Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the supreme leader killed in the attacks, is the new favorite of the ayatollahs to lead Iran

The Assembly of Experts, the council of 88 clerics responsible for choosing the successor of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei after his death in the joint US-Israeli operation on Saturday, would already have a clear favorite. Mojtaba Hussein Jameneisecond son of the supreme leader, would have guaranteed himself the majority of support to take over from his father.

According to publica The New York Timesthe assembly would have already reached a quorum and Mojtaba Khamenei would have prevailed other candidates considered moderate. Alireza Arafiwho leads the transitional National Leadership Council, or Seyed Hassan Jomeinigrandson of the historic Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, would be among those defeated.

Sources familiar with the process maintain that the decision has already been made, but the ayatollahs have not made it public yet to avoid making Mojtaba Khamenei a target of operations ‘Epic Fury’ and ‘Roar of the Lion’. On Tuesday, the headquarters of the Assembly of Experts was bombed for Israel, but its members were not present.

The deliberations have been carried out electronically to avoid offering targets to a military campaign that explicitly seeks to destabilize the regime. The the Jamenei family has already been a target of bombing: the supreme leader’s wife, daughter, son-in-law and several grandchildren – including a 14-month-old baby – are among the victims of Saturday’s attack.

Mojtaba Khamenei’s election would be a serious blow to the aspirations of the Iranian oppositionwho hoped that the beheading of the regime would imply a certain openness in the aftermath of the military operation. Vali Nasr, an expert at Johns Hopkins University on Iran and Shiism, explains to the newspaper that the vote would point to a hardening of the ideological line.

“He was in the predictions as a successor for a long time,” Nasr details, “but in the last two years he had completely disappeared from the radar.” Its reappearance, therefore, would imply a change of direction. “If he is the one chosen, this would imply that the hard line of the Revolutionary Guard is the one who holds the reins of the regime.”

Although Ali Khamenei was a cleric of discrete merits at the time of coming to power – his main asset was his proximity and loyalty to Khomeini – the supreme leader knew how to ally himself with the elite Revolutionary Guard, the armed wing of the regimeto rule with an iron fist for almost four decades.

The man in charge of overseeing the transition and a personal friend of the deceased ayatollah would be Ali Larijanione of his stalwarts within the old guard of the revolutionaries. Although before the attack he was nicknamed “Iran’s Delcy” for his possible role in a transitional executive, statements after the death of the supreme leader also point to a radicalization of his position.

Mojtaba Khamenei is 56 years old and is considered an influential character although also hermit and skilled at weaving a network of contacts in the shadow of his all-powerful father. His allies in the Revolutionary Guard would have exerted their weight to tilt the votes of the 88 in their favor.

“Mojtaba is the wisest choice at the moment because he knows intimately how the military and security apparatuses work and coordinate,” explains Mehdi Rahmati, an analyst from Tehran. “He was already in charge of all of this.” However, once he is proclaimed, it is foreseeable that the regime’s opponents redouble their efforts to overthrow him.

Other sources cited by The New York Times suggest that Mojtaba Khamenei could adopt a more open stance than his father, “as Mohamed bin Salman in Saudi Arabia“This might be welcomed by Washington, but it would do little to satisfy protesters’ demands for respect for human rights and civil liberties.