The president of the United States, Donald Trump, asserted on his platform Truth Social that Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, “is dead,” in a post where he celebrated the event as “justice” and linked the operation to “close cooperation with Israel.”
In the same text, Trump stated that Jamenei "could not evade" U.S. intelligence and argued that "the other leaders who died alongside him" were also unable to do anything.
In the message, the leader described Khamenei as "one of the most evil people in history" and asserted that his death would be justice "for the Iranian people" as well as for Americans and citizens of other countries who —he claimed— were "murdered or mutilated" by the Iranian leader and his "band of bloodthirsty thugs."
Trump presented the scenario as "the biggest opportunity" for the Iranian people to "take back their country" and stated that he has heard that "many" members of the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps), military personnel, and security forces "no longer want to fight" and "are seeking immunity."
The president also recalled a prior warning attributed to himself: “Now they may have immunity, soon they will only face death,” and expressed his desire for the IRGC and the police to “peacefully join” with “Iranian patriots” to “restore the greatness that the country deserves.”
In the same post, Trump stated that "in just one day" not only had Khamenei died, but that "the country" was left "deeply destroyed,甚至 annihilated."
He then warned that the "intense and precise bombings" would continue "uninterruptedly throughout the week or as long as necessary" to achieve his goal of "PEACE IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND, IN FACT, IN THE WORLD."
On January 31, 2026, the United States Central Command (CENTCOM) warned about the risk of “collisions and escalation” due to naval maneuvers with live fire announced by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in the strategically important Strait of Hormuz.
Washington urged Tehran to act "safely and professionally" and warned that it would not tolerate behaviors deemed dangerous to international navigation or to its forces deployed in the region, in one of the most sensitive maritime routes for global energy trade.
At the beginning of February, a U.S. fighter jet shot down an Iranian drone that, according to the Pentagon, approached “aggressively” toward the USS Abraham Lincoln carrier in the Arabian Sea.
The White House described the action as an act of self-defense, while Tehran maintained that the aircraft was conducting a routine reconnaissance mission. The incident highlighted the fragility of the military balance in the region, amid intermittent diplomatic contacts and escalating warnings from both sides.
Tension escalated a week later when Washington ordered the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier to be relocated from the Caribbean to the Middle East.
The movement strengthened the U.S. naval presence alongside the Abraham Lincoln and its strike group, amid a stalemate in negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program and public warnings from President Donald Trump about potential "very traumatic" consequences if an agreement with Tehran was not reached.
One day later, it was reported that the United States Army was preparing for the possibility of sustained operations lasting "weeks" against Iran if the president ordered it.
The buildup of military forces and the hardening of rhetoric from the Trump Administration thus established a phase of maximum tension prior to the recent statements regarding Iranian leadership.
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