Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has reportedly gone into hiding, retreating to an underground bunker amid fears he could be targeted by U.S. airstrikes as the USS Abraham Lincoln heads toward the Persian Gulf.
According to a report by Iran International cited by the Jerusalem Post, the 86-year-old leader relocated to a heavily fortified shelter in Tehran linked to an extensive network of underground tunnels after senior military commanders warned that the chances of an imminent U.S. attack were rising.
The report said Khamenei has delegated responsibility for the Islamic Republic’s daily operations to his youngest son, Masoud Khamenei, 53.
Masoud Khamenei is now tasked with emergency oversight duties, including serving as the main conduit between the supreme leader and Iran’s executive leadership, according to the same account.
Iranian officials reportedly assessed the risk of U.S. strikes as especially high after President Trump announced that American naval forces were moving toward the Middle East, issuing a warning to the ayatollah amid escalating rhetoric between Washington and Tehran.
Trump said Friday that the U.S. Navy was dispatching a large “armada.”
Stars and Stripes reported that the Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group — accompanied by three destroyers — is traveling from the Indian Ocean toward the Persian Gulf near Iran.
Despite the heightened military posture, Iranian leaders have publicly refused to de-escalate. President Masoud Pezeshkian warned that any strike by the U.S. or Israel targeting the supreme leader would be treated as “an all-out war against us.”
Iran’s parliamentary commission on national security echoed that stance this week, declaring that an attack on Khamenei would amount to grounds for a jihad, according to the Iranian Students News Agency as cited by the Jerusalem Post.
Khamenei, who is usually active online, has not posted on X since Jan. 17. It remains unclear exactly when he entered the bunker.
This is not the first time the supreme leader has withdrawn underground during a crisis. Khamenei also disappeared from public view last June when he reportedly sheltered in a bunker during the 12-Day War with Israel. At that time, he was said to have prepared a list of possible successors in case he was killed.
In his most recent post this year, Khamenei vowed to pursue both domestic and foreign “criminals” he blamed for the nationwide protests that erupted on Dec. 28.
Those demonstrations — fueled by economic collapse following the worst drought in decades — have been met with lethal force, with regime security units reportedly killing at least 3,000 civilians. Some groups have claimed the death toll could be as high as 20,000.
