Trump: Iran's Ayatollah Wounded, Not Dead
Trump: Iran's Ayatollah Wounded, Not Dead
The News
President Trump said Wednesday that Iran's supreme leader is alive but badly hurt, knocking down reports that the ayatollah had been killed.
"I don't think he's dead. He was very seriously wounded," Trump said on the Glenn Beck program, according to the Jerusalem Post.
Trump added that if the ayatollah is in fact dead, Iran is "putting on a good show," The Hill reported.
Iranian authorities have not confirmed the leader's condition.
Timeline
Reports circulate that Iran's new supreme leader is dead.
Beck asks Trump on air whether the new ayatollah is dead, and whether the United States can beat Iran without arming the Iranian people, according to The Right Scoop.
Trump answers that the leader is wounded rather than dead, and says an American victory over Iran will come very soon. He does not spell out what that victory would look like.
Reactions
Trump's account is the only on-the-record word so far on the leader's condition. Tehran has issued no confirmation either way.
Newsweek, which identifies the leader as Mojtaba Khamenei, argued that the more important question is not whether he is alive but whether Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps has turned him into a wartime figurehead it controls.
What's Next
Watch for any statement from Iranian state institutions confirming or denying the leader's status — the silence is itself the story.
Also watch what Trump means by "victory very soon": military, diplomatic, or something else. He offered no detail.
More
The condition and real authority of Iran's supreme leader is the hinge for everything that follows — whether Tehran can negotiate, and who is actually giving orders if it fights.
Sources: Jerusalem Post, The Hill, The Right Scoop, Reuters, Newsweek.
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