<div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>One after another, Israel has taken out Iran's top leaders.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>First it was Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, killed in the opening shots of the war. </span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Now Ali Larijani, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council who was considered one of the most powerful figures in the country, has also been killed. As have a raft of other top-ranking military and political leaders.</span></div></div><div><div id="adspot-mobile-medium"></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><strong><span>READ MORE: </span></strong><a href="https://www.9news.com.au/world/us-israel-iran-war-israel-hits-tehran-with-airstrikes-on-persian-new-year-as-war-jolts-energy-markets/039a694d-c088-4820-8422-3b860b725352"><strong><span>Israel hits Tehran with airstrikes on Persian New Year</span></strong></a><span></span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>With so many top leadership figures taken out, who is now running Iran? Here is a look at the country's power structure, what is known — and what is not.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><h3><span>Khamenei's successor</span></h3></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Ultimate authority in Iran rests with the country's supreme leader, who has sat at the apex of power since the creation of the Islamic Republic in 1979 after the revolution that overthrew the shah.</span></div></div><div><div class="OUTBRAIN" data-reactroot="" data-src="//www.9news.com.au/world/us-israel-iran-war-look-at-who-holds-the-reins-of-power-since-top-leaders-killed/d6f20e94-8a21-4e53-9a57-876cd188306f" data-widget-id="AR_5"></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>After Khamenei was killed, his son, 56-year-old Mojtaba Khamenei, was quickly named to replace him as Iran's new supreme leader. A secretive figure, the younger Khamenei has not been seen in public since the airstrike killed his 86-year-old father.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The cleric had long been considered a contender for the post, despite never having been elected or appointed to a government position. The younger Khamenei maintains close ties to the country's powerful paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>His views are believed to be even more hard-line than those of his father. Officially, he is now in charge of Iran's armed forces, and any decision regarding the country's nuclear program rests with him.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>But is he truly running Iran?</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><h3><span>Israel says Iran's leadership is in disarray</span></h3></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"I'm not sure who's running Iran right now," Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said during a news conference on Thursday night. </span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Mojtaba, the replacement ayatollah, has not shown his face. Have you seen him? We haven't, and we can't vouch for what exactly is happening there."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Mojtaba Khamenei's wife, Zahra Haddad Adel, was also killed in the Israeli strike that killed his father. US and Israeli officials have suggested he was wounded in the same attack.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Iran's command and control structure is in utter chaos," Netanyahu said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Burcu Ozcelik, senior research fellow for Middle East security at the Royal United Services Institute, a United Kingdom-based defence and security think tank, said the elimination of so many of Iran's top leaders will alter its theocracy — but that the change could be a gradual one.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Leadership matters, and the loss of key decision-makers spanning politics, intelligence, internal security and (the) army will have transformative consequences," Ozcelik said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"The fixation on the terminology of 'regime collapse' is obscuring the fact that the regime is already changing" due to the strikes against the country and the killing of high-level leaders. But the full impact of the war on the country could take time to emerge, Ozcelik explained.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"We need to be prepared for change that may take years, not weeks or months."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><h3><span>The Revolutionary Guard</span></h3></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>For many analysts, true power now rests with Iran's feared paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"The Revolutionary Guard is the state now," said Ali Vaez, Iran project director at the International Crisis Group. Before the war, the country's civilian leadership was "subservient entirely" to the supreme leader, he explained, while the Guard was the second-most powerful force in the country.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>But now, with the elder Khamenei gone and his son not enjoying the same authority as his father, "it is really the Revolutionary Guards who are running the country."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The Guard rose out of Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution as a force meant to protect the country's Shiite cleric-overseen government. It later became enshrined in its constitution and operated parallel to Iran's regular armed forces.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The Guard's expeditionary Quds Force was key in creating what Iran describes as its "Axis of Resistance" against Israel and the United States. </span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>It backed Syria's former President Bashar Assad, the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, Yemen's Houthi rebels and other armed groups in the region.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><h3><span>An independent military</span></h3></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Early on in the war, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi suggested the country's military units were acting independently from central government control.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Our … military units are now in fact independent and somehow isolated and they are acting based on instructions — you know, general instructions — given to them in advance," Araghchi had said on Al Jazeera on March 1.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Pressed about Tehran's attacks on other Gulf nations — such as Oman, which had acted as an intermediary for Iran in recent nuclear talks with the US — he said: "What happened in Oman was not our choice. We have already told our … army, armed forces to be careful about the targets that they choose."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><h3><span>"Multiple layers of leadership"</span></h3></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>The possibility of an Israeli or a US attack on Iran had long been in the cards. It was something the Islamic Republic had factored into its planning, setting up multiple contingency plans, Vaez said.</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"I think the mistake in the US and in Israel is that they ended up believing their own rhetoric that Iran is akin to a terrorist organisation, that decapitating the regime or removing one or two layers of political elite would result in paralysis and collapse," Vaez said. </span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"Whereas this is a state, … it has multiple layers of leadership."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>Even if all top generals are eliminated, he said, others lower down the ranks can pick up where their superiors left off. </span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><span>"The expectation that this regime will … implode by removing a few dozen senior leaders, I think is nothing but an illusion."</span></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><em><strong><span>NEVER MISS A STORY:</span></strong></em><span> </span><em><span>Get your breaking news and exclusive stories first by following us across all platforms.</span></em></div></div><div class="block-content"><div class="styles__Container-sc-1ylecsg-0 goULFa"><ul><li><em><strong><span>Download the 9NEWS App here via</span></strong></em><span> </span><a href="https://apps.apple.com/au/app/9news/id1010533727" target="" title=""><em><strong><span>Apple</span></strong></em></a><span> </span><em><strong><span>and</span></strong></em><span> </span><a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=nineNewsAlerts.nine.com&amp;hl=en_AU&amp;pli=1" target="" title=""><em><strong><span>Google Play</span></strong></em></a></li><li><em><strong><span>Make 9News your preferred source on Google by</span></strong></em><span> </span><a href="https://9.nine.com.au/8x987w" target="" title=""><em><strong><span>ticking this box here</span></strong></em></a></li><li><em><strong><span>Sign up to</span></strong></em><span> </span><a href="https://login.nine.com.au/edm?client_id=nineatnine" target="" title=""><em><strong><span>our breaking newsletter here</span></strong></em></a></li></ul></div></div>