Iran’s President Met New Supreme Leader In Total Darkness, Wondered If It Was Really Him

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian was reportedly taken to a secret location in Tehran and allowed only a brief meeting in complete darkness with a man he was told was Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, according to Iran International.

Citing sources familiar with the meeting, the outlet reported that Pezeshkian was transported by his own security detail to an undisclosed location before being removed from his vehicle and placed into the back seat of a commercial vehicle with heavily tinted windows. The man identified to him as Khamenei was already inside the vehicle.

The interior was reportedly kept so dark that neither man could see the other, and Pezeshkian was not permitted to shake the supposed Khamenei’s hand. After only a few minutes, Pezeshkian was instructed to leave. 

The outlet reported that afterward, the president questioned whether the person sitting beside him was actually Mojtaba Khamenei, as he had only heard a voice in the darkness.

The unusual account comes amid persistent questions about Mojtaba Khamenei’s physical condition, as the 56-year-old has not been seen publicly since assuming power following the death of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and was notably absent from his father’s funeral, with only written statements attributed to him that were released by state media. 

According to The New York Times, citing senior Iranian officials, Khamenei suffered serious injuries in the strike that killed his father, including significant damage to one leg and one hand requiring multiple surgeries, as well as severe facial burns that have limited his ability to speak and will likely require reconstructive surgery. The injuries have reportedly left him largely isolated as the regime works to conceal his whereabouts from the United States and Israel.

The meeting broke from the Iranian regime’s traditional protocol, under which presidents are typically received at the supreme leader’s official residence for formal consultations.

According to Iran International, Pezeshkian was angered by the encounter, viewing it as humiliating. The outlet reported that the president had repeatedly threatened to resign unless he was granted a meeting with the new supreme leader.

The account also appears to conflict with Pezeshkian’s own public remarks. Speaking to a gathering of trade association representatives, the president said he had spent two and a half hours with Khamenei “in a cordial atmosphere,” reported Iran International.

Pezeshkian also acknowledged publicly Wednesday that communicating with Khamenei has become increasingly difficult since the new supreme leader assumed power.

“It is very difficult to communicate with him at the moment, but in any case, his presence is a very great source of strength for us so that we can continue,” Pezeshkian said, according to AFP.

The president nevertheless defended Khamenei, saying he had held productive meetings with him and had been met with “kindness and very sound logic.”

“Unfortunately, the current situation allows some malicious people to describe him differently and to present a different image of him,” Pezeshkian said.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said during a July interview that he has not seen Khamenei and that “only a limited number of people have met with him,” according to Iran International. 

Iranian officials have reportedly taken extraordinary measures to conceal Khamenei’s location from the United States and Israel, relying on handwritten messages delivered through a network of trusted couriers traveling by car and motorcycle rather than electronic communications.

Mojtaba Khamenei assumed power after his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was killed on the opening day of the United States and Israel’s military campaign against Iran. Unlike his father—who ruled the Islamic Republic for more than three decades and exercised near-total control over the country’s political, religious, and military institutions—Mojtaba lacks the same religious authority and political stature and has reportedly become increasingly reliant on hardline military commanders as he recovers from his injuries.

Born into Iran’s ruling elite, Khamenei followed a path that combined religious study with military service. As a teenager, he joined an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps brigade during the Iran-Iraq War before later completing his theological education.

Despite his behind-the-scenes influence, he never held elected office or a formal senior government position. He was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department in 2019 and has also been accused of helping direct the regime’s crackdown on the 2009 Green Movement protests.

In March, The New York Post reported that U.S. intelligence believed the supreme leader may be gay, citing sources familiar with a classified White House briefing. According to the report, President Donald Trump laughed after hearing the assessment, while other officials in the room reportedly reacted similarly. 

The report drew particular attention because Iran’s Islamic Republic criminalizes homosexuality and same-sex relations can carry the death penalty.

His succession brought questions about whether the Islamic Republic is drifting toward a hereditary system of leadership. Ali Khamenei himself became supreme leader in 1989 after succeeding Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic, who led the 1979 revolution that toppled Iran’s shah. 

Iran International also reported that Mohammad-Bagher Kharrazi, a senior cleric whose sister is married to Khamenei’s brother, claimed in a video released Monday that Pezeshkian had threatened to resign 28 times.

According to Kharrazi, Khamenei responded by warning that the president’s next resignation would be accepted. 

“If he resigns one more time, I will approve it. I will write ‘approved’ underneath it, and that will be the end of it,” Kharrazi quoted Khamenei as saying.

Pezeshkian’s office rejected the allegation.

Mehdi Tabatabaei, deputy for communications and information in the president’s office, called the claims “baseless and an outright lie” in a post on X.

“A sinister alliance of deceitful agitators and proponents of extremism and incompetence has targeted sacred unity and national cohesion,” Tabatabaei wrote.