The most recent round of hostilities between Iran, on one hand, and Israel and the United States, on the other, opened with a campaign of leadership targeting. The initial strikes killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, and other senior figures within Iran’s military and security apparatus. Most died in Israeli attacks, often with at least American intelligence support; U.S. forces may have targeted others. Subsequent operations have extended to Lebanon, where Hezbollah leadership, including senior intelligence officers, have been targeted. These operations present a question that has animated over three decades of scholarship and government deliberations on what has variously been called decapitation, assassination, and targeted killing: in wartime, when is striking a member of the enemy leadership lawful under the law of armed conflict?
In this essay, we map the legal framework that governs the targeting of a State’s leadership during an international armed conflict (IAC). Our analysis focuses solely on IACs; it does not address the targeting of the leadership of an organized armed group during non-international armed conflict. We will similarly limit ourselves to the legality of such strikes under the law of armed conflict (LOAC), also known as international humanitarian law.
There is an important distinction to be made at the outset. As we will explain, there are circumstances in which a State’s leaders can lawfully be targeted under LOAC during an armed conflict. But the legality of such targeting does not affect any parallel illegality under the jus ad bellum. A State’s violation of the prohibition on the use of force in Article 2(4) of the UN Charter is not somehow “cured” by specific acts being lawful under LOAC. Thus, if targeting Khamenei and certain other senior Iranian leaders was lawful under LOAC (and in our view it likely, or at least arguably, was for most of those targeted), this does not diminish the illegality of the use of force by the United States and Israel against Iran (which is in our view is apparent), of which these strikes were part.
In short, a State leader can legally be targeted under LOAC if they are a combatant, meaning a member of the State’s armed forces (which some senior leaders will be), or if they are a civilian directly participating in hostilities (which, as we will explain, many civilian leaders often are). Civilian leaders who do not directly participate in hostilities are protected from attack. These are the same rules that apply to targeting any other person in a conflict.
Aside from a degree of complexity regarding the legal architecture governing leadership strikes, which we explore below, the assessment of individual strikes is heavily fact-dependent. Because we have access only to open-source material, our conclusions are, in most cases, tentative. It is also essential to point out that members of the leadership may have been killed incidentally in attacks on other individuals or objects that do qualify as “military objectives,” a term we use to include lawfully targetable persons. If they were not targetable themselves, their deaths would be factored into proportionality calculations and the requirement to take feasible precautions in attack to minimize harm to civilians.
From our review of the available reporting, many of the senior Iranian leaders killed were plainly combatants, and thus targetable under LOAC (which, again, does not affect the illegality of the use of force against Iran under the Charter). The analysis is less straightforward for some of the other leaders, including those from Iran’s intelligence apparatus, as it is for Khamenei. In two cases, based on the facts at our disposal, it is likely that the attacks were unlawful. The first is the alleged targeting of former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but there is conflicting reporting on this alleged strike, which may not have happened at all. Second, the Tuesday, March 3, reported attack on a meeting of Iran’s Assembly of Experts, tasked with electing Khamenei’s successor as Supreme Leader, at a minimum, raises very serious legal questions.
The Focus on “Assassination” is Misplaced
Since the operations began, there has been significant media and commentator focus on “assassinations” under international law. The term inevitably surfaces whenever a State targets a specific individual. In peacetime, killing the head of State of another State would plainly constitute a use of force against that State, be an infringement on its sovereignty, implicate rules on the personal immunities of high-ranking State officials, and violate the international human right to life. However, once an IAC has been initiated, the legal analysis of targeting enemy leadership turns not on whether the target is politically prominent, but on whether the killing is lawful under LOAC, in addition to issues that arise under the Charter.
The wartime analog of assassination is “treacherous killing,” which typically involves perfidy (Hague Regulations, art. 23(b)). That is not at issue here. Instead, the question is whether those who were directly targeted qualified as military objectives under LOAC. If not, they are civilians protected from attack. Attacking them would constitute an internationally wrongful act for the State concerned and a war crime for some of those involved.
