Photo: FADEL SENNA / AFP / Getty Images
Israeli forces struck a gathering of Iran's Supreme Council on Tuesday (March 3) as its members were meeting to choose a successor to the late Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to a senior Israeli official who spoke to Fox News.
The strike targeted a high-level meeting of the Supreme Council at a moment when Iran's leadership was at its most vulnerable — in the middle of a succession process following Khamenei's death in earlier joint U.S.-Israeli strikes.
Iran's Assembly of Experts had been expecting a swift appointment of a new supreme leader, as the country's top clerics and officials scrambled to fill the power vacuum left by Khamenei's death. The strike now threatens to throw that process into chaos.
The succession struggle inside Iran, combined with continued Israeli military pressure, signals that the conflict is far from over. How Iran's leadership crisis resolves — and who ultimately emerges as the next supreme leader — could shape the direction of the war and the broader balance of power in the region for years to come.
The assault is the latest development in an escalating conflict between the United States, Israel, and Iran — a confrontation that has entered a significant and dangerous new phase in the Middle East.