Iran's new supreme leader owns two apartments just a few meters from the Israeli embassy in London.

LondonIran's new supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, He manages a secret financial empire that stretches across the heart of some European capitals, and also along the coasts of the island of MallorcaKhamenei, through a proxies, owns two luxury properties in Kensington Palace Gardens, London's most exclusive street. These two apartments are located a mere 50 meters from the Israeli embassy in the British capital, one of the most heavily guarded diplomatic missions in the world, and very close to the palace that, until 2022, was the primary residence of Prince William and his wife, Kate Middleton.

The nine-story building housing Mojtaba Khamenei's two apartments visually overlooks the rear of the Israeli embassy. This proximity raised concerns at Scotland Yard at a time of heightened geopolitical tension. These revelations coincide with a counterterrorism operation carried out last weekend. Commander Dominic Murphy confirmed on Friday the arrest of four people accused of spying for Iran, adding to the five others arrested last year in Manchester, Swindon, London, and Stockport, allegedly for planning terrorist acts. At the time, Tehran denied any involvement in the alleged scheme.

The discovery of this wealth is the result of a Bloomberg journalistic investigation, published at the end of January, and is especially relevant following the election of Mukhta Khamenei. Bloomberg maintains that the new Supreme Leader's real estate holdings exceed €230 million. This wealth would include the two aforementioned apartments in Kensington—acquired in 2014 and 2016 for £35 million and valued today at €58 million—and a €39 million mansion located on The Bishops Avenue. In this exclusive area of ​​north London, known as "Millionaires' Lane," and located next to Hampstead Heath, Khamenei would control almost a dozen additional properties.

According to the same report, his network includes a five-star hotel in Frankfurt (the Hilton Frankfurt Gravenbruch) and a golf course on the coast of Mallorca.. Furthermore, he reportedly owned properties in Paris and Toronto, which he has since sold. He also allegedly owned a luxury villa in the Middle East, in the area known as the Beverly Hills of Dubai

The banker with three passports

In any case, none of the assets reported by Bloomberg are directly registered in Khamenei's name. In fact, the agency places the 57-year-old banker Ali Ansari at the center of the network and all the operations. Ansari, who made his fortune founding Bank Ayandeh (closed in 2025 due to corruption and after experiencing massive losses), was sanctioned by the UK last October. London accuses him of being a key figure in financing the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and facilitating hostile activities to destabilize the country. But Ansari's lawyer, Roger Gherson, maintains that his client "vehemently denies" any connection with Iran's Supreme Leader or the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Ansari, who holds passports from Iran, Cyprus, and Saint Kitts and Nevis in the Caribbean, plans to appeal the sanctions in the British courts. Authorities in Frankfurt and other European capitals are already closely monitoring his financial movements.

While Tehran's official media project an image of the Khamenei family's austere and pious lifestyle, the hidden fortune that Bloomberg identifies, including accounts in Switzerland and Liechtenstein, clashes head-on with the reality of Iran. The country is mired in a deep economic crisis, in which the population has suffered the effects of Western sanctions for years, and now also the effects of the war waged by Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu. The wealth of Ali Khamenei's son would fuel the concept ofaghazadeh, a pejorative term for the offspring of the Iranian elites who enrich themselves thanks to their political ties with the regime's power structure.