The death of the president changes the power dynamics in Iran

HAD THE supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, looked a touch less steely when delivering his eulogy, more Iranians might have believed the demise of his president was just an accident. Even Mr Khamenei’s officials contrasted the perfunctory manner he treated the deaths of Ebrahim Raisi and Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Iran’s foreign minister, in a helicopter crash on May 19th with the supreme leader’s uncontrollable sobbing after the assassination of his top commander, Qassem Suleimani, four years ago. In a speech the following day, he devoted more time to Gaza than to the loss of Mr Raisi. The president’s death would be “easily handled,” said the interior minister at his funeral.