serve as Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator and serve as the speaker of parliament for more than a decade. More recently, he returned to the core of power as secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, sitting at the intersection of military, intelligence and political decision-making. He also came from one of Iran’s most powerful clerical families, which matters in the theocracy.
In the months leading up to the war, Larijani had become even more important, at times effectively running the country’s day-to-day strategy as pressure mounted.
Operationally, the impact of his death is likely limited in the short term. Politically, it could harden attitudes and reinforce the narrative inside Tehran that this is an existential fight aimed at dismantling the leadership itself.
Over time, it removes one of the few insiders who could help shape a political off-ramp. Figures like Larijani are often the ones who help manage not just how wars are fought, but how they end.
Larijani could operate inside the security state and still engage in external negotiation. He helped shape Iran’s nuclear posture and was involved in quiet efforts to reopen channels with Washington even as tensions escalated.
Just as importantly, he helped manage the political layer of the war itself.
He was one of the few figures who could shape the messaging, signal intentions and maintain lines of communication externally, even as fighting continued, while remaining fully trusted by the system. While he understood escalation, he also understood where it needed to stop. That made him one of the few figures in Tehran capable of managing both sides of a crisis at once, and without him, that capability shrinks.
His death also means that Mojtaba Khamenei, who is the new supreme leader and son of the late ayatollah, loses one of the few men who knew how his father actually ran power. Larijani was close to the late Khamenei and part of an inner circle that understood how power was exercised at the top.
The Islamic Republic, however, is built to absorb the losses of leaders like Larijani, and so his death may not fundamentally change Iran’s trajectory. Power does not disappear, but instead shifts while the system remains.
In his final messages, Larijani was blunt. He framed the war as an existential struggle and challenged Muslim countries directly, asking them, “Which side are you on?” over their apparent silence as the violence raged on. At the same time, he insisted Iran was not seeking domination over its neighbors.
Larijani among other leaders killed
The Israeli military also announced on Tuesday the killing of the Gen. Gholam Reza Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s feared Basij paramilitary force.
“The Israeli Air Force, acting on IDF intelligence, targeted and eliminated Gholamreza Soleimani, who operated as commander of the Basij unit for the past six years,” the IDF said in a statement, accusing the Basij, under Soleimani’s command, of leading “the main repression operations, employing severe violence, widespread arrests, and the use of force against civilian demonstrators” to quash anti-government protests that swept across Iran in January.
The IDF called Soleimani’s assassination “an additional significant blow to the regime’s security command-and-control structures” and it vowed to “continue to operate with determination against commanders of the Iranian terror regime.”
The Trump administration said earlier this month that the operation against Iran had killed 49 of “the most senior Iranian regime leaders.”
The U.S. said on Friday it was offering up to $10 million, and the potential opportunity to relocate, for information on the whereabouts of 10 senior Iranian leaders. Larijani had been among them.
