Reclusive Khamenei breaks six-month silence to urge Gulf rulers to confront their 'real enemy'

Mojtaba Khamenei has ended six months of silence with a written Telegram message — his first public communication since US-Israeli airstrikes left him wounded — calling on Gulf Arab rulers to unite against their "real enemy," which he identified as America and Israel. Timed to Islamic Unity Week, the message asked whether Palestinians would have been "so defenceless" had Muslims stood together, and challenged Gulf monarchs to explain why foreign powers sought dominion over their lands. It described "the criminal rulers of America and the fake Zionist regime" as the sworn enemies of Muslim unity.

Mojtaba has made no public appearances since the airstrikes that triggered the Iran war, the same strikes that killed his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the previous supreme leader.

His sharpest words were aimed at Gulf Arab rulers — who have long viewed Iran's revolutionary ideology as a threat — as he demanded to know why "identity-less scoundrels from thousands of kilometres away" were able to covet their territories.

The message followed a Friday address to Iranians in which he prohibited conduct that damages social cohesion and instructed officials to avoid "discouraging statements" that sap national morale.