ANALYSIS: Sanctions on Mojtaba Khamenei, hitting the wallet of power

Introduction: targeting the money, not just the missiles

A Friday of sanctions that shifts its target

On July 10, 2026, the U.S. Treasury Department took a further step in its economic war against the Iranian regime. Rather than sticking to classic sanctions targeting banking institutions or oil exports, Washington chose to directly target the alleged personal financier of the new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei. This decision, announced in the middle of renewed military strikes against Iran, marks a shift in the nature of American pressure strategy: it is no longer only the regime's military apparatus being targeted, but the personal wealth of its very top.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent summed up this strategic shift bluntly, stating that the "so-called supreme leader hides in the shadows while his regime collapses," and that the Treasury would continue "using every tool at its disposal to isolate him, and other regime elites, from the global financial system." This statement, reported by the New York Post on July 10, 2026, illustrates a declared intent to personalize economic pressure rather than dilute it in impersonal institutional sanctions.

Ali Ansari, the man at the center of the case

At the heart of this new wave of sanctions is Ali Ansari, an Iranian national based in Dubai, described by the U.S. Treasury as having built a sprawling global network of real estate and commercial assets stretching from Germany to the United Kingdom, through Spain, Cyprus, and the United Arab Emirates, for the benefit of Mojtaba Khamenei and other regime insiders. The Treasury also sanctioned three currency exchange houses based in Iran, along with their managing partners and associated shell companies.

These measures rely on several U.S. presidential executive orders, notably Executive Order 13876, which specifically targets Iran's supreme leader and his affiliates, as well as Executive Order 13902 covering Iran's financial and petroleum sectors. This legal architecture confirms that Washington has had, for several years now, the legal tools needed to personally target the regime's leadership, beyond just military infrastructure.

There is something deeply fitting about this strategic pivot: rather than keep bombing installations that just get rebuilt, Washington chose to go after what matters most to any corrupt elite, their personal money stashed abroad. It is a slower war, but potentially more durable than any airstrike.

The murky past of Ali Ansari and Ayandeh Bank

A failed bank that swallowed billions

According to the New York Post, Ali Ansari previously owned Ayandeh Bank, based in Tehran and already sanctioned by the United States, which collapsed last year after piling up billions in losses. This bank reportedly issued loans backed by Iran's Central Bank to Ansari's own companies and commercial projects, using his publicly funded wealth to simultaneously build a commercial empire abroad in the name of Mojtaba Khamenei, then nicknamed "the power behind the robe" before succeeding his assassinated father as supreme leader.

This financial pattern, documented by the U.S. Treasury, illustrates a recurring practice in the most corrupt authoritarian regimes: using public banking institutions to fund, indirectly but systematically, the personal enrichment of political elites and their inner circle, at the expense of a population left to bear the economic consequences of this predatory management.

A recognition already long established by British authorities

Ansari's profile is nothing new to Western intelligence services. According to Euronews, the British government had already formally designated him on October 30, 2025, under British Iran sanctions regulations, with the Treasury's Office of Financial Sanctions Implementation stating that he had "facilitated and supported hostile Iranian government activity, namely by providing economic resources to the IRGC."

This prior British designation confirms that the Ansari case is not a recent American improvisation, but the culmination of intelligence work carried out jointly for years by different allied agencies, which today converge on the same conclusion: this financier is a central conduit for the personal enrichment of the top of the Iranian regime.

A public Iranian bank secretly financing the future supreme leader's personal real estate empire, while that same bank collapses under billions in losses: this is exactly the kind of corruption mechanism that should scandalize far more than the regime's military maneuvers alone. Money stolen from the Iranian people deserves the same attention as the missiles it finances.

The wider context of Operation Economic Fury

A pressure campaign that precedes the Hormuz crisis

These sanctions do not appear out of nowhere: they fit into what the U.S. Treasury calls Operation Economic Fury, a structured campaign designed to financially support President Trump's military effort to compel Iran to abandon its nuclear program. This linkage between military and economic pressure illustrates a coherent American strategy that refuses to treat these two levers separately.

Bessent's statement comes precisely after two consecutive nights of American airstrikes on Iran, plus a third strike attributed to an unidentified country, themselves triggered by Iranian attacks on Monday and Tuesday against three commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz. This synchronization between the military escalation and the escalation of financial sanctions is no accident: it aims to maximize cumulative pressure on the regime at the very moment its military vulnerability is most exposed.

