The joint Israeli-US strike on former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at the start of the ongoing war with Iran, rather than killing him, acted as a jailbreak from regime control, according to The Atlantic, citing Ahmadinejad’s associates.
Ahmadinejad’s associates, speaking on condition of anonymity, claim that he is alive, contradicting previous reports of his death during the opening strikes of Operation Roaring Lion and Epic Fury.
The Atlantic further noted that Ahmadinejad’s freedom of movement had been restricted following the mass anti-regime protests in January, where an estimated 36,500 people were killed by the Iranian regime.
His phones were reportedly confiscated, and the number of his bodyguards was raised to approximately 50.
The strikes, Ahmadinejad’s associates said, struck near his residence in Narnak, northeast Tehran, killing several of his bodyguards and allowing him and his family to flee underground.
His current location is unknown to the regime, according to The Atlantic.
Since his alleged escape, Ahmadinejad has made a few public addresses, including a congratulatory message on Mojtaba Khamenei’s rise to supreme leader.
Ahmadinejad becomes critic of Khamenei, regime
Ahmadinejad served as Iranian president from 2005 until 2013. Following this, he has been barred three times from running for president again by an unelected 12-member Guardian Council, in 2017, 2021, and 2024.
After the 2017 disqualification, he reportedly became a vocal critic of Ali Khamenei, going so far as to pay tribute to Iran’s former monarchy.
In 2018, former Iranian defense minister Hussein Dehghan told the Iranian magazine Mosallas that Ahmadinejad was similar to “the door of the mosque, which can’t be burned or thrown away” without bringing down the mosque itself.
“Arresting Ahmadinejad could unsettle the regime,” The Atlantic quoted Meir Javedanfar, co-author of a biography of Ahmadinejad, as saying. “He knows a hell of a lot about it.”
James Genn and Jerusalem Post Staff contributed to this report.