4 March 2026

ALAN HAYES

 

IRAN’S supreme leader is dead! But what now?

 

He presided over Iran for more than three decades, overseeing its transformation into a regional power while ruling at home with an iron fist. His death, which came as a result of Israeli airstrikes, based on American intelligence, has sent Iranians into the street — some to mourn, but also many to celebrate — as the government he led vows revenge.

 

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was the supreme leader of Iran’s theocratic government. Whoever takes his place — and how they come to power — will shape the future of this conflict, Iran and even the broader Middle East.

 

The real question is: Has the American warmonger a succession plan? The U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran began on Saturday with strikes that largely focused on military targets, like the missile launch sites scattered throughout the country.

 

The most prized target was a high-security compound in the heart of Tehran, where C.I.A. agents had learned that a meeting of top Iranian officials was taking place. Khamenei was nearby. Satellite images showed the compound reduced to rubble, and rumours of the Supreme Leader’s death began circulating quickly. The Mad King announced the death on social media on Saturday. Iran confirmed it hours later.

 

But what happens next still isn’t clear.

 

In the interim, Iran’s top national security official, Ali Larijani, has said an interim committee will run the country until a new ayatollah is chosen. Last June, during the 12-day war with Israel, Khamenei named three candidates who could replace him, with the successor to be appointed by a conservative body of clerics.

 

The goal, of course, is to ensure that the Islamic Republic survives, regardless of what the Trump administration may have in mind.

 

There’s been weeks of mixed messages from the sycophantic administration, and from the Mad King himself, around the outcome goals from going to war with Iran - was it to punish the government for killing tens of thousands during recent protests? To finish the job on its nuclear program? To eliminate the ballistic missiles threatening Israel? Mad King Donald issued a full-throated call for regime change last Saturday.

 

What was notable, though, was who the Mad King called upon to achieve this goal. It was the Iranian people. “When we are finished, take over your government,” he urged them, in a message.  “America is backing you with overwhelming strength and devastating force. Now is the time to seize control of your destiny.”

 

This approach — urging Iranians to overthrow their own unpopular government — allows Trump to avoid sending in ground troops to finish the job, something the Mad King's administration has insisted it will not do. The lessons from the Iraq war are still fresh on everyone’s mind.

 

However, many analysts are sceptical that Trump's call to the Iranian people will work. Intelligence agencies believe the organised opposition in and outside Iran remains relatively weak. This raises the obvious question: Does the Mad King’s administration, for all it is urging of Iranians to rise up, actually think outright regime change is likely — or whether it hopes for a softer, Venezuela-style decapitation? There, the Trump administration ousted the president — but rather than helping a democratically elected leader into power, it left the vice president of the old regime in charge.

 

It would seem that the Trumpian sycophants are envisioning a situation in which something like the Venezuela scenario plays out and that the next people up will ready to make a deal with the United States. A long bow to draw even for the Mad King’s hopefuls.

 

Even if Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards does ultimately take greater control over the country and pursue a less confrontational line with the U.S., in order to protect their economic and political interests, the next supreme leader may be just as hard-line but would have less power.

 

The problem at hand for the Trump administration, is that their unhinged leader started a conflict that was based on too many changing motives, whirling in and out of an unstable brain.

 

Yet, despite all the chaos and uncertainty, one thing seems clear - the death of Khamenei will be some kind of turning point for the Islamic Republic.

 

A muddled brain, a confused justification

 

In the weeks leading up to America and Israel’s attack on Iran, the Mad King, true to form, changed his mind, no doubt each time he belched, as to why the U.S. should wage war on Iran.

 

At first it was all about destroying Iran’s nuclear capabilities – forgetting that he had already boasted that they had been destroyed in June 2025, when the U.S. first attacked the country. This confirmation was reinforced in his recent State of the Union address.

 

Last Monday, the Mad King, in a somewhat confused explanation, has attempted to justify his need to wage war on Iran. A deadly war that has drawn in much of the Middle East.

 

Foremost in his mind is the claim that Iran had ignored US warnings and “refused to cease their pursuit of nuclear weapons”.

 

“The regime's conventional ballistic missile program was growing rapidly and dramatically, and this posed a very clear, colossal threat to America and our forces stationed overseas,” Trump added. “The regime already had missiles capable of hitting Europe and our bases, both local and overseas, and would soon have had missiles capable of reaching our beautiful America.”

 

In our lead story today, Mad as a Cut Snake, it has been reported that in the recent talks in Geneva, Iran's Foreign Affairs Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran “will under no circumstances ever develop a nuclear weapon; neither will we Iranians ever forgo our right to harness the dividends of peaceful nuclear technology for our people”.

 

To add further contradiction to the Mad King’s ramblings, his own administration told congressional staff in private briefings on Sunday that intelligence didn't suggest Iran was preparing to launch a pre-emptive strike against the U.S.