Eight individuals and six companies targeted in a single wave

According to Iran Focus, the U.S. Treasury added eight individuals and six companies to its list of specially designated nationals, including Shokufeh Rostam Abadi, Ali Ansari, Mohammad Darbani, Ali Asghar Khandan, Mohsen Khandan, Ahmad Navai Lavasani, Amir Navai Lavasani, and Zahra Sarshari. The sanctioned companies and exchange houses are registered in Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Hong Kong, and Saint Kitts and Nevis, a geographic spread that speaks to the sophistication of the targeted financial network.

The OFAC, the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control, also issued General License Y to authorize the orderly wind-down of transactions linked to Smart Global Limited, one of the targeted companies. This technical detail reveals the degree of legal precision with which Washington builds this kind of sanction, anticipating the legitimate commercial fallout that could be collaterally affected by the measure.

Eight individuals, six companies, four different jurisdictions: this list is not a symbolic punishment, it is a precise map of a laundering system built to survive Western sanctions for years. This meticulous exposure work deserves credit, even if it will likely have no immediate effect on the regime's behavior.

What these sanctions reveal about the new supreme leader's wealth

Displayed piety, concealed fortune

According to an Euronews investigation published in March 2026, official sanctions files, corporate documents, and land registries all point to a vast financial network potentially linked to Iran's new supreme leader. This contrast between the public image of religious austerity cultivated by the regime's hierarchy and the documented reality of a hidden international fortune is one of the most well-documented paradoxes of contemporary Iranian theocracy.

The investigation notes that while the assets are held in Ansari's name, a large share of these financial interests would, in reality, benefit Mojtaba Khamenei, his family, and other Iranian elites of the regime and the IRGC, who reportedly shielded Ansari from any sanction despite his blatant corruption and the considerable damage caused to the Iranian economy and people, according to the U.S. Treasury cited by the Times of Israel.

Mojtaba Khamenei, already sanctioned since 2019

This is not the first time Mojtaba Khamenei himself has been the target of direct American sanctions. According to Euronews, he was designated by OFAC on November 4, 2019, a symbolic date marking the fortieth anniversary of the Tehran hostage crisis, for acting on behalf of the supreme leader and coordinating directly with IRGC commanders and the paramilitary Basij force.

This continuity between the 2019 sanctions and those of 2026 illustrates the persistence, over nearly seven years, of the same line of American surveillance targeting the same figure, now the country's official supreme leader. This is therefore not a case improvised in the urgency of the current crisis, but the culmination of patient intelligence work that has finally converged with the most burning current events.

Seven years of sanctions targeting the same person, who is today Iran's official supreme leader: this continuity should remind anyone who still doubts the usefulness of long-term Western intelligence work that patience sometimes pays off, even against regimes that excel at the art of financial concealment.

The American strategy of the wallet over the missile

Isolating elites without starving the population further

The strategy displayed by the U.S. Treasury stands out for its declared intent to preserve seized assets "for the Iranian people," according to Bessent's remarks reported by the New York Post. This phrasing reflects an effort, at least rhetorically, to separate the pressure applied to the regime's corrupt elites from the economic suffering already endured by the ordinary Iranian population, hit for decades by chronic inflation and a devalued currency.

This distinction between sanctions targeted at elites and blanket sanctions on the national economy is a deliberate strategic choice, aimed at maximizing political pressure on the top of power while limiting, as much as possible, the nationalist radicalization effect that overly broad sanctions could produce among the population.

An effectiveness still to be demonstrated over the long term

Still, the real effectiveness of this individual targeting strategy remains, at this stage, hard to measure objectively. Sanctions-evasion financial networks, like the one built around Ansari, have shown for years a remarkable capacity to adapt, resorting to shell companies, multiple jurisdictions, and complex ownership structures to keep operating despite repeated designations.

This adaptive capacity should not, however, lead to underestimating the cumulative usefulness of these repeated sanctions. Every new designation makes it a little harder for the targeted network to access legitimate international financial channels, gradually raising the operational cost of concealment, even if that alone is never enough to trigger the immediate collapse of the targeted system.

