Large crowds of people dressed in black gathered outside Tehran’s main mosque to pay their respects to Iran’s former supreme leader on the first day of his funeral.
The body of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is currently lying in state at the Great Mosalla, before his possible burial in his hometown of Mashhad next Thursday.
Officials expect 15 to 20 million people to attend the ceremonies in Iran and Iraq in the coming days, which come more than four months after Khamenei was killed in U.S. and Israeli strikes.
Masses of supporters of the Islamic regime gathered Saturday morning, apparently chanting slogans against the United States and in favor of revenge for the assassination of the Ayatollah.
“We came [to the funeral] because we promised the supreme leader that we would be by his side until the end,” Professor Reza, 37, told AFP in the courtyard of Grande Mosalla.
“For a long time we shouted that we would sacrifice our lives for the leader, but he was the one who sacrificed himself for us.”
Arash Rahimi, 40, told Reuters: “Everyone here came to avenge the blood of their supreme leader.
“As our leader said, we have a vendetta with the United States. Our relationship with the United States will never be good.”
Khamenei was killed in joint Israeli and US strikes on Iran in late February, in what quickly escalated into a wider regional conflict.
US President Donald Trump said the Iranian government was “dying to make” a peace deal to end the war after a preliminary agreement was reached between the two, adding on Friday: “We gave them [Iran] a week off for a funeral because we’re nice.
Much of central Tehran will be closed this weekend as the funeral ceremony begins. It will be the largest funeral ever held in terms of the number of participants relative to the country’s population.
Khamenei’s body will lie in state for three days in Greater Mosalla, alongside the remains of his family members who were also killed in the airstrikes.
There will then be three more days of events outside the capital.
On Tuesday, his body will be transferred to Qom, south of Tehran, where a senior Shiite cleric will lead funeral prayers at Jamkaran, one of Iran’s most important and symbolic religious sites.
He will then travel to Najaf, Iraq, on Wednesday. After a procession to the sanctuary of Imam Ali, the first imam of Shiite Islam, the ceremonies will continue in Karbala before the body’s return to Iran.
On Thursday, Khamenei will be buried at the Imam Reza Shrine, the mausoleum of Shiite Islam’s eighth imam and Iran’s most important pilgrimage site, in Mashhad.
Ceremonies beyond the six-day procession will continue across the country for the next 40 days, with commemorative events planned until the first anniversary of Khamenei’s burial.
Khamenei was replaced as Iran’s supreme leader by his son, Mojtaba, who has not been seen in public since taking office, sparking speculation about his health.
His presence at the funeral remains a key question surrounding the carefully choreographed ceremony.