 

Regardless of the advice received from U.S. intelligence, Trump claimed there were four aims for the war he started at the weekend, including: “destroying Iran's missile capabilities”, “annihilating their navy”, “ensuring that the world's number one sponsor of terror can never obtain a nuclear weapon” and “ensuring that the Iranian regime cannot continue to arm, fund and direct terrorist armies outside of their borders”.

 

No doubt the Iranian people are wondering what they did to deserve the terror inflicted upon them by Donald Trump; something he continues to sponsor with addled justification.

 

There has been enormous concern, worldwide, over the lack of transparency from the US administration over what it was hoping to achieve by joining Israel in striking Iran and killing Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

 

Israel has had a centuries-old conflict with the Arab nations surrounding it, and for the U.S. to embark on a Middle-Eastern conflict with a nation, whose Prime Minister, following an investigation of war crimes and crimes against humanity, had arrest warrants issued against him by the International Criminal Court (ICC) is, without doubt, highly untenable.

 

But is Trump convinced that his marriage to Israel will convince the world of the bona fides of their attack on Iran? Trump's rhetoric to numerous publications has changed continuously since the war began, including his rather absurd statement “We haven't even started hitting them hard. The big wave hasn't even happened. The big one is coming soon.”

 

Gregg Carlstrom, Middle East correspondent for The Economist, a British news and current affairs journal, said “He (Trump) doesn’t sound convinced by any of it. He’s throwing spaghetti at the wall.”

 

On Monday, US Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth said the American military action was “not a so-called regime change war”, but the regime “surely changed and the world is better off for it.” Hegseth also claimed the US operation against Iran would not lead to an “endless war”.

 

To add further to the contradictions of opinions coming from the Mad King’s regime, was the claim by General Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who proceeded to say more troops and fighter jets were being sent to the region as the U.S. involvement expanded. “This work is just beginning and will continue,” General Caine said.

 

Australia’s pain

 

So, while the world waits, and the war continues, the spread of the conflict into neighbouring Middle-Eastern countries will no doubt impact on the supply and price of oil in Australia.

 

Global media network Al Jazeera has already reported that gas prices have soared in Europe and Asia following the Qatar Energy announcement to halt liquefied natural gas production after Iranian attacks.

 

The Saudi Ministry of Defence, in reports carried by the state-run Saudi Press Agency (SPA), said two drones had “attempted to attack” the Ras Tanura refinery on Monday morning, and that a “small” fire had broken out after they were intercepted. They said they were temporarily shutting down some units of the Ras Tanura oil refinery following a drone attack.

 

Ras Tanura oil refinery, one of the world’s largest oil processing facilities and located near the eastern city of Dammam, has a capacity of 550,000 barrels per day. The facility is home to one of the largest refineries in the Middle East and is considered a cornerstone of the Saudi Arabia’s energy sector.

 

The attacks came as oil tankers had been piling up on either side of the Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of the world’s seaborne oil and the bulk of Qatari gas flows.

 

The maritime disruptions and fears of a prolonged conflict have led to a sharp rise in global oil prices, which will have a significant impact on the global economy. Oil prices have surged as much as 13 percent to above $82 a barrel, the highest since January 2025.

 

And what has Australia’s Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, had to say? Not much!

 

Albanese appeared on ABC's 7.30 program on Monday night with little to say about Iranian conflict. The national broadcaster said the PM “sidestepped questions about the legality of U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, while also saying the public mourning of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Australia is inappropriate”.

 

It has been reported that more than 10,000 Australian citizens have been unable to leave the Middle East since the conflict began and may face weeks of uncertainty.

 

The U.S.-Israeli assault on Iran makes Australia less safe, by increasing the risk of terrorism against Western countries, and destabilising an already volatile region.

 

For better or worse, Anthony Albanese has emerged as one of the few world leaders to clearly spell out his support for the U.S. air strikes against Iran, saying in a statement: “We support the United States acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and to prevent Iran continuing to threaten international peace and security.”

 

Outside the U.S., Israel and Australia, there weren’t many who were applauding.

 

The questions will now be whether Trump notices Albanese's vassal compliance — and just how far Australia is willing to follow the US president down the path he’s chosen.

 

 Independent Senator Jacqui Lambie said Albanese was “bending over to Trump”, adding it was “shameful” and that Albanese should “start standing up” to the “bloody sociopath” in the White House.

 

Greens foreign affairs spokesperson David Shoebridge accused Albanese of trying to “curry favour” with Trump, adding: “Obviously a lot of countries are desperate to have the approval of an increasingly erratic and dangerous Trump administration.”

 

Like an addict, who refuses to see the damage their drug of choice is doing to them, Trump's unhinged policies are not just a threat to the world but a significant source of harm. But then every lunatic has a pet, and it seems the Mad King's pet is Israel - a pet who is able to manipulate the United States into backing its terrorism, expansionism and aggression.

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