Iran endured a day of unprecedented military and diplomatic pressure on Tuesday as US airstrikes raised the country’s death toll above 800 and the offices of the Assembly of Experts, the body set to select a replacement for slain supreme leader Ali Khamenei, were bombed.
It would be an extraordinary security breach if it were discovered that many of the assembly’s 88 senior clerics were in the Qom building voting at the time. “Today there was another blow to the new leadership, and it seems like it was quite substantial,” Trump said at an event at the White House, although it was not clear what he was talking about specifically.
In Tehran, a building housing a body that mediates between the Iranian parliament and the Guardian Council of clerics and lawyers was also attacked.
In an attempt to instill some stability, it had become imperative for Iranian authorities to try to quickly install a new clerical figure to replace the 86-year-old Khamenei. He was murdered along with his wife and granddaughter on Sunday.
Reports of the assassination of the defense minister, appointed only two days earlier, were not confirmed. The offices of the supreme national security council were bombed. It is not known whether Ali Larijani, secretary general of the council, was present. The chaos suggests that Iran’s government is struggling to function in the midst of a war that is turning into an existential struggle for survival.
Behind the scenes, a power struggle is raging among officials over whether to adopt a more flexible approach toward the West, a debate that revolves around the election of the new supreme leader, underscoring the need for the political elite to make a decision.
Israel’s warplanes appear to have almost complete control of the skies over Tehran and can eliminate Iran’s leaders and security officials at will. Large swaths of black smoke and fires appeared on the Tehran skyline, as more residents tried to flee to the countryside.
Donald Trump has admitted that airstrikes against Iran’s leadership have been so effective that at least two members of the government he had appointed to lead Iran had been killed in airstrikes. With Trump’s goals in the war changing almost daily, it is unclear whether he wants Iran to discard the concept of clerical rule and whether he believes a secular politician will be more malleable. Iran’s supreme leader has an authority that no politician can match and can effectively override any democratic institution in the country.
Trump showed no interest in Turkish-led diplomatic efforts to restart talks, sending a message on Truth Social that: “Their air defense, their air force, their navy and their leadership are gone. They want to negotiate, I said it’s too late!”
Iranian officials denied they were trying to restart talks that ended Thursday, followed 24 hours later by the first airstrikes on Tehran. Iran had thought talks should continue at a technical level this week.
In a sign of the tragedy unfolding across Iran, thousands of people flocked to Minab, southern Iran, to attend the funeral of more than 170 schoolgirls killed in a bomb attack on Sunday. The United States has not accepted responsibility, but the U.N. human rights commission has asked Washington to organize an urgent investigation into its role, including whether the United States mistook the school for an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps building.
Highlighting the destruction of civilian properties, including schools and hospitals, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei held his weekly press conference at a damaged school in Tehran.
Baghaei insisted that Iran was not interested in resuming talks that failed last week, saying: “Now is the time for war and to defend the homeland. Anything that tries to distract us must be avoided and rejected. Deception is part of the United States’ pattern of behavior.”
Photograph: Mark Schiefelbein/AP
He called US special envoy Steve Witkoff’s description of the negotiations a lie. Baghaei explained that Witkoff had stated in an American television interview that the United States had four demands: “An end to the nuclear and missile programs, any kind of support for friends in the region, and an end to the Iranian navy. Of course, none of these were raised in the negotiations. These are lies that they are inventing to justify their actions.”
Returning to the claims of Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, the United States had acted largely because it knew that Israel was about to attack and that would make the United States a target for Iran. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said this seemed like a case of Israel and not America first.
He added: “Trump received false information from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu about Iran’s military defense and deterrent capabilities. The question is whether Israel, with a deliberate miscalculation, made the United States a victim of its own interests.”
He warned European powers not to help the United States launch airstrikes against Iran, saying: “It would be an act of war. Any such act against Iran would be considered complicity with the aggressors.”
The United Kingdom has said it is willing to allow the United States to use its air bases in the United Kingdom and the Diego Garcia base to attack Iran, as long as the attacks on Iranian missile sites are part of a defensive operation to protect the economies of the Gulf states.
Tensions with Gulf allies continued as Tehran pursued its long-noted plan to create chaos in global markets by attacking US assets across the region. The measure is causing a collapse in relations with the Gulf States and pushing the price of oil towards $85 a barrel.
The Foreign Ministry urged angry Gulf states to act with reflection and patience. Ministry sources said they believed Israeli Mossad agents were working in Saudi Arabia and Qatar in a bid to carry out operations that could turn the states against Iran.
In a rare admission of the diplomatic damage the strategy may be causing, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian’s son Yousef said: “I know how much my father tried to improve relations with neighbors and Muslim countries in the region, and how important it was and continues to be for him.
“How bitter it is that to defend ourselves we have to attack American bases in our friendly countries. I don’t know if they understand it or not. I wish none of our neighbors’ territories were under the control of the American military.”
