BBC Persian Service
US President Donald Trump has, according to US media reports, rejected Israel's plan to assassinate Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during the current conflict, calling it a "bad idea".
In addition to the stated goal of attacking Iran's nuclear program, which he claims poses a threat to Israel's survival, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stated that the result would be Israeli military attacks There could also be regime change in Iran.
He had previously directly addressed the Iranian people and called on them to rise up against their leaders.
Below, we examine who the Supreme Leader of Iran actually is, how much power he has in the country, and what role his family plays in the politics of the Islamic Republic.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is only the second Supreme Leader of Iran since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, and he assumed the position in 1989.
Young generations of Iranians have spent their entire lives under his rule.
He is at the center of a complex network of different centers of power, and can veto any public policy issue and personally select candidates for public office.
As head of state and supreme commander of the armed forces, as well as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), also known as the Revolutionary Guard, he wields almost absolute power.
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He was born in 1939 in Mashhad, the second largest city in Iran.
He is the second oldest of eight children in a religious family.
His father was a mid-ranking Shia cleric, and Shia Islam is the dominant branch of Islam in Iran.
His education was mainly devoted to the study of the Quran, and at the age of 11 he qualified as a priest.
But like many religious leaders at the time, Khamenei was simultaneously politically and spiritually engaged.
A gifted orator, he joined the opponents of the then Shah of Iran, a monarch who was overthrown from power during the Islamic Revolution.
He spent years in hiding and in prison.
The Shah's secret police arrested him six times, abused him, and persecuted him internally.
A year after the 1979 revolution, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini appointed him to lead Friday prayers in Tehran, the capital of Iran.
Khamenei was elected president of Iran in 1981, and in 1989, religious elders chose him as the successor to Ayatollah Khomeini, who died at the age of 86.
How powerful is his son Mojtaba?
But Khamenei rarely travels abroad and, according to reports, lives modestly with his wife in central Tehran.
He is known to love gardening and poetry.
He smoked in his youth, which is unusual for clerics in Iran.
In an assassination attempt in the 1980s, his right arm was paralyzed.
He has six children with his wife Mansureh Hojaste Bagerzadeh - four sons and two daughters.
The Khamenei family rarely appears in public or in the media, and there is little official and verified information about the private lives of his children.
Of the four sons, the most famous is Mojtaba, the second oldest, due to the influence and significant role he plays in his father's inner circle of associates.
Mojtaba attended the Alavi Islamic High School in Tehran, which is traditionally attended by the children of high-ranking officials of the Islamic Republic.
He married the daughter of Gholam-Ali Hadad-Adel, a prominent conservative politician, at a time when he was not yet a priest.
At the age of 30, he began formal religious education in the city of Qom, the most famous religious educational institution in Iran.
By the mid-2000s, Mojtaba had gained greater influence over the country's political life, although the media rarely reported on it.
He came to the spotlight after the controversial 2004 presidential election, when prominent opposition candidate Mehdi Karroubi publicly accused him of behind-the-scenes political activities in favor of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in an open letter addressed to Ayatollah Khamenei.
Since the 2010s, Mojtaba Khamenei has increasingly been described in public as one of the most powerful people in the Islamic Republic, and according to some unverified reports, his father wants him to succeed him.
However, official sources have repeatedly denied these claims.
Although Ali Khamenei is not king and cannot hand over the throne to his son, Mojtaba has great influence among his father's hardline associates, as well as in the Supreme Leader's cabinet, which is more powerful than constitutional institutions.
Mustafa Khamenei is the eldest son in the family.
His wife is the daughter of Azizolah Hoschvagt, an extremely conservative traditional cleric.
Both Mustafa and Mojtaba were at the front during The Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s.
The third son, Massoud Khamenei, was born in 1972.
He is married to Suzanne Harazi, the daughter of a prominent cleric, Mohsen Harazi, who is affiliated with the conservative Association of Lecturers at the Religious Education Center in Qom, and the sister of Mohammad Sadeq Harazi, a former diplomat of reformist beliefs.
Masud keeps himself away from political circles and is little liked.
He previously headed the office responsible for monitoring his father's work, which also acts as Ayatollah Khamenei's main propaganda apparatus.
He was also in charge of compiling and editing his father's biography and memoirs.
The youngest son, Maysam Khamenei, was born in 1977.
Like his three older brothers, he is a priest.
His wife, whose name has not been mentioned in the media, is the daughter of Mahmud Lolacian, a wealthy and influential merchant who financially supported clerics who advocated revolution before 1979.
Maysam worked with his brother Massoud in the Office for the Preservation and Publication of Ayatollah Khamenei's Works.
Two daughters
There is little information available about Ali Khamenei's daughters.
Bushra and Hoda are the youngest members of the family and were both born after the Islamic Revolution.
Bushra was born in 1980 and is married to Mohammad-Javad Mohammadi Golpayegani, the son of Gholamhossein (Mohammad) Mohammadi Golpayegani, Ayatollah Khamenei's chief of staff.
Hoda, Khamenei's youngest child, was born in 1981.
She is married to Mesbah el-Hod Bagheri Kani, who studied marketing and taught at the private Imam Sadiq University in Tehran.
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