He was neither a radical nor a reformist, but a system engineer.
Author: Ahmad Saeedi, analyst on Afghanistan and regional affairs (Switzerland), especially for “Sangar”
Iranian authorities confirmed that Ali Larijani, an adviser to Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, along with his son Morteza Larijani, were killed yesterday as a result of Israeli airstrikes.
In my view, the death of Ali Larijani is a huge loss and a blow to the power structure within Iran.
But who exactly was Ali Larijani?
Ali Larijani was not an ordinary politician in Iran; he was one of those rare figures in whom the threads of power and intellect were intertwined. He belonged to a family that in Iran was often described as a “state within a state,” headed by his father, the Shiite cleric Mirza Hashem Amoli. His brothers also held key positions: Ali Sadeq Larijani led the judiciary for a decade and now heads the Expediency Discernment Council; Mohammad Javad Larijani is a close adviser on international affairs with an academic background; Bagher Larijani was engaged in important scientific and academic matters. This family network gave him not only rapid access to influence but also an institutional depth that is difficult to penetrate within the state apparatus.
What made Larijani unique was the complex and multi-layered trajectory of his life. He began his career in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps during the Iran–Iraq War, where his connections within the security establishment were formed. In the 1990s, he moved to the Ministry of Culture, where he strictly controlled its activities. Later, for more than a decade, he headed Iran’s state broadcasting organization, turning official media into a tool for shaping public opinion; he understood well that the struggle over narrative is no less important than the struggle on the battlefield.
In the mid-2000s, he took on key responsibilities and became Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and chief nuclear negotiator. Here, his pragmatism became evident: he supported negotiations with the West to ease sanctions, while at the same time adhering to strict security lines. This ability to combine flexibility with firmness made him one of the architects of a policy focused on managing contradictions rather than resolving them.
Later, during his long tenure as Speaker of Parliament (2008–2020), he consolidated his position; he was not merely the head of an institution, but a balancer of forces among centers of power. He managed to advance major decisions, such as the nuclear deal, while at the same time preventing fundamental changes in the structure of power. During this period, his image took shape as someone who was neither fully conservative nor a typical reformist.
Beyond his political and security career, Larijani possessed a deep intellectual identity. He earned a PhD in philosophy from the University of Tehran; his dissertation dealt with the philosophy of mathematics according to Immanuel Kant. He did not limit himself to teaching, but wrote philosophical works and dozens of studies on the relationship between science and religion, the nature of knowledge, and the boundaries between science and metaphysics. In these works, he sought not to reject Western thought, but to reinterpret it from within, within a religious-political project balancing the survival of the system with the demands of modernization.
Another important aspect of his life was the international scientific activity of his family. One of his daughters works as a physician and oncology researcher in the United States and has published numerous articles in respected scientific journals. This demonstrates that the family managed to combine traditional roots with a presence at the highest levels of global science.
This tension between thought and action is key to understanding his personality. In 2009, he criticized the suppression of student protests, but in 2026 his role in one of the harshest waves of repression in Iran became evident again. These shifts are not merely contradictions, but a stable pattern of his behavior: to act based on what is necessary for the survival of the state, even if his words change.
In recent years, amid rising regional tensions, he returned to the center of security decision-making and managed complex issues—from military coordination to relations with major powers, especially with Vladimir Putin, as well as developing cooperation with China.
The peak of his role became evident after the death of Ali Khamenei, when Iran entered a phase of power vacuum. During this period, Larijani emerged not as a religious leader but as a key behind-the-scenes manager and a pillar of the system.
His role at this stage can be summarized in three aspects:
Preserving the integrity of the system and preventing inter-factional conflict in the absence of a supreme religious authority;
Managing security and military decisions in complex regional conditions;
Guiding the new leadership from behind the scenes by shaping policy.
Thus, Larijani should not be viewed simply as a radical or a reformist; he should be seen as a system engineer in the fullest sense of the term—a figure who simultaneously possessed intellectual, security, media, and familial instruments. He did not rely on rhetoric or popularity, but on deep influence and quiet effectiveness.
In any case, supporters of Reza Shah Pahlavi, with the arrival of America and Israel in Iran, are celebrating and rejoicing over the killing of Ali Larijani—an experience we are familiar with from the presence of foreigners in Afghanistan; a day will come when Iranians will deeply regret it.