Reform candidate Massoud Pezechkian Iranian Presidential Election Runoff Winner On Saturday, he defeated hardline leader Said Djalili, who promised to work with Western countries and ease enforcement of the country's compulsory headscarf law after years of sanctions and protests that have oppressed the Islamic Republic.
During his campaign, Pezeshkian promised no radical change to Iran's Shiite theocracy, which has long viewed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as the final arbiter of all state affairs in the country. But even his modest goals will be tested by a government that remains largely made up of hardliners, an ongoing war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Western concerns about Iran's enrichment of uranium to nearly weapons-grade levels.
Pezeshkian won Friday's election with 16.3 million votes to Jalili's 13.5 million, according to results released by authorities.
Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu via Getty Images
Supporters of Pezeshkian, a heart surgeon and longtime lawmaker, took to the streets of Tehran and other cities before dawn, celebrating his widening lead over Jalili, a hardline former nuclear negotiator.
But Pezeshkian's victory marks what remains a delicate moment for Iran amid rising tensions in the Middle East over the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, progress on Iran's nuclear program and looming U.S. presidential elections that could jeopardize any potential detente between Tehran and Washington.
The first round of voting, held on June 28, saw the lowest voter turnout in Iran's history since the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Iranian officials have long pointed to the turnout as a sign of support for the Shiite theocracy in a country under strain due to years of sanctions that have suffocated Iran's economy, mass demonstrations and a harsh crackdown on all dissent.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and other government officials expected turnout to increase as voting began, and state television aired footage of low-key queues at some polling stations across the country.
But online videos reportedly showed some polling stations empty, and a survey of dozens of locations in the capital Tehran showed light traffic amid heavy security on the streets.
The election comes amid rising tensions in the region: In April, Iran launched its first direct attack on Israel over the war in Gaza, while militias it supplies with weapons in the region, such as Lebanon's Hezbollah and Yemen's Houthi rebels, have joined the fighting and intensified attacks.
Iran has enriched uranium to nearly weapons-grade levels and has stockpiled enough of it to build multiple nuclear weapons, and while Khamenei remains the country's final decision-maker, Iran's foreign policy is likely to lean toward either confrontation or cooperation with the West, regardless of who wins the presidential election.
The campaign also repeatedly touched on what would happen if former President Donald Trump, who unilaterally withdrew the United States from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018, wins the November election. Iran has been in indirect talks with President Joe Biden's administration, but there has been no clear move to again restrict Iran's nuclear program in exchange for economic sanctions relief.
More than 61 million Iranians aged 18 and above are eligible to vote, of which 18 million are between the ages of 18 and 30. Polls were scheduled to close at 6 pm but were extended until midnight to increase voter turnout.
The late President Ebrahim Raisi, who died in a helicopter crash in May, was a protégé of Khamenei and was seen as a possible successor to the supreme leader.
Still, he is known to many for his role in Iran's 1988 mass executions and in the bloody crackdown on dissent that followed protests over the 2022 death of Mahsa Amini, a young woman who was detained by police for allegedly improperly wearing the mandatory headscarf, or hijab.
