What Iran is left with, if it survives this war, is survival itself. That is not nothing. But it is considerably less than what it had before October 2023. The mask is off. And the region has seen what is underneath

Trump carries not only Soleimani’s blood but also Ali Khamenei’s. That makes any compromise far harder to sell. A supreme leader who opens negotiations with Washington in the weeks after his predecessor’s assassination would be signing his own political death warrant

The killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in a joint U.S.-Israeli strike on February 28, 2026, has produced the kind of reactions we have seen before.