We're also setting up, as we speak, a purely defensive mission. This is a support mission, the purpose of which is to work with other European and indeed non-European states.

The purpose is to provide escorts for container ships to gradually reopen the Strait of Hormuz, which is, of course, a passage for international trade but also a passage for oil and gas, which should be able to come out of the region.

This will all take place in good order, and we've started discussing this. This is a peaceful defensive mission; it's a support mission, but indeed it is essential for our economies and indeed for the global economy at large.

Hezbollah should stop all attack from Lebanese soil because it is threatening all Lebanese nationals.

Israel should also stop its military operations and strikes against Lebanon.

Unconditional surrender means we're fighting to win. It means we set the terms.

We'll know when they're not capable of fighting.

Whether they know it or not, they will be combat ineffective. They will surrender.

There's a reason we changed our name from the Department of Defense to the Department of War.

Not because we seek war. Not because we want more war.

Frankly, we want peace.

If war is necessary, we're going to fight to win.

President Trump is right when he says we obliterated their nuclear program. He’s right. We did. We dropped those bombs exactly where they needed to be, set them back.

But that doesn’t mean they’ve stopped their pursuit.

"By a decisive vote, the Assembly of ​Experts appointed Ayatollah Seyyed Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei as the third Leader of the sacred system of the Islamic Republic of Iran," the ​assembly said in a statement.

“One righteous person after another.”

Mojtaba Hosseini Khamenei, born on September 8, 1969, in Mashhad, Iran, is a Shia cleric and politician who has recently ascended to the position of Supreme Leader of Iran following the death of his father, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in a targeted strike.

As the second-eldest son in the Khamenei family, Mojtaba grew up amid Iran's revolutionary turmoil, with his father rising as a key opponent to the shah. After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the family relocated to Tehran, where Mojtaba later served in the Iran-Iraq War from 1987 to 1988 as part of the Revolutionary Guard's Habib ibn Mazahir Battalion.

Despite lacking the high clerical rank of ayatollah and rarely appearing in public, Mojtaba has wielded significant behind-the-scenes influence for decades. He has deep ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the Basij paramilitary group, playing a pivotal role in suppressing the 2009 Green Movement protests following the disputed presidential election.

He supported hardline figures like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the 2005 and 2009 elections, helping to sideline reformist factions. In 2019, the U.S. sanctioned him for advancing his father's "destabilizing regional ambitions and oppressive domestic objectives," including close collaboration with the Quds Force in supporting groups like Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Taliban.

Mojtaba's political stances embody a radical, pragmatic conservatism centered on the absolute survival of the Islamic Republic and the principle of Velayat-e Faqih (Guardianship of the Islamic Jurist). He prioritizes national security, rejecting democratic reforms that could undermine the theocratic system.

His worldview features staunch anti-Zionism and anti-imperialism, with deep hostility toward Israel and the United States, and the collective west, while bolstering Iran's proxy networks across the region.

Analysts describe him as an authoritarian pragmatist who might allow minor social concessions, like easing hijab enforcement, to quell unrest but maintains a "security-first" grip on power. A figure, possibly more radical than his father, who could work on speeding up the path towards nuclear armament, disregarding his father's previous fatwa.