Iran has opened more than 5,000 schools and fifty of thousands of classrooms nationwide to house mourners traveling to Tehran for the funeral of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Hotels are also offering 50% discounts, while mosques and sports halls have been prepared as temporary accommodation. Bus and rail networks are being diverted to serve the main events.
Millions are expected to attend the week-long ceremonies that began Saturday at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Mosalla Grand Mosque. Officials say the farewell will draw more than 10 million people from across Iran and abroad, with Tehran’s mayor preparing for “almost 20 million” in the capital alone. Crowds dressed in black have jammed major avenues to view the coffin of the 86-year-old leader.
Khamenei was killed in a US-Israeli strike in February, state media reported. Family members displayed in coffins alongside him include his daughter, son-in-law, and baby granddaughter, as well as the wife of his son Mojtaba. Islamic burial customs call for burial within a day, but authorities postponed the funeral until after last month’s interim truce due to wartime risks.
The funeral program spans six days across four cities. After a massive procession in central Tehran on Monday, the remains will move to Qom on Tuesday for ceremonies at the seminary center of Iran’s Shia hierarchy. On Wednesday, events will be held in Iraq’s shrine cities of Najaf and Karbala with attendees from Iran’s regional network of Shia proxies. The burial is scheduled for Thursday in Mashhad, near the tomb of Imam Reza.
Delegations from more than 100 countries attended Friday’s ceremony for foreign dignitaries. Security is tight with temporary airspace restrictions over Tehran and other cities. The government has banned private vehicles near procession routes and deployed 16 mobile bakeries to produce 50 million pieces of bread for mourners.
State institutions are framing the turnout as a show of unity. Officials described the large public procession as “another referendum for the Islamic Republic” and said the response demonstrates national resolve following the war.
