Iran’s supreme leader was killed in a military strike on his compound as Israel and the US launched attacks on the country. Patrick Wintour reports

He survived imprisonment, assassination attempts, decades of protests and exerted a brutal iron grip on Iran’s 90 million people. Now, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is dead. He was killed by US and Israeli air strikes that levelled the compound where he and some of the most senior regime leaders were sheltering.

As news of the ayatollah’s death emerged, there was public mourning on the streets of Iran. There were also ecstatic celebrations, inside Iran and around the world, explains Patrick Wintour. Iran has launched retaliatory strikes and vows vengeance, and it is still unclear whether his assassination will bring about the regime change that Donald Trump so clearly desires. It is also unclear what will happen next for Iran, where the air strikes continue and the death toll is spiralling.