I remain cautious about the immediate effectiveness of these targeted sanctions, because recent history has shown that the most sophisticated financial networks always eventually find new loopholes. But refusing to act simply because the effect isn't immediate would be an intellectual surrender I refuse to accept.

The military backdrop accompanying the financial pressure

A hundred and forty targets struck in a single night

These financial sanctions come amid a particularly intense military backdrop. According to the New York Post, American forces struck roughly 140 sites in Iran on the night of July 11 to 12, 2026, including missile and drone installations, naval assets, munitions depots, and communication systems, bringing the total number of targets struck since July 6 to more than 300.

This combination of massive military strikes and personalized financial sanctions illustrates a double-edged approach in current American strategy, seeking to simultaneously weaken the regime's operational capacity on the ground and its long-term ability to finance the reconstruction of its most sensitive infrastructure, particularly nuclear and ballistic.

A triggering attack on international maritime shipping

The most recent American strikes respond directly to the IRGC's attack on the container ship M/V GFS Galaxy and the proclaimed closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth summed up this sequence of retaliation in unambiguous terms, stating that "Iran made a bad choice," before American strikes began under the direct orders of President Trump.

This link between Iranian maritime provocation and a combined American response, both military and financial, confirms that Washington chose to use every available lever simultaneously rather than limiting itself to a single dimension of strategic pressure, in a logic of cumulative exhaustion of the regime's capabilities.

Striking 140 military targets the same week you sanction the supreme leader's personal financier is not a scheduling coincidence, it is a deliberate demonstration that the West can now hit the Iranian regime on every front at once, military and financial, without having to choose between the two.

Tehran's defiance in the face of cumulative pressure

A regime that refuses to bend publicly

Despite the cumulative intensity of military strikes and financial sanctions, the Iranian regime continues to publicly display a posture of defiance. According to Reuters, President Trump himself acknowledged this persistent resistance, stating on July 6, 2026, that there would be "either a deal with Iran or the United States will finish the job," renewing his threat of military action as Tehran continued projecting an image of defiance after the funeral of the assassinated former supreme leader.

This posture of public resistance, documented by several Western media outlets throughout July 2026, illustrates the persistent difficulty of forcing a regime to bend that has survived, over the decades, considerable economic and diplomatic pressure without ever publicly abandoning its fundamental strategic objectives.

Indirect negotiations with no visible breakthrough

Indirect negotiations between Washington and Tehran continued without any significant public breakthrough, according to Reuters, despite a sixty-day truce meant to create space for diplomacy after the American and Israeli strikes that triggered the initial conflict. This absence of visible progress, even after several rounds of technical talks in Doha, confirms that the financial sanctions targeting Mojtaba Khamenei's entourage have not, at this stage, produced any perceptible shift in Iran's official position.

This lack of immediate results should not, however, be read as a definitive failure of the American strategy. The cumulative effects of financial sanctions are generally measured over years rather than weeks, and the history of international sanctions against Iran since 1979 shows a slow but real erosion of the regime's economic capacity to fund its costliest regional ambitions.

We must resist the temptation to judge this sanctions strategy on just the first few weeks. History teaches us that these financial measures slowly, patiently erode a regime's capacity to fund its ambitions, even while official propaganda keeps projecting undented defiance.

The IRGC's involvement in the sanctioned financial network

A military corporation that protects its financiers

The Times of Israel specified that while the financial interests are held in Ansari's name, they actually benefit Mojtaba Khamenei, his family, other regime elites, and the IRGC itself, which reportedly shielded Ansari from any sanction despite his proven corruption. This institutional protection granted by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to a private financier illustrates the growing fusion between the military apparatus and the financial apparatus at the top of the Iranian regime.

This fusion between military power and financial power is not unique to contemporary Iran: it echoes patterns already observed in other authoritarian regimes where the army, beyond its coercive function, also becomes the institutional guarantor of the wealth accumulated by its leaders closest to the top of power.

Shell companies in Hong Kong and the Emirates

The U.S. Treasury also targeted CDM Trading Limited, based in Hong Kong, and Naba Alzaki Raw Materials Trading LLC, based in the United Arab Emirates, two entities accused of conducting financial transactions through the sanctioned exchange houses. This geographic spread confirms the sophistication of the financial arrangement set up to conceal the real origin of funds flowing to the benefit of Iranian regime elites.