There is no LOAC rule prohibiting attacks against specific, named individuals, so long as the cardinal principle of distinction (distinguishing between military objectives and civilians) is complied with. For example, during the first Gulf War in 1991, coalition forces conducted a massive air campaign that included repeated strikes on leadership targets, including Saddam Hussein, even though the Air Force Chief of Staff had earlier been fired in September of 1990 for suggesting that Hussein should be the “focus of our efforts.” Since then, leadership strikes are not unprecedented. In 2003, the United States moved forward the date at which it was going to launch Operation Iraqi Freedom when it identified the location of Hussein. Other noteworthy leadership strikes include the drone strike on Qasem Soleimani (IRGC-Quds Force) in 2020, the CIA strike on Ayman al-Zawahiri (al-Qaeda) in 2022, the Israeli killings of Fuad Shukr (Hezbollah) and Ismail Haniya (Hamas) in 2024, and the decapitation strike on Hassan Nasrallah (Hezbollah) in 2024. Whether those examples were part of an IAC may distinguish some of the cases.
That said, in each case, the legality of the operation turned not on the target’s political prominence but on their status or conduct under the law of armed conflict. Moreover, the fact that a leader bears political or moral responsibility for aggression or atrocities does not render that person targetable under the law of armed conflict. The issue is function or conduct, not blame-worthiness.
Simply put, the law is clear. Two categories of leaders can lawfully be attacked during an IAC: combatants (members of the armed forces) and civilians who have lost their protection from attack because they are directly participating in hostilities.
Leaders as Members of the Armed Forces
Distinction is the foundational principle of the “conduct of hostilities” during an armed conflict. This customary rule of law (and therefore binding on Israel and the United States) finds its treaty expression in Article 48 of the 1977 Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions: “In order to ensure respect for and protection of the civilian population and civilian objects, the Parties to the conflict shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants … and accordingly shall direct their operations only against military objectives” (see also DoD, Law of War Manual, § 2.5; ICRC Customary IHL study, rule 1). Thus, during an armed conflict, members of the armed forces are clearly subject to direct attack as combatants. (DoD, Law of War Manual, § 5.7; ICRC Customary IHL study, Rule 3).
Geneva Convention III (GC III), which addresses prisoner of war status, is also treated as the touchstone for targetability based on combatant status. Article 4A(1) includes in this category, “[m]embers of the armed forces of a Party to the conflict as well as members of militias or volunteer corps forming part of such armed forces.” Additional Protocol I, Article 43 (AP I) clarifies that “[m]embers of the armed forces of a Party to a conflict (other than medical personnel and chaplains … are combatants,” defining the armed forces as “all organized armed forces, groups and units which are under a command responsible to that Party for the conduct of its subordinates, even if that Party is represented by a government or an authority not recognized by an adverse Party. Such armed forces shall be subject to an internal disciplinary system which, ‘inter alia,’ shall enforce compliance with the rules of international law applicable in armed conflict.” Neither the United States nor Israel is a party to the Protocol, but this provision fairly reflects the customary law.
Membership in the armed forces will generally depend on a State’s domestic law. As the ICRC puts it in the 2020 Commentary on Article 4 GC III, “The requirements for membership in the armed forces are not prescribed in international law. Rather, it is a matter of domestic regulation” (¶ 977). Thus, to identify the various branches of the Iranian armed forces, we need to examine Iranian domestic law. Individuals who are leaders of those branches and are themselves members of the armed forces are clearly combatants and are targetable during an IAC.
There are two components to the Iranian armed forces under Iran’s Constitution–the Army of the Islamic Republic of Iran (Artesh) and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). The Army is responsible for “guarding the independence and territorial integrity of the country as well as the order of the Islamic Republic” (art. 143). By contrast, the IRGC “is tasked with “guarding the revolution and its achievements” (art. 150). Its relationship with the other armed forces in terms of duties is “to be determined by law.” The Quds Force, a unit of the IRGC, is responsible for extraterritorial operations and the organization, arming, training, and funding of armed groups such as Hezbollah, Hamas, and the Houthis. Every individual who is formally a member of these two groups (on their “roll”), except for purely medical and religious personnel, is targetable solely based on their status. That includes all its leadership.
Iran’s Constitution also requires the government to “provide a program of military training, with all requisite facilities, for its citizens” (art. 151). This is the basis for the Basij (Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed), a volunteer paramilitary force that delivers that training. It serves primarily as an internal security and law enforcement auxiliary, including policing morals and suppressing dissent.
