Hours after the joint US-Israel military operation, US President Donald Trump said on Saturday that Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had been killed.
Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said there were “many signs” that Khamenei was dead.
Later, Iranian state television and the state-run IRNA news agency confirmed his death early Sunday.
Iran state television announced a 40-day mourning period and seven public holidays following the death of Khamenei, who had been in power since 1989.
Khamenei's daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter were also killed in the strikes.
Israel and the United States carried out waves of strikes on Saturday, including a daylight attack on Tehran. The first apparent strike was reported near Khamenei’s office.
The attacks, which were accompanied by calls for regime change in Iran, prompted retaliation from the Islamic Republic.
An Israeli strike also hit an elementary girls’ school in Minab in Hormozgan province in southern Iran, killing at least 108 people.
The Iranian Red Crescent said on Saturday evening that at least 201 people had been killed and 747 injured in the attacks.
Following the strikes, the UN Security Council held an emergency meeting where the US and Israel clashed with Iran. The U.N. chief and several countries urged an immediate halt to the fighting and a return to negotiations.
AFP has cited an Iranian security official and reported that the trasition of leadership after the assassination of the country's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will begin on Sunday.
The 86-year-old leader, along with his daughter, son-in-law and grandson was killed in a joint airstrike by Israel and US in Tehran on Saturday.
Thousands of mourners have gathered in the historic Iranian city of Isfahan to pay tribute to the leader, reported Al Jazeera.
Thick black smoke could be seen over Doha on Sunday morning after several loud explosions were heard across the Qatari captial, according to an AFP journalist.
The smoke could be seen on the clear morning horizon in the south of the city after Iran targeted US bases across the Gulf states in retaliation for a massive US and Israeli attack that killed Iranian leader Ali Khamenei.
Iran's parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf on Sunday described US and Israeli leaders as "filthy criminals" who will face "devastating blows" for their attacks on his country.
"We have prepared ourselves for these moments and have considered all scenarios," Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said in a video carried on state TV, adding US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have "crossed our red lines" and "will suffer the consequences."
"We will deliver such devastating blows that you yourselves will be driven to beg," he said.
At least 148 people has been killed and 95 others injured in the US-Israeli attack on an elementary girls’ school in southern Iran’s Minab city, reported Al Jazeera.
US President Donald Trump on Sunday said he would hit Iran with "force that has never been seen before" if the country retaliated against US and Israeli strikes that killed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
"Iran just stated that they are going to hit very hard today, harder than they have ever hit before," Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.
"THEY BETTER NOT DO THAT, HOWEVER, BECAUSE IF THEY DO, WE WILL HIT THEM WITH A FORCE THAT HAS NEVER BEEN SEEN BEFORE!"
Israel's defence minister hailed on Sunday the killing of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in joint strikes with the United States, saying "justice has been served."
"Khamenei was eliminated... along with senior members of the Iranian fortress of terror," Minister Israel Katz said in a statement shared on social media.
"Justice has been served, and the Axis of evil has taken a severe beating."
President Donald Trump made his case for war against Iran early on Saturday as US and Israeli forces bombed the Islamic republic, claiming conflict was required to eliminate "imminent threats" from Tehran.
Iran "rejected every opportunity to renounce their nuclear ambitions," Trump claimed in a roughly eight-minute video message posted on social media more than an hour after US strikes began.
"They attempted to rebuild their nuclear program and to continue developing long-range missiles" that "could soon reach the American homeland," the US president claimed, also calling on Iranians to overthrow their government.
But Iran was said to have signaled in talks that it was willing to cease stockpiling nuclear material, while Tehran may still be years away from developing significant quantities of missiles with intercontinental range -- raising significant questions about Trump's rationale for the conflict.
Hundreds of Iraqis attempted early Sunday to storm Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, where the US embassy is located, after the death of Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, a security source told AFP.
"Their attempts had been thwarted so far, but they keep trying," the source said.
Videos shared on social media showed protesters throwing stones at security forces, who responded with tear gas. An AFP staffer saw hundreds of people holding flags of a pro-Iran armed group.
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has announced a sixth wave of retaliatory attacks on Israel and US on 27 military bases in the Middle East, reported Al Jazeera, citing Iranian state media.