This international financial architecture, patiently built over several years across multiple jurisdictions, illustrates an unavoidable truth in the fight against corruption in authoritarian regimes: Western sanctions must constantly adapt to increasingly complex evasion structures, in a permanent race between investigators and architects of financial concealment.

Hong Kong, the Emirates, Cyprus, Saint Kitts and Nevis: this geography of financial concealment tells, better than any official speech, just how much the IRGC and its financiers have built a global system designed to survive any single sanction. It takes continuous pressure, not one-off blows, to hope to dent this system.

Comparison with other sanctioned authoritarian regimes

A method already proven against Russia and North Korea

This strategy of sanctions personally targeting ruling elites is not unique to the Iranian file. It echoes methods already employed by Washington against circles close to Vladimir Putin since the invasion of Ukraine, as well as against North Korean financial networks linked to Pyongyang's nuclear program. In all three cases, the logic remains similar: hit the personal wealth of leaders and their inner circle directly rather than sticking to blanket sectoral sanctions.

This methodological convergence between the Russian, North Korean, and Iranian files illustrates a now well-established American doctrine against the main authoritarian threats identified by Washington: China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea, four regimes whose ruling elites share, according to multiple Western investigations, comparable patterns of personal enrichment hidden behind complex international financial structures.

A systemic threat that goes beyond the nuclear file alone

This convergence between the financial behavior of Russian, North Korean, and Iranian elites confirms, if confirmation were needed, that the threat these authoritarian regimes pose to the international order is not limited to their military or nuclear capabilities alone. It also extends to their ability to systematically bypass international financial rules to preserve their own power and their own enrichment, at the expense of their own populations.

It is this systemic dimension that justifies, in the eyes of many Western analysts, a coordinated approach among democratic allies to simultaneously target these different authoritarian financial networks, rather than treating each national file in isolation, disconnected from the others.

Seeing the same method of personalized sanctions applied to Moscow, to Pyongyang, and now to Tehran convinces me that there is indeed a common system of financial predation among the regimes that most directly threaten the international order. Naming this convergence is not geopolitical paranoia, it is factual clarity.

The legal and practical limits of these sanctions

Shell companies that are ever harder to unmask

We must honestly acknowledge the structural limits of this type of sanction. The proliferation of shell companies, permissive offshore jurisdictions, and financial intermediaries specializing in bypassing international sanctions considerably complicates the work of Western investigators, who must constantly identify new entities before they themselves become obsolete, replaced by new equivalent structures.

This perpetual race between sanctioners and the sanctioned explains why the Ansari case, already documented by British authorities since October 2025, still requires fresh waves of American designations nearly a year later. This is not a sign of failure of previous sanctions, but a demonstration of ongoing investigative work that must constantly adapt to the evolution of evasion structures.

Effective enforcement still depends on international cooperation

The real effectiveness of these sanctions also depends, in large part, on effective cooperation from the jurisdictions where the targeted entities are registered. Without rigorous enforcement by the authorities in Hong Kong, the United Arab Emirates, or Saint Kitts and Nevis, American designations risk remaining largely symbolic, unable to truly deprive the Iranian financial network of its real operational capabilities.

This dependence on the goodwill of third-party jurisdictions, some of which maintain ambiguous economic relations with Iran, is one of the most persistent blind spots in the American sanctions strategy, and it deserves to be documented with the same rigor as Washington's official announcements.

I refuse to present these sanctions as a miracle solution. Without real cooperation from the offshore jurisdictions involved, these designations remain partly symbolic, and it would be dishonest to let the public believe that eight names added to a list alone will be enough to dry up the Iranian regime's financing.

What this financial pressure means for ongoing negotiations

One more lever in an already complex balance of power

These financial sanctions add to an already considerable set of pressure levers Washington is using simultaneously in its standoff with Tehran: repeated military strikes, oil sanctions, technology restrictions, and now personalized targeting of financial elites close to the supreme leader. This accumulation of levers aims to convince the Iranian regime that no option of prolonged resistance remains free of significant cost.

The negotiation timetable, however, remains marked by successive postponements, with indirect talks between Washington and Tehran having been suspended during the former supreme leader's funeral before resuming, according to Al Arabiya cited by the Times of Israel, around July 11, 2026, with sanctions, frozen Iranian funds, and the nuclear file on the agenda.

