Ayatollah Ebrahim Amini Dies at 95

On Friday, April 24 came news that Iran’s Ayatollah Ebrahim Amini had died at age 95. While Amini wasn’t well-known outside Iran, he occupied an influential perch inside the Nezam. His death is a reminder of conservatives’ consolidation of control over organs of power involved in succession.

Born in Najafabad, Amini rose through the ranks of the seminaries. He studied at the Islamic Seminaries of Isfahan and Qom, focusing his academic work on family rights and psychology. Amini also occupied key clerical roles as a member of the Academic Council of the Islamic Seminary of Qom. Likewise, he was part of the Islamic Republic’s efforts to spread its ideology around the world through his membership on the Supreme Council of the Ahl al-Bayt World Assembly. The Assembly, whose head is appointed directly by Iran’s supreme leader, has also reportedly counted Hezbollah’s Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah as a member of its Supreme Council.

In addition to these positions, Amini was a regime insider who served as a member of—and past vice chairman of—the Assembly of Experts, a Khamenei appointee on the Expediency Council, and a Friday Prayer leader in Qom. He used his position in Qom and specialization in family matters to articulate regime dogma, for example dubbing gay marriages as a weakness of western culture. In addition to his rank as an Ayatollah, his combination of clerical and political roles led to speculation of Amini being a candidate to become supreme leader. But his age—he was over a decade older than Khamenei—was always a weakness.

Amini was also significant because he represented the pragmatic brand of Iranian politics practiced by former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. A critic of former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, he once challenged Ahmadinejad over “galloping inflation.” There were also reports he was part of a delegation which visited Iran’s supreme leader in 2009 to protest the interference of his son, Mojtaba, in Iranian elections. Mojtaba Khamenei stood accused of helping engineer Ahmadinejad’s widely-disputed electoral victory.

Years later, Amini played a starring role in the 2016 internal election for the chairmanship of the Assembly of Experts. Reports indicate Rafsanjani had asked Amini to run for the Assembly’s top job, where he found himself squaring off against conservative mainstay Ahmad Jannati and former Chief Justice Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi. Jannati won the contest. Taking place against the backdrop of the then newly-inked Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and Rouhani’s gains in the 2016 parliamentary elections, this result was evidence that hardline elements—embodied by Jannati—were still well-positioned to control pivotal power centers involved in succession.

Months after this episode, Rafsanjani died. While another Rafsanjani ally, Hassan Rouhani, still retains a seat on the Assembly of Experts, his political fortunes have rapidly eroded amid severe economic problems during his presidential tenure. That’s not to mention that in addition to Jannati, Rouhani’s conservative rival, Chief Justice Ebrahim Raisi, retains a leadership role in the Assembly of Experts as first deputy chairman.

With the recent deaths of Amini and Ayatollah Hashem Bathaei-Golpayagani, the Assembly will now have more vacancies just after it held a midterm election in February. But Amini’s passing is itself symbolic, as it is a reminder that hardliners remain in important leadership roles of the most sensitive power centers in the Islamic Republic.

Jason M. Brodsky is the policy director of United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI).