Saeed Jalili
Saeed Jalili (born September 6, 1965, Mashhad, Iran) is a fundamentalist Iranian political figure and academic who is best known for his role under Pres. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (2005–13) as the chief nuclear negotiator and the secretary of the Supreme National Security Council (2007–13). He has since run for president three times (in 2013, 2021, and 2024) and remains a close adviser to Ali Khamenei, Iran’s rahbar (supreme leader), maintaining back-channel connections to government officials in what he characterizes as a “shadow government.”
For Britannica’s detailed coverage of the factions, personalities, and significance of this year’s election see What to expect from Iran’s presidential election of 2024.
A child of the Islamic Revolution
Jalili was born in Mashhad, where several of the most prominent figures of the Islamic Revolution were living before the 1979 revolution. He was born a few years into the White Revolution, an aggressive modernization program implemented by Mohammad Reza Shah that had particularly disruptive effects on the Mashhad area. The Iranian Revolution took place when Jalili was 13 years old.
When Jalili was 15, the forces of Saddam Hussein in Iraq invaded Iran, seeking to take advantage of the fledgling Islamic Republic that was struggling to stabilize the country after the tumultuous revolution. It was an existential fight to many Iranians, and the Iran-Iraq War turned into one of the most bloody and destructive wars of the late 20th century. At some point during the war—the timing is not publicly known—the young Jalili joined the Basij, a branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) that enlists civilian volunteers who are motivated by zealotry and devotion to the Islamic Republic. They require less training than more regular divisions and are easily mobilized, and so they are often the first of the armed forces to respond to unrest. The Basij consists primarily of young working-class men (or boys under 18) who have yet to begin a career, marry, or have children, and who believe deeply in their mission. They are often the most willing to die for the cause. During the Iran-Iraq War (1980–88), the Basij was responsible for the infamous “human wave” assaults, in which its members charged at Iraqi forces in the most dangerous situations, leading to high casualties but clearing the area for troops that are more highly trained. In 1987 Jalili lost his lower right leg while fighting in a battle that left tens of thousands of people dead. He has obsessed over the United States’ backing of Hussein in the war ever since.
Growth as an ideologue and tenure as Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator under Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
After the war came to an end, Jalili joined the foreign ministry in 1989. He later began graduate study in political science at Imam Sadiq University in Tehrān, where in 2002 he completed a doctoral dissertation on Islamic political thought in the Qurʾān. The treatise was later published as a book, Seyāset-e khārejī-ye Payāmbar (S.) (2014; “The Foreign Policy of the Prophet [P.B.U.H.]”). He began lecturing at the university, and, as a diplomat, he gained a reputation for his uncompromising monologues that stated Iranian policy stances in terms of Islamic values. Meanwhile, he worked on foreign policy in the Office of the Supreme Leader, and in 2001 he was appointed director general of the office.
Jalili served as an adviser to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad upon his election as president in 2005. He was soon afterward appointed deputy foreign minister to Europe and America, during which time he drafted an 18-page letter on the failures of liberal democracy to U.S. Pres. George W. Bush on behalf of Ahmadinejad. Jalili first came into the public eye in late 2007 when Ahmadinejad appointed him secretary of the Supreme National Security Council. In his capacity as secretary, he was also placed in charge of negotiations with the United States and other foreign powers over Iran’s nuclear program. Although, like Ahmadinejad, he took a hard line on Iran’s right to a nuclear program, he approached the topic with a demeanor of academic charm rather than boisterous fervor. Underlying his train of thought, however, was the idea that the United States could never be a trustworthy partner.
Presidential ambitions
As Ahmadinejad’s tenure as president came to an end in 2013, Jalili entered the race for president. Early in the campaign, he was considered the front-runner, and he enjoyed the support of the Paydari Front, a nascent fundamentalist faction that had arisen in Ahmadinejad’s second term to back its hard-line foreign policy and the crackdowns on domestic dissent against the Islamic Republic. But, when the election was held, Jalili came in third place with 11.3 percent of the vote, splitting the conservative camp between himself, Tehrān’s mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf (with 16.6 percent), and a few other candidates. Hassan Rouhani, the sole moderate candidate, won with 50.6 percent.
In 2015 Rouhani and his foreign minister, Javad Zarif, concluded a nuclear agreement with the United States and other foreign powers, leading to the lifting of economic sanctions on Iran. After years under Ahmadinejad and Jalili’s intransigence, Iran’s economy enjoyed immediate benefits from its reintegration into the global economy, including sharp growth in gross domestic product (GDP) and a drop in inflation to its lowest levels since the 1990s. Rouhani won reelection in a landslide in 2017 against Ebrahim Raisi, who, like Jalili, believed that the nuclear deal had conceded far too much. But shortly into Rouhani’s second term, Jalili’s pessimism appeared to be vindicated. Average Iranians failed to see significant economic improvement in their everyday lives, and in December 2017 many Iranians took to the streets in frustration. Then, in May 2018, the United States announced its unilateral withdrawal from the agreement, despite Iran holding up its end of the bargain.
In 2021 Jalili again entered the race for president. But, as the conservative vote appeared to coalesce around Raisi, he withdrew before election day, stating that “a significant part of society has favored my dear brother [Raisi].” Throughout Raisi’s presidency the Paydari Front, with which he sympathized and Jalili associated, gained significant traction in both administration and parliament. In the year leading up to the 2024 parliamentary election, some observers suggested that Jalili might challenge Ghalibaf, an establishment figure who was widely reputed to be corrupt, for the parliament speakership. The Paydari Front earned a majority of seats in the legislature, but Ghalibaf earned Khamenei’s backing to retain the speakership and was reelected in May.
Jalili was given another opportunity to vie for leadership, as Raisi had died suddenly in a helicopter crash just days before the speakership election. A presidential election to replace Raisi was set for late June, and Jalili qualified as one of the top contenders. He won the most votes of any conservative candidate, including Ghalibaf, but less than Masoud Pezeshkian, the only candidate for reformist and moderate voters. He lost to Pezeshkian in a second round of voting in July.