Pressure that could accelerate, or instead harden, Iran's posture

Iran's recent diplomatic history in the face of international sanctions offers contradictory precedents: some waves of sanctions preceded significant diplomatic concessions, while others instead reinforced the regime's nationalist rhetoric of resistance, which has often managed to turn outside pressure into an argument for domestic legitimacy with its own population.

This uncertainty about the net effect of current financial pressure calls for analytical caution rather than categorical predictions about the outcome of ongoing negotiations. What can be said with certainty, however, is that the cumulative cost of Iranian resistance keeps rising, week after week, with no tangible sign of regime collapse documented to date by reliable independent sources.

I do not know whether this financial pressure will accelerate a deal or further harden Tehran's resistance, and I would rather admit that than claim a certainty the facts do not yet allow. What I do know is that the price of Iranian resistance rises every week, with no guarantee of results.

Trump and the hard economic line against Iran

Strategic continuity since 2019

The strategy of personalized sanctions targeting Mojtaba Khamenei and his financial entourage fits into a remarkable continuity with the first American designation of 2019, made under the first Trump administration. This continuity confirms that the hard economic line adopted against the Iranian regime is not a matter of circumstantial improvisation, but a strategic doctrine sustained across multiple terms, despite the change of administration in the White House between 2021 and 2025.

Geopolitically, this constant economic firmness, combined with the repeated military strikes of 2026, illustrates the role Trump plays as a necessary source of pressure against a regime that has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to exploit any diplomatic slack to rebuild its most dangerous capabilities, whether nuclear, ballistic, or financial.

Presidential rhetoric that calls for scrutiny without indulgence

On the American domestic political front, however, certain presidential statements surrounding this file call for critical examination separate from the overall geopolitical assessment. Remarks attributed to Trump about orders for massive bombing in case of an attack on his person must be reported as documented public statements, without implicit validation or transformation into an officially established military doctrine by the Department of Defense.

This methodological distinction, between the strategic assessment of economic firmness toward Iran and critical examination of the president's most spectacular domestic statements, remains essential to maintain the journalistic rigor this file demands, given its evident political sensitivity.

One can acknowledge the strategic consistency of the hard American line on Iran since 2019, while still refusing to grant automatic blank-check status to every spectacular presidential statement. The consistency of a foreign policy never exempts it from critical scrutiny of the rhetoric that accompanies it.

Historical precedents of targeted sanctions against religious leaders

A method already tested against other theocracies and military regimes

The recent history of Western sanctions offers several precedents of directly targeting religious or military leaders rather than only their institutions. Measures targeting certain militia leaders in West Africa, or personal sanctions against Burmese generals after the 2021 coup, followed a similar logic: demonstrating that a leader's religious or institutional status no longer serves as an automatic shield against individual financial accountability.

This historical comparison helps place the Mojtaba Khamenei case within a broader trend in contemporary Western diplomacy, which increasingly rejects the artificial distinction between a leader's official function and their personal responsibility in corruption schemes documented by international financial investigations.

A precedent that could inspire other regional files

Some analysts cited by several Western media outlets believe the precedent set by the sanctions targeting Mojtaba Khamenei could eventually inspire similar measures against other religious or military figures in the region, particularly within militias backed by Tehran in Lebanon, Iraq, or Yemen, insofar as these networks often share comparable financing patterns backed by apparently legitimate commercial structures.

This broader regional dimension of the Ansari case underscores that the fight against the covert financing of Iranian regime elites is not confined to Tehran itself, but potentially extends to the entire financial architecture the IRGC has patiently built to support its regional proxies over several decades.

If this precedent were to extend to the financial networks of Hezbollah or Iraqi militias backed by Tehran, we would witness a significant transformation in how the West fights Iranian influence in the region, finally targeting the financial roots rather than just the military manifestations of that influence.

What Iran's official silence reveals about the regime's nervousness

No substantial official reaction to date

As of July 13, 2026, no substantial official reaction from the Iranian government or the new leadership of the supreme leader has been reported by Western media following this file in direct response to the sanctions targeting Ali Ansari and the financial network associated with Mojtaba Khamenei. This silence contrasts with the regime's usually swift public denunciations in the face of more classic economic sanctions hitting the oil or national banking sector.