The IRGC said 27 US bases, as well as the Israeli Tel Nof airbase, the Israeli army’s command headquarters at HaKirya in Tel Aviv, and a large defence industrial complex in the same city, were attacked.
It added that Iranian forces will "implement a different and harsh step of revenge, with successive, regrettable slaps."
Iran launched a new wave of missile and drone strikes on Sunday targeting US military bases in the region and Israel, state media said, in retaliation for a massive attack that killed supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Twenty-seven US bases in the region, as well as Israel's military headquarters and a defence industries complex in Tel Aviv, were among the targets, Iranian state TV said.
Israel's military said it was responding to Iranian missile fire on Sunday, with air raid sirens activated across central Israel and parts of the occupied West Bank.
"Sirens were sounded in several areas across the country, following the identification of missiles launched from Iran toward the State of Israel," a military statement said, adding that the air force was "operating to intercept and strike threats where necessary".
Thousands of mourners gathered on Sunday in the centre of Iran's capital after the death of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to AFP journalists.
The mourners, dressed mostly in black and some crying, chanted "death to America" and "death to Israel" in Enghelab (Revolution) Square, with many waving Iran's flags and holding photos of Khamenei.
Loud explosions were heard early Sunday near Erbil airport, which hosts US-led coalition troops in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region.
According to a report by AFP, thick black smoke was seen rising from the airport area.
On Saturday, US-led coalition forces downed several missiles and explosive-laden drones over Erbil.
As outlined in its constitution, Iran on Sunday formed a council to assume leadership duties and govern the country.
The council is made up of Iran's sitting president, the head of the country's judiciary and a member of the Guardian Council chosen by Iran's Expediency Council, which advises the supreme leader and settles disputes with parliament.
Iran's reformist President Masoud Pezeshkian and hard-line judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei are its members who will step in and "temporarily assume all the duties of leadership."
The head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and a top security adviser to the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei were killed in American-Israel airstrikes on the country, state media reported Sunday.
The Guards' commander, General Mohammad Pakpour, and Ali Shamkhani, the head of the national defence council, were "martyred" in Saturday's attacks, the Iranian judiciary's Mizan online news portal reported.
Flights across the Middle East were cancelled Saturday as several countries closed their airspace after the United States and Israel launched strikes on Iran.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards said on Sunday they would launch the "most ferocious" operation in history against Israel and US bases.
"The most ferocious offensive operation in the history of the Islamic Republic of Iran's armed forces will begin any moment now," the Guards posted on Telegram.
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is dead, Iranian state media reported early Sunday.
Iranian state television and the state-run IRNA news agency confirmed Khamenei's death early Sunday, hours after Donald Trump announced the killing of the 86-year-old cleric he described as "one of the most evil people in History."
IRNA news agency reported the 86-year-old's death without elaborating on the cause.
The United States and Israel on Saturday defended their attacks on Iran, which called resulting civilian deaths a "war crime" during an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council.
"The international community has long affirmed a simple and necessary principle: Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon," said US ambassador Mike Waltz, pointing to past UN resolutions ignored by Tehran.
"That principle is not a matter of politics, it's a matter of global security, and to that end, the United States is taking lawful actions," he added.
Referencing Iran's recent deadly crackdowns on protesters, Waltz said that Iran's presence at Saturday's emergency meeting in New York "makes a mockery of this body."
"But where the UN lacks moral clarity, the United States of America will maintain it," he added.
A major attack launched by Israel and the United States killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, President Donald Trump said Saturday, announcing an assassination that he said gave Iranians their “greatest chance” to “take back" their country but that also put the future of the Islamic Republic in doubt and raised the risk of regional instability.
“Khamenei, one of the most evil people in History, is dead,” Trump wrote in a social media post. He warned of “heavy and pinpoint bombing” that he said would continue throughout the week and even beyond, part of a lethal assault the U.S. has justified as necessary to disable the country's nuclear capabilities.
Iran did not immediately confirm the death.
The US Central Command, in a post on X, shared unclassified footage of the air strikes on Iran.
Describing the operation as a "bold action", CENTCOM said its objective was to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime.
"The President ordered bold action," the post read, adding that CENTCOM forces were delivering an overwhelming and unrelenting blow.