Iran’s Supreme Leader has not been seen in months. For Trump’s sake, he better not be dead

April 30, 2026 — 3:00am

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A recent video out of Iran has drawn attention over its inclusion of Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei in a commemorative display of top regime figures martyred in the war.

Since he was elected in March following the killing of his father Ali Khamenei, Mojtaba has been neither seen nor heard by a nation at war and under fire, emerging only in cardboard cutout form in a viral clip (that later turned out to be AI-generated) which inspired derision, countless memes and parodies at diaspora anti-regime protests.

Mojtaba was elected by Iran’s Assembly of Experts, a body largely made up of ultra-loyalist clerics, some of whom reportedly had to be strong-armed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps into choosing him.

Reuters has published reports that Mojtaba is receiving treatment for severe limb and facial injuries sustained in the bombing that killed his father. Quoting sources within the regime, The New York Times has claimed that the new Supreme Leader is sequestered away in a high security medical facility being treated by doctors including, bizarrely, current Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who in his former life was a heart surgeon. As a fig-leaf leader with seemingly even less power than before the war, one can imagine that Pezeshkian would have the time.

While “Mojtaba” has released several written statements that have been read aloud by anchors on state television, no definitive proof of life has been offered. As time passes, the nickname “cardboard Ayatollah” seems more apt.

While regime propaganda emphasises that Mojtaba is lucid and........

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