5.3.2026
U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday he should be involved in choosing Iran’s next supreme leader as the U.S. and Israel hammered the country for a sixth day. Iran kept up its retaliatory attacks on Israel, American bases and countries around the region.
Speaking to Axios, Trump ruled out Mojtaba Khamenei, a front-runner to replace his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed in the opening strikes of the war. Trump’s comments were likely to renew questions about whether the U.S. and Israel seek the overthrow of the Islamic Republic or just a change in its policies.
Trump told Axios that “I have to be involved in the appointment” of Khamenei’s successor, and that the late leader’s 56-year-old son “is unacceptable to me,” and “a light weight.”
“We want someone that will bring harmony and peace to Iran,” Trump said.
“I have to be involved in the appointment, like with Delcy in Venezuela,” said Trump, referring to the acting president in the South American country.
The war has meanwhile escalated each day, affecting an additional 14 countries across the Middle East and beyond. Iran has said the U.S. will”bitterly regret” torpedoing an Iranian warship near Sri Lanka. On Thursday, Azerbaijan accused Iran of attacking it with drones — though Tehran denied that. A day earlier, the U.S. said it sank an Iranian frigate in the waters off Sri Lanka.
All the while, the U.S. and Israel have battered Iran with nationwide strikes, targeting their military capabilities, leadership and nuclear program. Israeli and American leaders have suggested that toppling the government was a goal, but the exact aims and timelines have repeatedly shifted, and the conflict has increasingly appeared to be open-ended.
Iran’s attacks have targeted their Arab neighbors, disrupted oil supplies and snarled global air travel. The war has killed at least 1,230 people in Iran, more than 100 in Lebanon and around a dozen in Israel, according to officials in those countries. Six U.S. troops have been killed. AP