Iran’s president claims Supreme Leader Khamenei healthy, able to govern

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian claimed Thursday that Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, who has been absent from public view for months, is “completely” healthy despite reports that he could be deceased or brain-dead.

Questions have surrounded Khamenei’s condition since he was reportedly seriously injured during U.S.-Israeli airstrikes on Feb. 28 that killed his father and predecessor, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, along with several members of his family.

The younger Khamenei is believed to have gone into hiding and has not been seen in public or photographed since becoming the regime’s next supreme leader.

When asked by Fox News’s “Special Report” host Bret Baier when the last time Pezeshkian saw Khamenei in-person, the Iranian president said the two met “about a month ago” and had “conducted talks.”

“I don’t remember the dates. About a month, a month and a half ago,” Pezeshkian said. “We met for about seven hours.”

Baier asked for a health update on Khamenei and whether he would be able to govern.

“Very much so, completely,” Pezeshkian responded, adding that his administration is being consulted and directed by Khamenei.

When pressed about why the supreme leader has yet to address the public since the start of the war, Pezeshkian blamed Khamenei’s reclusiveness on the “lack of security that was created by the action of foreigners,” whom he called “aggressors.”

Questions have surrounded Khamenei’s condition since he was reportedly seriously injured during Operation Epic Fury that killed his father and predecessor, along with several members of his family.

A report from The Atlantic cited sources in Tehran that speculated Khamenei was either dead or brain-dead, while others believed he was still alive.

President Trump pushed back on the report, saying he doesn’t believe the supreme leader is dead.

“He was very seriously wounded, but I don’t think he’s dead,” he said in an interview with conservative commentator Glenn Beck.

“And if he is, they’re putting on a pretty good show because they talk about going back to talk to him all the time to get a final blessing on things,” Trump added.

The president said Khamenei had suffered very serious wounds in the strikes to “the left side of his body, the arm, the leg, the whole thing.”