Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, has spent more than three decades consolidating power by crushing internal threats.
But his leadership faces its most significant challenge yet as widespread protests against his leadership continue to grow across the country, with millions of Iranians taking to the streets to demand regime change.
US President Donald Trump has threatened to strike Iran if Mr Khamenei’s regime continues its deadly crackdown of protesters, with Tehran warning they are ‘ready for war’ in response to the threats.
Mr Trump suggested last week that Mr Khamenei might be planning to flee the country amidst the unrest, with the Iranian leader responding by calling Mr Trump “arrogant”, saying he would be “overthrown.”
Iranian officials, speaking to the New York Times, indicated the government had been “thrust into survival mode”, with reports last week also suggesting Mr Khamenei could flee to Russia.
Here’s what you need to know about Khamenei.
When he rose to power in 1989, Khamenei had to overcome deep doubts about his authority as he succeeded the leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
A low-level cleric at the time, Khamenei didn’t have his predecessor’s religious credentials. With his thick glasses and plodding style, he didn’t have his fiery charisma either.
But Khamenei has ruled three times longer than the late Khomeini and has shaped Iran’s Islamic Republic perhaps even more dramatically.
He entrenched the system of rule by the “mullahs,” or Shiite Muslim clerics. That secured his place in the eyes of hardliners as the unquestionable authority — below only that of God.
At the same time, Khamenei built the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard into the dominant force in Iran’s military and internal politics.
The Guard boasts Iran’s most elite military and oversees its ballistic missile program. Its international arm, the Quds Force, pieced together the “Axis of Resistance,” the collection of pro-Iranian proxies stretching from Yemen to Lebanon that for years gave Iran considerable power across the region.
Khamenei also gave the Guard a free hand to build a network of businesses allowing it to dominate Iran’s economy.
In return, the Guard became his loyal shock force.