Of significance in the strikes on leadership, the Basij also maintains armed brigades to augment the IRGC during armed conflict. Because there are distinct units for military and non-military purposes, only members of the armed brigades qualify as members of the armed forces (Ashoura, Al-Zahra, Imam Hossein, Imam Ali Brigades) and are therefore targetable as such. They qualify as a “volunteer corps forming part of [the] armed forces,” (GC III, art. 4(A)(1)). Those members of the overall leadership of the Basij who exercise control over both the armed military and other wings likewise qualify as combatants for targeting purposes.
Bearing this in mind, the targeting of individuals such as General Mohammad Pakpour, the commander of the IRGC, and General Abdolrahim Mousavi, the chief of staff of the Army, is unambiguously lawful as a matter of LOAC; they were combatants. And U.S. and/or Israeli forces are pressing their decapitation campaign against the Iranian armed forces hard, just yesterday killing the commander of Iran’s Quds Force operations in Lebanon, Daoud Ali Zadeh, in a drone strike in Tehran. Again, that attack was lawful.
Leaders as Civilians Directly Participating in Hostilities
In addition to members of the armed forces, civilians who take a “direct part in hostilities” may lawfully be targeted. Additional Protocol I, Article 51(3), codifies this customary rule of international law in IACs: “Civilians shall enjoy the protection afforded by this Part, unless and for such time as they take a direct part in hostilities” (see also ICRC Customary IHL study, rule 6).
The DoD Law of War Manual is in accord: “Civilians who take a direct part in hostilities forfeit protection from being made the object of attack” (§ 5.8). Of relevance to the leadership strikes, the Manual confirms the rule’s applicability to political leaders: “In addition to leaders who have a role in the operational chain of command, leaders taking a direct part in hostilities may also be made the object of attack.” (§ 5.7.4).
This raises the question of when a civilian leader can be said to be directly participating in hostilities. In its Interpretive Guidance on the Notion of Direct Participation, the ICRC set forth three “constitutive elements” of direct participation, the satisfaction of which qualify as action as direct participation, opening the door to targeting the individual “for such time” as they engage in the activity.
- The act must be likely to adversely affect the military operations or military capacity of a party to an armed conflict or, alternatively, to inflict death, injury, or destruction on persons or objects protected against direct attack (threshold of harm), and
- There must be a direct causal link between the act and the harm likely to result either from that act, or from a coordinated military operation of which that act constitutes an integral part (direct causation), and
- The act must be specifically designed to directly cause the required threshold of harm in support of a party to the conflict and to the detriment of another (belligerent nexus).
Various acts by civilian leaders meet these criteria and thus constitute direct participation in hostilities. Of particular relevance to the strikes, direct participation includes military decision-making at the operational (campaign or other major operations) or tactical level of war. To the extent Iranian civilian leaders are involved in decisions on which targets to strike, how to strike them, when to mount the attack, etc., they are direct participants. Direct participation also encompasses military intelligence activities at the tactical and operational levels of war, as distinct from intelligence activities supporting political analysis or bearing on strategic-level matters. If an organization generates, even in part, intelligence falling into the former categories and is not led by members of the military, its leaders are direct participants in the hostilities and are targetable as such.
One of the individuals targeted by the IDF, Saleh Asadi, was, for instance, a high-ranking military intelligence officer and – on the assumption that he was not a member of the armed forces – he was likely a civilian directly participating in hostilities. It is somewhat more difficult to assess the IDF strike on the Ministry of Intelligence in Thran, which killed several high-ranking intelligence officers. Clearly, the facility itself was a lawful military objective. Yet, as in the case of the Central Intelligence Agency Headquarters, it is not obvious to us, although we cannot rule it out, that all of those killed during the attack were performing intelligence functions that would clearly render them direct participants. If not, those individuals would have to be considered in the proportionality and precautions assessment preceding the attack.
The question of direct participation of civilians in hostilities has important temporal dimensions. As the text of Article 51(3) makes clear, direct participants may only be targeted “for such time” as they participate. There have been conflicting views among States and scholars on how strictly this temporal requirement should be interpreted. The issue is particularly fraught regarding a decapitation strike on the leadership of a country at the very start of an IAC because it is difficult to say in such circumstances that a civilian is directly participating in hostilities when, before the strike, there were as yet no hostilities in which to participate.
