CAIRO, March 20 (Xinhua) -- In a matter of days, a string of high-profile killings has torn through Iran's senior ranks, claiming the lives of Ali Larijani, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, and Intelligence Minister Esmaeil Khatib, among others.
The wave of targeted strikes raises urgent questions about the Islamic Republic's stability, its capacity to continue its fight against the United States and Israel, and the prospects for any negotiated end to the conflict.
WHO WERE KILLED?
On the first day of the conflict, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed, an event with no modern precedent in the history of the Islamic Republic. He had been meeting with senior officials at the time, several of whom also died in the strike: Ali Shamkhani, secretary of Iran's National Defense Council; Mohammad Pakpour, chief commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC); Defense Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh; and Armed Forces Chief of Staff Abdolrahim Mousavi.
The killings continued in the weeks that followed. On Monday, Israeli forces killed Larijani and Gholamreza Soleimani, commander of Iran's Basij volunteer force, in a targeted strike. Israel described Larijani as one of the most powerful figures in post-Khamenei Iran: a longtime confidant of the Supreme Leader who had effectively assumed control of Iranian military operations following Khamenei's death. Soleimani had led the Basij for six years, commanding a paramilitary force that Israel described as crucial to Iran's broader military structure.
On Tuesday, Intelligence Minister Khatib was killed in a separate Israeli strike. A veteran of the Revolutionary Guards, he had spent years in senior IRGC roles before his 2021 appointment and, according to Israel, had overseen Iranian operations targeting Israeli and U.S. interests worldwide.
CAN IRAN'S RULING SYSTEM SURVIVE?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, announcing Larijani's death, said Israel was opening the door to what he called a "regime change," a claim he had also made after Ali Khamenei was killed.
U.S. intelligence agencies, however, have reached a more cautious assessment. The Washington Post, citing informed sources, reported that while the strikes have degraded Iran's military capabilities, they have not triggered significant fractures or defections within the ruling system. If anything, the report said, Iran's leadership, backed by IRGC, has hardened its stance toward Washington.
U.S. Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard offered a measured assessment at a congressional hearing on Wednesday, stating that the Iranian leadership was "intact" but "largely degraded."
Signals from Tehran suggest the government had anticipated such an onslaught. Iran's Fars News Agency reported Tuesday, citing informed sources, that officials had predesignated between three and seven successors for each key civilian and military post to ensure continuity of core state functions in an emergency.
Iranian Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi made a similar point more bluntly in an interview with Al Jazeera on Wednesday. The United States and Israel, he said, have yet to grasp that Iran has a "strong political structure with established political, economic, and social institutions," designed to survive leadership shocks.
No single individual is indispensable, he said, adding that even Khamenei's death had not halted the system's functioning and that any vacant post, including that of foreign minister, would eventually be filled.
HOW WILL THE WAR BE AFFECTED?
Analysts warn that Israel's campaign of targeted killings, however tactically striking, may be making the war harder to end, not easier.
They noted that Larijani, despite his recent hawkish turn, was a figure who might have been open to serious negotiations with the United States. Trita Parsi, co-founder of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, argued that Israel killed Larijani precisely to foreclose that possibility, eliminating any potential "off-ramp" for the Trump administration before one could be taken.
Iranian scholar Seyed Emamian said the Trump administration, with no quick victory in sight, is already searching for a face-saving exit, and that Larijani's death may have removed the most viable path to one.
The pattern itself has attracted criticism. Israeli political commentator Ori Goldberg wrote that Israel's relentless resort to assassination reflects a government that has grown not merely comfortable with the tactic, but dependent on it.
Vali Nasr, a Middle East scholar at Johns Hopkins University, offered a stark assessment: the killings, he said, are likely to make Iran's remaining leadership more rigid and uncompromising, ultimately entangling the United States more deeply in a prolonged regional conflict rather than shortening it. ■
