In the small hours of Friday the police roadblocks, stalls, posters and army vans were starting to appear across Tehran as millions of Iranians prepared to attend the long-delayed six-day funeral ceremony for Ali Khamenei\u2019s, Iran\u2019s supreme leader for 36 turbulent years.<\/p>\n
Killed in the opening salvo of the US-Israeli attack on the country in February, the funeral is intended to be an epic display of personal mourning, national power, resilience and social cohesion. Small groups of mourners carrying flags were gathering along the roads festooned with the red fist, the symbol of the funeral alongside the slogan \u201cWe must rise\u201d. At a ceremony dedicated to the families of martyrs, Khamenei\u2019s coffin was displayed.<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s first vice-president, Mohammad Reza Aref, who is the lead funeral organiser, described the ceremony, which begins on Saturday in Tehran and will end with Khamenei\u2019s burial on Thursday in Mashhad, as \u201cthe most important event of this century\u201d and the most attended event since the 1979 revolution.<\/p>\n
The funeral\u2019s scale has been conceived to relay political and religious messages of resistance to the rest of the world. The former supreme leader\u2019s body, at the request of Iraqi politicians, will also be carried through the Iraqi Shia cities of Karbala and Najaf.<\/p>\n
Despite the many posters of Khamenei\u2019s son and successor, Mojtaba Khamenei, walking with his father in a garden, projecting continuity, Mojtaba is not expected to make an appearance at his father\u2019s funeral. He was severely injured in the same US-Israeli strike on a government residence in Tehran at a little after 8am local time on 28 February that killed many of his family. It killed Ali Khamenei, his daughter and her husband, Mojtaba\u2019s wife and his 14-month-old daughter.<\/p>\n
The extent of Mojtaba\u2019s injuries are unknown and he has so far issued only written statements, including one that distanced himself from the ceasefire negotiations, but sanctioned their continuance. Israel\u2019s defence minister Israel Katz threatened to kill him this week, saying he was marked for death, remarks that prompted hardliners to call for a re-examination of Iran\u2019s fatwa against possession of nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n
Preparations for the funeral at the Grand Mosalla mosque in Tehran. Photograph: Fatemeh Bahrami\/Anadolu\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran\u2019s chief negotiator and speaker of the still suspended parliament, said in an eve-of-funeral message: \u201cWe must rise up and convey the nation\u2019s call for bloodshed to the world so that the world knows that the honourable and noble nation of Iran will not remain silent in the face of oppression and arrogance and will not spare the blood of its imam.<\/p>\n
\u201cIran stands on the threshold of creating one of the greatest scenes in its history, a day when a nation, with hearts full of love, loyalty and the pain of separation, comes to bid farewell to a great man.\u201d<\/p>\n
The public funeral will begin on Saturday \u2013 as the US marks the 250th anniversary of its declaration of independence \u2013 at Tehran\u2019s Grand Mosalla mosque, where Khamenei\u2019s body will lie in state alongside the bodies of his relatives. The vast mosque complex has hosted many state religious ceremonies.<\/p>\n
All week, workers have been redecorating the vast building and there has been a heavy police presence around the area. The funeral had been planned for early March but the war with US and Israel precluded such a large gathering.<\/p>\n
A separate ceremony is scheduled on Friday for foreign leaders. Ali Akbar Pourjamshidian, the secretary of the national funeral and farewell committee, estimated that representatives from about 30 countries would attend the ceremony, but said no leaders from Europe or the US had been invited.<\/p>\n
Iran\u2019s foreign ministry spokesperson, Esmail Baghaei, has accused European countries of standing on the \u201cwrong side of history\u201d and called their stance on the US-Israeli attacks on Iran \u201ctruly shameful\u201d.<\/p>\n
A large banner of Khamenei at a busy road junction in Tehran ahead of his funeral. Photograph: Abedin Taherkenareh\/EPA<\/p>\n
A six-mile (10km) procession through central Tehran is planned for Monday from Imam Hossein Square to Azadi Square, the site of the 1979 revolution that ultimately led to the establishment of the Islamic Republic that Khamenei led after the death in 1989 from natural causes of the first supreme leader, Ruhollah Khomeini.<\/p>\n
The mayor of Tehran, Alireza Zakani, has described Monday\u2019s procession as \u201cthe largest gathering in the city\u2019s history\u201d and forecast about 20 million people will attend. Approximately 60% of Iran\u2019s population of 90 million had known no other supreme leader.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, Khamenei\u2019s body will be taken to the holy city of Qom, travelling between the shrine of Fatima Masumeh and the Jamkaran mosque. Temperatures are expected to reach about 40C.<\/p>\n
It will then go to the Iraqi Shia strongholds of Karbala and Najaf on Wednesday. The foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, has visited both cities to consult on the ceremony that is intended to demonstrate Khamenei\u2019s role as a spiritual leader of Shia Muslims.<\/p>\n
The burial on Thursday will be at the Imam Reza shrine in Mashhad, the supreme leader\u2019s birthplace.<\/p>\n
With the funeral taking place during a 60-day ceasefire with the US that is intended to reopen the strait of Hormuz and allow for talks, the organisers intend that the event will show Iranians united behind its much-changed leadership as they seek to extract concessions from US negotiators.<\/p>\n