Frontrunner for Iran’s Next Supreme Leader Emerges, US Sub Sinks Iranian Warship Off Sri Lanka

The powerful son of Iran’s slain supreme leader emerged on Wednesday as a frontrunner to succeed him as the US stepped up its military campaign against Tehran.

As new explosions rang out in Tehran, plans were in doubt for a funeral for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, 86, killed by Israeli forces on Saturday in the first assassination of a nation’s top ruler by an airstrike.

The body had been expected to lie in state in a vast Tehran mosque from Wednesday evening, but state media reported a farewell ceremony had been postponed.

Two Iranian sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that Mojtaba Khamenei, son of Iran’s slain supreme leader, was not in Tehran when his father was killed in a strike that destroyed the leader‘s compound.

Iran said the Assembly of Experts that will select the new leader would announce its decision soon, only the second time it will have done so since the Islamic Republic’s founding in 1979.

Assembly member Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami told state TV the candidates had already been identified but did not name them.

Israel said it would hunt down whoever was chosen.

Other candidates for supreme leader include Hassan Khomeini, grandson of the Islamic Republic’s founder and a champion of the reformist faction sidelined in recent decades.

But the favorite appears to be Mojtaba Khamenei, who has amassed power as a senior figure in the security forces and the vast business empire they control, the Iranian sources said. Choosing him would send a signal that hardliners were still firmly in charge.

Some Iranians have openly celebrated the death of the supreme leader, whose security forces killed thousands of anti-government demonstrators only weeks ago in the biggest domestic unrest since the era of the revolution.

But Iranians angry with the government said there was unlikely to be much sign of protest while bombs are falling.

“We have nowhere to go to protect ourselves from strikes, how can we protest?” Farah, 45, said by phone from Tehran, adding that the security forces “are everywhere. They will kill us. I hate this regime, but first I have to think about the safety of my two children.”

Meanwhile, in a sign of the US military’s reach, US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said a US submarine had sunk an Iranian warship off the southern coast of Sri Lanka. At least 80 people were killed, Sri Lanka’s deputy foreign minister told local television.

The United States and Israel pressed on with their round-the-clock assaults on Iran that began on Saturday. The top US commander said the campaign was “ahead of the game plan” and Hegseth said the US was winning the conflict.

“This was never meant to be a fair fight, and it is not a fair fight. We are punching them while they’re down,” Hegseth told a briefing. “Our air ​defenses and ​that of our allies ‌have ⁠plenty of runway. We can sustain this fight ​easily ​for ⁠as long as we ​need to.”

A New York Times report said that Iranian intelligence had reached out to the CIA early in the war about a path toward ending the conflict.

The report said that officials in Washington were skeptical of an “off-ramp” for now, while Trump said on Tuesday that Iranians wanted talks but it was “too late.”