TEHRAN July 05,2026 (Daily Times) : Funeral prayers for martyred Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and four other family members were offered in Tehran on Sunday, the second day of funeral ceremonies that have drawn huge crowds to pay their final respects.
Khamenei ruled the Islamic republic from 1989 until he was martyred aged 86 in an airstrike on the first day of the US-Israeli war with Iran on February 28.Sunday’s service at Tehran’s Grand Mosalla complex was led by prominent cleric Jafar Sobhani, a 97-year-old scholar who teaches in seminaries at the holy city of Qom.
Khamenei’s son and successor Mojtaba Khamenei, who is said to have been wounded in the February 28 attack, has not appeared in public since being named supreme leader and was notably absent from the funeral prayers.
The late supreme leader’s other three sons, Masoud, Mostafa and Meysam, were in attendance.
Sunday was declared a public holiday across Iran, and later in the day, Khamenei’s body will be moved from the Grand Mosalla complex where it is lying in state in preparation for processions through the capital on Monday.
The vast religious complex and surrounding streets were packed with mourners on Sunday morning.
With temperatures set to exceed 35°C, mourners carrying Iranian flags and portraits of Khamenei, as they made their way to the Grand Mosalla, were handed refreshments.
President Masoud Pezeshkian attended the ceremony alongside senior officials including parliament speaker and Iran’s chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, state television footage showed.
Khamenei’s coffin, draped in the Iranian flag and topped with his black turban, was placed alongside the coffins of four relatives also martyred in the February strikes, including an infant granddaughter.
Authorities have said they expect more than 10 million people to take part in ceremonies in Tehran.