This contrast between Tehran's usual quick reaction to sectoral sanctions and its relative silence on personal sanctions directly touching the supreme leader's entourage could, according to several observers, reflect particular discomfort within the regime about publicly commenting on accusations touching the personal enrichment of its highest religious and political authority.

A hypothesis to be treated with analytical caution

This hypothesis of particular discomfort remains, at this stage, a cautious interpretation rather than an established fact, for lack of an official Iranian statement that would confirm or refute it with certainty. It should be flagged as a plausible line of analysis, documented by the absence of a reaction rather than by positive proof, without ever presenting it as a definitively established truth.

This kind of official silence, from a regime usually quick to denounce any Western measure as imperialist aggression, deserves to be watched in the coming weeks, since any shift in this posture, whether a belated denial or an implicit acknowledgment, would be significant information for understanding the real solidity of the regime's new leadership.

This Iranian silence in the face of such precise accusations strikes me as more revealing than any official statement of defiance. A regime confident in its legitimacy would have loudly denied these accusations; this one, for now, prefers to say nothing, and that silence deserves as much attention as the speeches.

Conclusion: a financial war that doesn't make headlines

A discreet but potentially lasting lever

At the end of this analysis, one conclusion stands out: the sanctions targeting Mojtaba Khamenei's financial network will never make headlines with the same intensity as missile strikes on the Strait of Hormuz, but they potentially constitute a more durable lever of pressure over the long run. Unlike military infrastructure, which can be rebuilt, the trust of international financial partners, once eroded by repeated designations, rebuilds much more slowly.

This quiet economic war, waged through technical statements from the U.S. Treasury rather than spectacular images of bombing, deserves journalistic coverage as rigorous as that given to the most visible military developments of this crisis, precisely because it targets the lifeblood that, for any authoritarian regime, is continued access to international financial channels.

Vigilance that must outlast the immediate news cycle

Documenting this financial file with rigor, beyond the immediate media cycle, is an essential journalistic duty for understanding the real trajectory of the Iranian regime in the months and years ahead. Financial sanctions, unlike military strikes, produce their most significant effects on timescales that far exceed the news cycle of a few weeks.

It is this demanding but necessary analytical patience that must continue to guide coverage of this file, as the fate of the financial network linked to Mojtaba Khamenei, like that of the regime it finances, will continue to play out, in large part, in discreet press briefing rooms rather than on the spectacular theaters of direct military confrontation.

I end this analysis convinced that the real long-term battle against this regime will not be won with missiles alone, but with methodical patience in dismantling its financial networks. It is a less spectacular war, but potentially more decisive over time.

Signed Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency note

What I know and what I don't

I know that the U.S. Treasury sanctioned, on July 10, 2026, Ali Ansari along with three Iranian exchange houses and several shell companies linked to Mojtaba Khamenei, according to the State Department, the New York Post, and Iran Focus. I know that Ansari had already been sanctioned by the United Kingdom in October 2025, according to Euronews. I know that Mojtaba Khamenei had been personally sanctioned by OFAC as far back as 2019.

I do not know with certainty the exact scale of Mojtaba Khamenei's real personal wealth, nor whether the companies targeted by these new sanctions will continue operating under other structures in the coming months. I would rather document established facts than speculate on amounts not confirmed by verifiable sources.

Method

This analysis draws on statements from the State Department and the U.S. Treasury, on coverage from the New York Post, Iran Focus, Euronews, the Times of Israel, and Reuters published in July 2026. No scene has been invented, no firsthand account is claimed, and every element attributed to a source is reproduced faithfully from publicly available information.

My editorial angle is stated plainly: I consider this strategy of personalized sanctions to be legitimate and necessary pressure against a regime whose elites have documented, over years, hidden personal enrichment, while acknowledging the practical limits of this type of measure against sophisticated financial networks.

Sources

Primary sources

State Department sanctions targeting Mojtaba Khamenei's financial network — July 10, 2026

U.S. Treasury designations targeting eight individuals and six companies — Iran Focus, July 11, 2026

Sanctions targeting Mojtaba Khamenei's financier — The Times of Israel, July 10, 2026

Secondary sources

Scott Bessent's statements on financial sanctions — New York Post, July 10, 2026

Investigation into Mojtaba Khamenei's assets — Euronews, March 18, 2026

Negotiations and the American threat — Reuters, July 6, 2026