Funeral for Ayatollah Khamenei set for July amid efforts to end war

Iran's state media has announced that funeral ceremonies for former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will be held from July 4 to 9. The events are expected to take place across Tehran, Qom and Mashhad as efforts to end the conflict continue

Islamabad: Iran’s state-run news agency said on Saturday that funeral processions for its former Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, would be held in July, as mediators say an agreement to end the war is close.

The funeral, burial and farewell ceremonies for Khamenei would take place between July 4 and 9, Iran’s state-run television, IRIB, reported.

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Khamenei was killed in the opening salvo of the war that Israel and the United States launched against Iran in late February. He has since been replaced by his son, Mojtaba, who is seen as even less compromising.

Khamenei to be buried at the holiest of Shiite shrines

Funeral ceremonies for Khamenei are expected to begin in Tehran, and the procession will move to Qom, a stronghold of many senior Shiite clerics, and then to Mashhad, his birthplace, where he will be buried at the Imam Reza Shrine, considered the holiest place among Shiite devotees.

Funerals for Khamenei’s daughter and son-in-law, who were killed in the February strike, will also be held on the same day.

Khamenei dramatically reshaped the Islamic Republic after taking the reins following the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989. Khomeini was the fiery, charismatic ideologue who led the overthrow of the Shah and installed rule by Shiite Muslim clerics tasked with spreading religious purity.

He ended up ruling far longer than Khomeini. He greatly expanded the Shiite clerical class and built the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard into the most important body underpinning his rule. The Guard became a military and business behemoth, the country’s most elite force and the custodian of its ballistic missile arsenal, with influence across Iran’s economic sectors.