News

Evening Brief: Khamenei Plans for the Possibility of His Assassination, Pakistan To Nominate Trump for Peace Prize

BY Guy D. McCardle

As Khamenei retreats to a bunker, Israel picks off his generals one by one, Trump lands a Nobel nod from Pakistan for stopping a nuclear standoff, and U.S. B-2s loaded with bunker busters are quietly headed for Guam—because nothing says peace quite like preparing for war. Welcome to your Saturday Evening Brief for June 21, 2025.

Behind the staged calm of the Supreme Leader’s portrait lies a regime scrambling underground, hunted from above and planning for the day its top man might not walk out alive. Image Credit: Reuters

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei isn’t leaving anything to chance. With Israeli airstrikes hammering Iranian targets and several of his top commanders already dead, Iran’s Supreme Leader is now operating under what amounts to assassination contingency planning. He’s relocated to a fortified underground bunker and shut off all electronic communications. Instead, he’s relying on a single trusted aide to serve as the messenger to the military, keeping his digital footprint practically nonexistent.

Advertisement

Recognizing how vulnerable Iran’s top brass has become, Khamenei has taken the rare step of appointing backup commanders across the board. If more senior figures are taken out, replacements are already lined up. But the most significant move has been in the realm of succession. Breaking with precedent, Khamenei has named three senior clerics as possible successors and instructed the Assembly of Experts to pick one of them if he dies. That’s a dramatic shift designed to keep the regime from descending into infighting at a moment of crisis. Notably, his son Mojtaba—long rumored to be groomed for power—isn’t on the list.

The motivation behind all this is simple: survival of the regime. Khamenei fears that Israel—or possibly the United States—will try to take him out. And given the intensity of the Israeli attacks, that’s not some paranoid fantasy. Analysts are saying Iran has taken more damage in the past few days than during the entire Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s. Khamenei’s goal now is to make sure the Islamic Republic doesn’t unravel if he suddenly disappears. That means no guesswork, no power vacuum, and no chaos. Whether or not the plan holds up under fire is another story, but the planning itself is as cold and calculated as anything we’ve seen from Tehran in decades.

 

Advertisement

Pakistan Intends to Nominate President Trump for Nobel Peace Prize

Pakistan is making a bold diplomatic move by announcing its intention to nominate U.S. President Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. The reason? Islamabad credits Trump with stepping in during the May 2025 flare-up between India and Pakistan—the worst bout of cross-border fighting between the two nuclear neighbors since 1971—and helping to broker a ceasefire. According to Pakistani officials, Trump’s intervention on May 8 was pivotal in halting the escalation before it spiraled into a full-blown war.

The announcement was rolled out via government statements and amplified on social media, with praise for Trump’s “strategic insight and exceptional statesmanship.” Islamabad claims he played a central role in navigating the diplomatic channels between New Delhi and Islamabad to de-escalate tensions. Under Nobel rules, governments are allowed to submit nominations to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, and Pakistan plans to take full advantage of that.

Advertisement

Of course, not everyone is buying it. India insists the ceasefire was worked out bilaterally, downplaying any American involvement. Inside Pakistan, reactions have been mixed. Some officials see this as a smart play—possibly a way to cozy up to Washington and signal disapproval of any U.S.-Israeli coordination on Iran. Others are more skeptical, pointing to Trump’s open support for Israel as a reason he shouldn’t be anywhere near a peace prize.

Still, for Islamabad, the move is as much about diplomacy as it is about recognition. Whether it’s a calculated attempt to shape Trump’s future foreign policy or a genuine gesture of appreciation, Pakistan’s nomination makes one thing clear—they believe Trump’s involvement helped pull the region back from the brink. Now they want to see him get the global credit for it.

 

Head of Palestine Corps of Iran’s Quds Force Killed in Overnight Drone Strike

Saeed Izadi, the head of the Palestine Corps within Iran’s Quds Force, is dead—killed in an Israeli drone strike that hit an apartment building in the city of Qom, just south of Tehran. According to Israeli officials, the hit was executed by the Israeli Air Force in a “precise” operation based on solid intelligence that pinpointed Izadi’s location. Israel wasted no time calling it a major win, both operationally and in terms of intelligence gathering.

Izadi wasn’t just another Iranian commander. He was the key liaison between Tehran and Palestinian militant groups, most notably Hamas. Israeli officials say he played a central role in funneling weapons and money to Hamas ahead of the group’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel—a massacre that left deep scars and triggered months of conflict. Tel Aviv is calling him “one of the masterminds” behind that assault, and his death is being celebrated in Israeli defense circles as a significant blow to Iran’s regional proxy network.

This strike is part of a wider Israeli effort to go after high-value Iranian military targets, especially those involved in orchestrating attacks against Israel. As of now, Iran hasn’t confirmed Izadi’s death, but Israeli sources are standing firm: they got their man. Whether or not Tehran chooses to acknowledge it, the message is loud and clear—Iran’s top operatives are no longer safe, even in their own backyard.

 

US Moves B-2 Bombers to Guam

The United States is moving B-2 stealth bombers to Guam as President Donald Trump considers whether the U.S. should participate in Israeli military strikes against Iran Several B-2 bombers departed from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri and are heading across the Pacific, with flight tracking data and air traffic control communications indicating their destination is a U.S. Air Force base in Guam.

These bombers are capable of carrying the 30,000-pound GBU-57 Massive Ordnance Penetrator, a weapon specifically designed to destroy deeply buried targets such as Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility. Experts note that only the U.S. possesses this kind of bunker-buster bomb, which could be critical if a strike on Iran’s underground nuclear sites is ordered.

At this time, no orders have been given to deploy the bombers beyond Guam, and officials have not disclosed the exact number of aircraft involved. The Pentagon has not commented on the move. The deployment does not necessarily mean a strike is imminent; such repositioning is standard practice to provide the president and military leadership with operational options as tensions escalate in the Middle East.

 

 

 

Advertisement

What readers are saying

Generating a quick summary of the conversation...

This summary is AI-generated. AI can make mistakes and this summary is not a replacement for reading the comments.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR