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Mojtaba Khamenei has for years been one of the most powerful yet least publicly exposed figures in Iran. Reuters has described him as a mid-ranking cleric and hardliner who headed his father’s office, known in Persian as the beyt, and who played a direct role in the operation of the state while cultivating close ties with the Guards and their business networks. Though widely discussed inside Iran and by outside analysts as a possible successor to his father, he remained relatively unknown to many ordinary Iranians because he made few speeches and rarely sought the public profile that usually accompanies top office. That opacity has now become a political issue in itself, because at a time of war and succession, Iranians and foreign governments alike are trying to judge how much authority he personally commands and how much rests with the security establishment around him.
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