Iran’s Ayatollah ‘moves underground to hide in bunker’ over fears of US strikes as regime ‘wages war on its own people’
Juliana Cruz Lima , Foreign News Reporter
Massive armada heads toward Iran, Trump reveals as he turns the pressure back UP on the Mullahs & vows ‘we’re watching’PauseUnmuteFullscreenClose
IRAN’S supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is reportedly cowering in an underground bunker – hiding out of fear he could be wiped out by US airstrikes.
The 86-year-old bloodthirsty autocrat is said to have fled to a heavily fortified shelter linked by a maze of tunnels under Tehran as an American armada powers toward the Persian Gulf.
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His move came after senior military officials warned the ageing leader that a US strike could be imminent, according to Iran International.
Khamenei has handed day-to-day control of the Islamic Republic to his youngest son, Masoud Khamenei, 53, who is now running office and acting as the regime’s main channel to the executive branch.
Publicly, Tehran is pounding its chest. But in private, its supreme leader seems to be hiding from the wrath of Donald Trump and his troops.
The US President said Friday the US Navy was sending a massive armada to the Middle East, in a warning shot aimed squarely at Tehran after days of escalating threats.
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The Abraham Lincoln carrier strike group – carrying five squadrons of fighter jets and at least three missile destroyers – is now moving from the Indian Ocean toward waters off Iran.
Iran’s response has been predictable bluster, with President Masoud Pezeshkian threatening that any US or Israeli strike on Khamenei would be treated as “an all-out war against us.”
Iran’s national security parliamentary commission went further, declaring that any attack on the embattled ayatollah would trigger a declaration of jihad.
Yet the regime’s actions tell a different story. Khamenei, normally eager to sermonise online, has gone silent on X since January 17.
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It is not known exactly when he slipped into hiding, but the sudden quiet from a man who rarely misses a chance to posture has raised eyebrows.
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This is not the first time Khamenei has vanished underground.
During last year’s short but intense 12-day war with Israel, he also retreated to a bunker and reportedly even drafted a list of potential successors in case he was killed.
His most recent online threat promised retribution against internal and international “criminals” he blamed for the massive protests that have ripped across Iran since December 28.
Those demonstrations, sparked by economic collapse and the worst drought in decades, have been met with staggering violence.
The death toll has now exploded past 33,000.
New figures suggest around 33,100 protesters have been killed in just two weeks.
One source described the staggering number as “off the scale,” adding: “This was genocide.”
Nearly 98,000 more have been wounded, with research showing 30 per cent suffering eye injuries.
Hospital data indicates hundreds were executed outright, including at least 468 in Tehran alone.
Inside Iran’s hospitals, doctors describe scenes closer to a war zone than a public health system.
One surgeon said pellet injuries quickly gave way to live ammunition, with “war bullets” fired at close range.
Operating rooms were overwhelmed, stretchers piled up, and surgeons worked nonstop through the night as patients poured in faster than they could be treated.
“This was not policing,” one doctor told The Guardian.
“This was something else.”
As the blood flowed at home, Iran’s rulers doubled down on threats abroad.
Revolutionary Guard commanders warned they had their “finger on the trigger,” vowing to unleash chaos if the US intervened.
Exiled crown prince Reza Pahlavi accused the regime of “waging war on its own people,” saying nearly as many Iranians have been killed in weeks as Americans lost over years in Vietnam.
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Calling for urgent Western action, he warned: “We are at a point of no return and that’s why it’s so critical the world has to help or there will be even more of the same.”
He added: “It’s a moral obligation. There cannot just be condemnation then back to business as usual. The West cannot throw protesters under a bus.”
Iran’s supreme leader retreats underground, warned of likelihood of US airstrikes: report
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Trump says US has an ‘armada’ headed toward Iran
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has gone underground, reportedly hiding out in a bunker out of fear of being wiped out by US airstrikes — as the USS Abraham Lincoln steams toward the Persian Gulf.
The 86-year-old supreme leader has moved to a fortified shelter in Tehran connected to a series of elaborate underground tunnels after senior military officials warned of the increasing likelihood of an imminent US attack, Iran International reported, according to the Jerusalem Post.
Khamenei has left his youngest son Masoud Khamenei, 53, in charge of running the day-to-day management of the Islamic Republic, the Jerusalem Post reported.
Masoud Khamenei’s emergency duties include being the primary communication channel with the regime’s executive branch, according to the report.
Iran has deemed the likelihood of US airstrikes to be high after President Trump announced that warships were headed to the Middle East as a warning to the ayatollah, following a continuing war of words between the two leaders in recent days.
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Trump boasted Friday that the US Navy was sending a massive “armada.”
The Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, which includes three destroyers, is currently motoring from the Indian Ocean to the Persian Gulf region of Iran, Stars and Stripes reported.
Publicly, Tehran has not backed down from heightened tensions with the US as Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian threatened to treat any attack against the supreme leader by the US or Israel as “an all-out war against us.”
Iran’s national security parliamentary commission also declared this week that any attack against the embattled Khamenei would trigger a declaration of jihad, the Iranian Students News Agency reported, according to the Jerusalem Post.
Khamenei, who is frequently active on social media, has not posted on X since Jan. 17, though it is not known when he allegedly entered into hiding.
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It’s not the first time the supreme leader has holed up underground. Khamenei also went silent after retreating to a bunker last June, during the 12-Day War with Israel. He reportedly had even drafted a list of potential successors in the event he was killed in the short-lived conflict.
His latest X post this year threatened to go after both internal and international “criminals” who he claimed were responsible for the widespread protests that have gripped the nation since Dec. 28.
