Massive Mourning in Mashhad as Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Buried
On 9 July 2026 the coffin of Iran’s former supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was carried through a boulevard in Mashhad to the Imam Reza shrine, the world’s holiest Shia site.
Hundreds of thousands of mourners, many holding red banners that read "We must rise" and photos of the late leader, lined the streets in black. Some chants even called for the death of U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the men who ordered the April strike that killed the leader earlier this year.
The burial followed six days of official mourning that began in Tehran and Qom and extended to the Iraqi cities of Najaf and Karbala. The coffin crossed the city in a slow procession, eventually arriving at the Imam Reza complex as night fell.
The event took place amid a renewed U.S.-Iran skirmish, with U.S. strikes on Iranian rail bridges and Iranian forces responding in turn. Negotiations for a cease‑fire, which began with a memorandum of understanding in early June, paused while the funerary ceremonies concluded.
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