Black-clad mourners packing Tehran’s Grand Mosalla on Saturday chanted slogans against the United States and vowed revenge, as the first day of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s funeral got under way. The former supreme leader was killed more than four months ago in joint US-Israeli airstrikes that triggered a wider regional conflict.
“Everyone here has come to avenge the blood of their supreme leader,” Arash Rahimi, 40, told Reuters from the courtyard. “As our leader has said, we have a blood feud with the United States. Our relations with the United States will never be good.”
“Millions mourn Ayatollah Khamenei in Tehran after his killing in US-Israeli strikes, with 15-20 million expected at six-day funeral.”
Khamenei’s body, lying in state alongside the remains of family members also killed in the strikes, will remain at the Grand Mosalla for three days before being moved to Qom, then to his hometown of Mashhad for burial on Thursday. Authorities expect 15 to 20 million people to attend the six-day ceremonies across Iran and Iraq — potentially the largest funeral in history as a proportion of the population.
“We came because we promised the supreme leader we would stand by him to the very end,” said Reza, a 37-year-old professor. “For a long time, we shouted that we would sacrifice our lives for the leader, but it was he who sacrificed himself for us.”
US President Donald Trump, who said Iran’s government was “dying to settle” a peace deal after a preliminary agreement, remarked on Friday: “We gave them a week off for a funeral because we’re nice.”
Much of central Tehran has been locked down for the weekend. The BBC’s chief international correspondent Lyse Doucet is reporting from the capital under restrictions that apply to all international media — including a condition that none of her material be used on the BBC’s Persian Service.
As the crowds swelled, the question of what comes next for the Islamic Republic hung over the proceedings. The funeral is the largest display of public mourning since the war began, but the regime now faces the challenge of replacing a leader who was the face of Iran for decades.