Iran on Friday (July 10, 2026) laid to rest its former supreme leader Ali Khamenei over four months after his killing in an airstrike, as two days of U.S. and Iranian attacks raised fears of a return to all-out war.

Khamenei’s flag-covered coffin was carried aloft into the shrine of Imam Reza in his home city of Mashhad in eastern Iran as a sea of people waited outside and listened to prayers, with no sign of a public appearance by his son and successor Mojtaba Khamenei.

The “body of the martyred leader of the Islamic Revolution was buried in the memorial hall of the shrine of Imam Reza,” state broadcaster IRIB reported.

The burial came after a second day of tit-for-tat attacks by Washington and Tehran’s forces, with Iranian officials reporting that U.S. strikes killed 17 people and state media saying one targeted a railway line between Tehran and Mashhad.

The Islamic republic said it had resumed attacks targeting U.S. assets in Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar, while sirens blared in Jordan – another American ally – where the military said it had intercepted eight missiles launched from Iran.

Khamenei was killed alongside close family members on the first day of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran on February 28.

The last of a marathon six days of funeral ceremonies, Khamenei’s burial in Mashhad was closely watched for signs of Mojtaba Khamenei, who has yet to appear in public since being appointed.

Parliament speaker and chief negotiator in talks with the United States, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, powerful chief justice Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, and Khamenei’s eldest son Mostafa Khamenei were all present at the shrine, with some senior figures weeping over Khamenei’s coffin, state TV images showed.

But as on other days of the funeral process, there was no sign of Mojtaba Khamenei, who since being named has only communicated through written statements and is said to have been wounded in the February 28 strikes.

Khamenei is only the second ruler of the nation to be buried in the city of Mashhad. In 1747, Nader Shah was buried in the city after he was assassinated following nearly 11 years in power.

(With inputs from AFP, AP)

Pakistan, which is playing mediator to end the U.S.-Iran war, allowed Iranian military aircraft to park on its airfields to shield them from American airstrikes, CBS News reported here quoting US officials.

The report also claimed that Iran had also parked its civilian aircraft in neighbouring Afghanistan to protect it from U.S. airstrikes.

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Reacting to the report, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham called for a complete re-evaluation of Pakistan’s role as a mediator to end the U.S.-Iran war that broke out on February 28 and has been put on pause since April 8.

“If this reporting is accurate, it would require a complete reevaluation of the role Pakistan is playing as mediator between Iran, the United States and other parties,” Mr. Graham, the Senator from South Carolina, said in a post on X.

“Given some of the prior statements by Pakistani defense officials towards Israel, I would not be shocked if this were true,” Mr. Graham said.

The CBS report, quoting unnamed U.S. officials, said that Iran has sent “multiple aircraft”, including a reconnaissance and intelligence plane, to Pakistan’s Nur Khan airbase soon after U.S. President Donald Trump announced the ceasefire in April.

A senior Pakistan official rejected the claims involving Nur Khan Air Base, and told CBS News, that “Nur Khan base is right in the heart of [the] city, a large fleet of aircraft parked there can’t be hidden from [the] public eye”.

An Afghan civil aviation officer told CBS News that an Iranian civilian aircraft belonging to Mahan Air landed in Kabul shortly before the war started and remained parked after the closure of the Iranian airspace.

The same aircraft was moved to an airport in Herat near the Iranian border after Pakistan launched attacks on Afghanistan, the Afghan officials said, adding that the Mahan Air plane was the only Iranian aircraft in the country.

Pakistan’s reliance on China for military assistance has risen dramatically over the past decade. A Stockholm International Peace Research Institute study showed China supplied about 80%of Pakistan’s major arms between 2020 and 2024, and Islamabad also has close economic ties with Beijing, the CBS News report said.

Islamabad has attempted to navigate both sides of the crisis — presenting itself to Washington as a stabilizing intermediary while avoiding steps that could alienate Tehran or China, Iran’s most powerful international backer, the CBS News report said.