ALBAWABA - According to a story citing Iranian media, Iran’s former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was assassinated earlier this year while attending a high-level security briefing about possible anti-government rallies.
Khamenei was meeting senior military officials to discuss preparations to increase the readiness of Iran's security forces to deal with future unrest with the least deaths, opposition source Iran International quoted a story carried by Nour News.
The strike was aimed not at a full session of the National Defense Council but at a meeting of one of its specialized committees, where officials were discussing both internal security and mounting concerns over a possible military confrontation involving the United States and Israel, the report said.
Participants believed Iran was under a dual threat of an external military invasion happening at the same time as a fresh wave of domestic protests, the research said. The meeting was thus designed to plan reactions to either of these possibilities.
The security strategy in question was apparently drawn up after huge protests erupted across Iran earlier this year. Khamenei reportedly personally backed the move and ordered officials to speed its implementation. The plan was overseen by the National Defense Council, said Ali Shamkhani, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council.
The report says the goal was to strengthen the preparation of security and police forces to manage future demonstrations, while reducing civilian casualties.
The same source also indicated that a defense industrial complex struck by Israel during the 12-day conflict had been working on creating equipment for crowd control and public order activities, emphasizing non-lethal techniques of dispersing protestors.
The reports have not been independently verified and Iranian officials have not released publicly the circumstances surrounding the meeting or its agenda.