We imagine the Israeli view on this would rely on their position that there has been a longstanding, ongoing IAC between Israel and Iran, which was never interrupted. We have previously written that this argument has no bearing on the central jus ad bellum question of whether the use of force against Iran was lawful under the Charter (here and here). But it does bear on assessing the temporal dimension of the DPH question. By it, Israel can argue that the civilians attacked were repeatedly participating in hostilities and were in some relevant sense continuing to do so. This would rely on the assertion (supported by Mike) that repeated related acts of direct participation amount to continuous participation.
The alternative view is that each alleged act of participation is subject to a separate “for such time” assessment, thereby creating a revolving door of targetability (ICRC Interpretive Guidance, page 70). Under this approach, whether civilians could lawfully be attacked as direct participants depends on what they are doing at the time of the surprise attack.
The analysis is even more challenging for the United States, as it clearly was not involved in an IAC with Iran until it launched the attacks, and therefore could not assert a continuing participation argument. Instead, the IAC to which LOAC applies only began with the first U.S. strike on Feb. 28, 2026. If a targeted civilian was at that very time engaging in activities qualifying as direct participation, then it can be argued that attacking them was lawful. But if not, they were civilians who retained their protection as such. All that said, if the United States was assisting Israel in an ongoing IAC between Israel and Iran, that would be lawful.
Even if one rejects the Israeli view that there was an ongoing IAC and agrees that the United States was not involved in an IAC directly with Iran until the current hostilities began, a colorable argument could be fashioned that the United States and Israel anticipated that particular individuals would, within minutes or even seconds, almost certainly be participating directly in hostilities, and therefore could be treated as direct participants. Examples include civilians performing tactical-level military intelligence functions, the defense minister, or even the Supreme Leader himself (see below). It is a novel approach, but not unreasonable. Naturally, however, it would apply equally to both Israel and the United States – a surprise decapitation strike by another state against either country could arguably be justified under LOAC by arguing that key civilian leaders, such as the President, Prime Minister, and defense ministers, routinely and deliberately participate in hostilities by making tactical and operational military decisions.
Key Strikes
Killing the Supreme Leader: The former Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, exercises “supreme command of the armed forces” pursuant to Article 110(4) of the Constitution. By that article, he is authorized to appoint, dismiss, and accept the resignation of the Chief of the Joint (General) Staff, the IRGC Commander, and the Commanders of the armed forces.
The exact point at which someone appointed as commander in chief becomes a targetable combatant based on that role (and is entitled to prisoner-of-war status upon capture) is somewhat uncertain (see discussion here). However, there is general consensus that if a leader is officially designated as the commander-in-chief and is a member of the armed forces under domestic law, that individual qualifies as a member of the armed forces for targeting purposes. This was the case, for example, with Saddam Hussein, who held the rank of Field Marshal (Muhib) in the Iraqi armed forces.
The situation becomes more complicated when the commander-in-chief is not formally a member of the armed forces under the law of the State concerned. For instance, many presidents serve as Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces, as with the American and French presidents. The mere designation as the commander-in-chief, standing alone, does not render an individual targetable. For instance, in the United Kingdom, the monarch is the Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. That does not make him a targetable combatant, despite military trappings such as a uniform worn at ceremonies.
Yet, by one view (Mike’s), if the commander-in-chief is formally designated as such and exercises regular military command at the operational and tactical levels of war, they qualify as members of the armed forces. Khamenei was undeniably deeply involved in military affairs at that level. For instance, he is reported to have ordered an attack on US forces in 2020 and ordered the deployment of the Quds Force into Syria beginning in 2011. By this view, he was targetable as a combatant.
The alternative view (Marko’s) is that even in such cases, the individual is, absent being on the rolls of the military, a civilian. For instance, the premise of civilian control of the military implies that a leader may be at the top of the chain of command without losing civilian status, regardless of any legal designation as commander-in-chief. President Trump, for example, is a civilian, but one who (like his predecessors) routinely directly participates in hostilities and can be targeted for such time as he does so.
In such a case, the issue is whether the leader’s duties satisfy the three constitutive elements of direct participation. This was likely the case for Khamenei, with the caveat noted above regarding the temporal dimension of direct participation in a surprise decapitation strike. But, by either of the two views, Khamenei was, in our estimation, a lawful target.
