Iran confirms Ali Larijani’s death: ‘Martyred’

An Iranian news agency affiliated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps confirmed Tuesday that Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, is dead, hours after Israel said he and another senior Iranian official were killed in overnight airstrikes

“Ali Larijani, Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, has been martyred,” the Fars News Agency wrote in a post on the social platform X, translated from Persian.

“Martyr Ali Larijani, one of the country’s prominent and prudent officials, along with his son, one of his deputies, and a group of bodyguards, was targeted by American and Zionist regime fighter jets at his daughter’s home in the Pardis area and was martyred,” the news agency wrote in a follow-up post.

Larijani, who was speaker of Iran’s parliament until 2020, is the second most senior Iranian official to be assassinated since Ayatollah Ali Khameini was killed in targeted strikes on his compound on the first day of the joint U.S.-Israeli military operation.

He was seen as a de facto transitional leader after U.S.-Israeli strike killed the country’s former supreme leader, Ali Khameini, early in the war. The new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khameini, has not appeared publicly since assuming his father’s role.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) also said Tuesday that Gholamreza Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s Basij paramilitary force, had been “eliminated” following an attack.

“Under Soleimani, the Basij unit led the main repression operations in Iran, employing severe violence, widespread arrests, and the use of force against civilian demonstrators,” the IDF wrote on X.

The Iranian regime’s military leadership has been a central target of the joint U.S. and Israeli strikes, which are largely aimed at suppressing Tehran’s nuclear and missile capabilities.

As the war started, Trump suggested Iranians should topple the longtime ruling Islamic regime, but in recent days has suggested such an uprising is unlikely given the threat of repressive violence.

In a statement posted by the Fars News Agency, the IRGC vowed to avenge the deaths of those who have died in the conflict.

“The pure blood of Martyr Ali Larijani, like that of our other dear martyrs, will serve as a source of honor, strength, and national awakening against the global front of arrogance and international Zionism, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps will certainly never forget to avenge the blood of this great martyr and the other martyrs of the Sacred Defense,” the statement said.

Iran has already retaliated by targeting U.S. and Israeli interests across neighboring Gulf states and by effectively restricting shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, seeking to exert economic pressure to bring the war to an end.

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