A leaked internal Iranian recording published by the British Telegraph on March 16 purports to describe how Mujtaba — widely identified in Western coverage as the son of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and a figure in succession speculation — narrowly escaped death during a Feb. 28 airstrike that Tehran says was carried out by US and Israeli forces. The recording, said to be a leaked speech by a senior Khamenei aide to clerics and IRGC commanders, details the moment a ballistic missile struck the compound where members of the Khamenei family live.
According to the tape as reported, the missile hit at 09:32 local time and struck the Supreme Leader’s residence in Tehran. The recording claims Mujtaba was spared because he had stepped outside into a garden minutes earlier to tend to business, while several relatives and senior military figures were killed or badly injured when missiles struck multiple locations within the compound.
The speech was reportedly delivered on March 12 by Mazaher Hosseini, the head of ceremonies in Khamenei’s office, and was leaked to the Telegraph, which says it independently verified the tape. The recording names several high‑profile casualties, including the reported deaths or severe injuries of senior IRGC commanders — among them names rendered in the report as Muhammad Shirazi, IRGC Ground Forces commander Mohammad Pakpour, and Defence Minister Nasirzadeh — and describes graphic scenes at multiple targeted residences.
Iranian officials have offered conflicting public accounts since the strike. Iran’s foreign minister publicly insisted on March 14 that Mujtaba was healthy and carrying out duties, while other Iranian military sources quoted in the leak said commanders had no contact with the Supreme Leader after the attack. In Washington, President Trump was quoted as saying he did not know whether Mujtaba had been killed, highlighting the fog of information around the event.
If accurate, the recording carries weight beyond the personal tragedy it alleges: it would confirm that a strike intended to decapitate or cripple Iran’s senior leadership was narrowly averted, and that multiple members of the ruling household and top commanders were directly targeted. That would mark a significant escalation in the tactics deployed by the United States and Israel and would explain the high level of secrecy and internal alarm inside Tehran reflected in the tape.
The leak itself is consequential. A recording of a private briefing circulating outside official channels suggests either factional leakage inside the Iranian elite or a breakdown in operational security around the Supreme Leader’s inner circle. Either possibility matters for Tehran’s internal cohesion and for adversaries trying to calibrate pressure without provoking open war.
Analysts caution that the accounts in the recording remain subject to verification; the Telegraph says it has authenticated the tape, but independent confirmation of specific deaths and the full sequence of events remains limited. Nonetheless, even the possibility that multiple senior figures in the Khamenei household and IRGC leadership were struck alters calculations in Tehran and in capitals watching for further retaliation or restraint.