For years, Mojtaba Khamenei lived in the shadows of power in Iranfar from the spotlight and the public exposure reserved for his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
However, behind the scenes, the supreme leader’s second son was weaving a dense network of loyalties within the political and security apparatus that, over time, has placed him among the most powerful figures in the country: the highest political and religious authority.
This Sunday, the Assembly of Experts – a body made up of 88 clerics – named him the new supreme leader, after the death of his father and his wife in a joint attack by the United States and Israel during the first day of the war.
Mojtaba had long headed the list of successors, although he had never held an official position in the Government or in State institutions. He holds the rank of hojatoleslam, an average clerical level below that of ayatollah, But if his appointment was controversial it is due to the risk of bringing power to a theocratic version of the former hereditary monarchy of the Shah, overthrown during the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
Her appointment, welcomed by the Revolutionary Guard, to which she is close, has been interpreted as a direct challenge to Donald Trump. At the same time, it is perceived as a sign that the regime does not die with the bombingsbut continues under an even harder line.
“Power behind the robes”
Two decades ago, US diplomatic documents published by WikiLeaks showed the extent to which Mojtaba was perceived as a key actor within Iranian power. Some sources described it as “the power behind the robes” and they even maintained that he controlled the telephone and ran his own father’s office in the center of Tehran.
Mojtaba Khamenei has not only moved in the corridors of religious and political power. According to exclusive research by Bloomberg, controls a global real estate empirel which includes luxury hotels in Europe, from Frankfurt to Mallorca, with an estimated value of about 100 million dollars (approximately 86.4 million euros).
People gather in Tehran in support of Iran’s new supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei.
This investment network also includes luxury properties in London, such as a 33.4 million pound (about 38 million euros) house in one of the most exclusive neighborhoods of the British capital.
Mojtaba is believed to have knows the city well: according to The Daily Mailbased in WikiLeaks documentsin the early 2000s he traveled to London on several occasions with his wife to undergo fertility treatment, complying with family pressures to produce an heir. It took four visits, including a final two-month stay, until they managed to have a son whom they named Ali, in honor of his grandfather, the then Supreme Leader.
This empire also includes a villa in what is known as the “Beverly Hills of Dubai” and luxury hotels throughout Europe. This network of assets would have allowed Khamenei to channel funds to Western markets, circumventing international sanctions imposed since 2019 due to the Iranian nuclear program.
According to documents reviewed by Bloomberg and sources familiar with the matter, the resources would have moved through accounts in the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and the United Arab Emiratescoming mainly from Iranian oil sales.
Officially, the sale of Iranian crude oil corresponds to the National Iranian Oil Company, but international sanctions have diverted much of the trade into opaque channels.
The intermediary
Although all threads seem to lead to Mojtaba, he has not been directly involved in the transactions. The name that appears behind the purchases is Ali Ansari, an Iranian construction magnate sanctioned by the United Kingdom, described as a “corrupt businessman and banker.”
Accused of “financially supporting” the Revolutionary Guard, Ansari has always denied all accusations of acting as an intermediary between the new ayatollah and his investments abroad.
In parallel, an investigation of the Financial Times indicates that Ali Ansari owns a vast collection of properties in Europe, the total value of which is estimated at 400 million euros.
These include the Steigenberger golf and spa resort in Camp de Mar, a 164-room luxury hotel in Mallorcaa stake in the Schlosshotel Kitzbühel ski resort in Austrian Alps and two luxury hotels in Germany.
Normally, Iranian state media tends to show the supreme leader and his family as people who lead an austere and deeply religious life. In this sense, little evidence suggests that foreign assets have been used to maintain an ostentatious lifestyle. However, hidden wealth attributed to the young Mojtaba Khamenei contradicts that image of modesty promoted by the regime.
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