Killing the Defense Minister: The Iranian Minister of Defense, Aziz Nasirzadeh, was also killed in the U.S.-Israeli strikes. Before he was appointed minister in 2024, Nasirzadeh was a Brigadier General and served as the Deputy Chief of Staff of the Iranian armed forces. It is unclear whether, under Iranian law, a military officer who joins the civilian government must resign his military commission—legal systems vary on this point. We lack enough facts to answer this question.
If Nasirzadeh was still a member of the armed forces, he was a targetable combatant. If not, he was a civilian, and the question would be whether he directly participated in hostilities. In principle, as noted above, defense ministers do participate in hostilities because they make operational and tactical military decisions, such as approving specific strikes. This is certainly the case with the current U.S. Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, who is a civilian but routinely makes decisions that make him a direct participant in hostilities in this IAC. There is nothing unusual about the proposition. Nasirzadeh was almost certainly a legitimate target.
“Targeting” Ahmadinejad: There have been conflicting reports about whether former Iranian President Ahmadinejad has been targeted in the US-Israeli strikes. Some, citing Iranian media, claim he has been killed (see here and here). Others state that his death cannot be confirmed. One report, by the Turkish Anadolu news agency, quotes one of his aides as saying that Ahmadinejad is alive, and that: “A building related to his security detail was struck yesterday. Three of his bodyguards— members of the IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) — have been killed. His own residence remained unaffected and was not targeted 100 meters away from that building.”
If Ahmadinejad was in fact targeted, we think it is highly unlikely that doing so was lawful, unless he was somehow directly participating in the hostilities. As a former president, he is an ordinary civilian. There are no indications in the public domain that he has been involved in the kinds of decision-making or other activities that could render him a direct participant in hostilities. If, on the contrary, it was his bodyguards – who were IRGC members and therefore combatants – who were targeted, and he was killed in the attack, the issue would be the proportionality of the strike and whether the attack complied with the obligation to take feasible precautions to avoid harming him. But, again, at the moment, it appears possible that Ahmadinejad was not harmed in that strike.
The Assembly of Experts: Under Article 111 of the Iranian Constitution, the Assembly of Experts is a deliberative body tasked with supervising and electing the Supreme Leader. It has been reported that the IDF struck an office building of the Assembly in the holy city of Qom on 3 March, allegedly to disrupt the process of the election of the new leader. It is unclear at this time whether the Assembly had met in person or virtually, and whether the IDF was targeting the building as such or specific individuals within it (see more here, here, here). An Israeli defense official said, “We wanted to prevent them from picking a new supreme leader.”
Even if one accepts, as we do, that targeting the previous Supreme Leader was lawful in terms of LOAC, we have difficulty seeing how it can be argued that the experts electing a new leader, all civilian religious figures, were directly participating in hostilities. Nor can we see how it could be argued that the Assembly office building itself was a military objective. However, we leave open the possibility that there may be relevant information that is not in the public domain. And if the building did somehow qualify as a military objective or there were legally targetable individuals in it, compliance with LOAC would be determined by reference to the rule of proportionality and the obligation to take feasible precautions to avoid harm to civilians in and near the building, including the participants.
Concluding Thoughts
The legality of targeting leaders in an IAC ultimately depends not on the individual’s political prominence but on well-established targeting rules in the law of armed conflict. The key question is whether the individual qualifies as a lawful military objective, either as a member of the armed forces or as a civilian directly participating in hostilities. These principles apply equally to high-level leaders and the most junior personnel.
Applying these rules to the strikes against Iranian leadership indicates that many of the individuals targeted—especially members of the regular armed forces and the IRGC–were clearly lawful targets consistent with the principle of distinction. The legal analysis becomes more complex regarding Khamenei, considering his designation in the Constitution as the supreme commander. It is also complicated when it comes to civilian leaders such as intelligence officials and senior political authorities, whose targetability depends on a detailed assessment of whether they are directly involved in hostilities and the temporal limits associated with that status. Be that as it may, the essential point is that it is the functional nature of targetability, which focuses on status and conduct rather than rank or political authority, that matters. Perhaps the most difficult legal question, on which we have offered some thoughts above, is how the rules governing direct participation in hostilities apply to decapitation strikes that initiate an armed conflict.
– Marko Milanovic and Michael Schmitt, Published courtesy of Just Security.
