--- title: "Unseen since March, Mojtaba Khamenei orders a response without borders" description: "After Qatari diplomats spent more than 12 hours talking in Tehran, Iran’s supreme leader told his commanders to update their target bank" author: "Jan Sokol" published: 2026-10-31T12:13:42Z modified: 2026-11-01T01:12:38Z url: https://rews.cc/a/unseen-since-march-mojtaba-khamenei-orders-a-response-withou-d0080a language: en tags: ["iran", "war", "hormuz", "trump", "mideast", "world"] publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)" --- # Unseen since March, Mojtaba Khamenei orders a response without borders *After Qatari diplomats spent more than 12 hours talking in Tehran, Iran’s supreme leader told his commanders to update their target bank* By Jan Sokol · October 31, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/unseen-since-march-mojtaba-khamenei-orders-a-response-withou-d0080a ## In brief - Mojtaba Khamenei met Iran’s top military commanders on 31 October and ordered a response ‘without geographical restriction’ if attacked - He told commanders to update the ‘target bank’ to cover US and Israeli assets and said readiness was high around Hormuz - Qatari mediators held more than 12 hours of talks in Tehran on Friday, with talks continuing in Doha on Saturday - Iran wants the June memorandum restored, the port blockade ended and oil sanctions waived in return for reopening Hormuz - Strait transits in the week to 28 October were 70 percent below pre-war levels, and US strikes may resume after the midterms On Saturday, 31 October, the office of Iran’s supreme leader announced that Mojtaba Khamenei had met the country’s senior military commanders and handed them “important strategic directives”. The man giving those directives has not been seen or heard in public since he took his assassinated father’s place in March, as [Maziar Motamedi reported for Al Jazeera from Tehran](https://aljazeera.com/news/2026/10/31/iran-warns-of-unfettered-retaliation-if-attacked-as-mediators-try-for-peace). [Axios described the session](https://www.axios.com/2026/10/31/irans-supreme-leader-maximum-response-us-attack) as the first publicly disclosed meeting between Khamenei and all the top commanders of the army, the Revolutionary Guards and the armed forces since the war began. Axios also dates his absence a little differently: he has not appeared, it says, since he was wounded in an Israeli strike on the war’s first day. So the country heard him the way it now usually hears him, through a statement on his official Telegram account. He called for “maximum deterrence”. According to [Newsweek’s rendering](https://www.newsweek.com/khamenei-orders-iran-military-response-without-geographical-limitations-12644735) of the text, he wrote: “Any level or type of threat must be met with an immediate, impactful, and geographically unrestricted response.” ## The target bank The rest of the statement read like a quartermaster’s order. The “target bank”, he instructed, must be brought up to date “so that all types of the American-Zionist enemy’s material and non-material assets fall within the reach of the Armed Forces.” He praised “the intelligent steadfastness” of Iran’s allied forces across the region. His commanders, he said, had reported high readiness along the Gulf coast, in and around the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman, and on the northwestern and southeastern borders. Then came the sentence meant for Washington: ![A black leather chair stands behind a torn paper map of the Middle East, with red pins and strings stretching across a dark teal background.](https://rews.cc/img/4f841422bc31b3b71777b94da9462c07fe37c924.webp) > If the enemies once again launch military or terrorist attacks, it will be the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Armed Forces and the Iranian nation that determine when and under what conditions those hostilities will end. A reflection, and only that: a ruler who cannot show himself has to make his presence felt some other way, and reach is the oldest of those ways. A face can be photographed. A map with no edges is harder to measure. ## Twelve hours in Tehran The statement landed one day after Qatar’s diplomats had worked in the capital. Axios put Friday’s talks at more than 12 hours, aimed at a deal to restart direct negotiations between the United States and Iran, and said they moved on to Doha on Saturday. A person briefed on the talks was quoted as calling the trip a “last-ditch effort to broker an interim deal between Iran and the US,” one coordinated with Washington. A week earlier the Qataris had brought a seven-day plan to Tehran, in which each side would take daily steps to build trust before broader peace talks. A senior Iranian official told Reuters on Friday that Tehran did not consider it satisfactory, [Arab News reported](https://www.arabnews.com/middle-east/iranian-envoys-meet-qatari-mediators-as-threat-looms-of-us-strikes-after-midterms-3009168). Pakistan is mediating as well. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said an aide of his was in Qatar to keep consultations going. A Qatar-based outlet, citing sources close to the mediation, reported that an American delegation was expected to join Iranian officials in Doha for direct talks on Saturday. That has not been confirmed. ![A red briefcase rests on a folded paper bridge spanning a rocky chasm, with a large orange sun against a teal sky.](https://rews.cc/img/4d4410faa0eb0d3fbf01bb1beb989a45cba6a0bd.webp) Behind the shuttling sits a letter. US Vice President JD Vance reportedly wrote to Mohsen Rezaei, head of the Supreme National Security Council, and the letter is believed to ask for nuclear commitments: access for inspectors, and a decision on Iran’s highly enriched uranium, which Tehran says will stay in the country. President Donald Trump denied ordering any new talks and said the letter was about medical supplies. Tehran has [already answered with its own terms](https://rews.cc/a/tehran-reads-vance-s-letter-and-answers-with-its-terms-for-a-449446). Iranian media say the starting point is still its offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within days if the June memorandum of understanding is restored, along with an end to the US blockade of Iranian ports, waivers on oil sanctions and a regional truce that covers Lebanon. ## On the water The strait is where the war has always been easiest to count. Two fishing boats were reportedly hit by a US drone near Qeshm island, and several fishermen were wounded. Iranian state television claimed that at least six tankers had been damaged by mines. The British maritime agency UKMTO reported a small boat fixing explosives to a tanker’s hull northeast of Khasab. In the week ending 28 October there were 155 inbound and 122 outbound transits, 70 percent below pre-war levels. The head of US Central Command, Brad Cooper, said of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards: “I didn’t see the IRGC out there at all.” ![A large oil tanker and small boat cross dark teal water between torn parchment edges, with a shadowy naval mine beneath the surface.](https://rews.cc/img/010ba235f565b4fde2b811190ae549c657f49460.webp) ## Before Tuesday Once the supreme leader had spoken, his subordinates said it louder. Army spokesman Mohammad Akraminia warned the Trump administration that Iran would strike any attacker “using new weapons” and that “the fire of war will undoubtedly engulf a wider geography.” German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has estimated that the war has cost Europe more than €100bn. Rezaei answered him: “Now it’s your turn to pay.” Araghchi wrote: “Red lines are a thing of the past.” The region is watching a date. Trump has held off on striking Iran in the weeks before Tuesday’s midterm elections, and governments nearby expect that attacks could start again [once the voting is done](https://rews.cc/a/before-the-midterms-tehran-holds-the-strait-and-its-memory-o-87e2a2). Eight months have passed since the joint US-Israeli bombing campaign killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his son was chosen to succeed him. Not everyone in Washington accepts that the next round is a plan at all. Senator Chris Murphy called the US plan for resumed strikes “insane”. Eric Brewer of the Nuclear Threat Initiative said: “The risks of this operation far exceed any gains.” In Tehran the same argument is being made in print. The daily Jomhouri-e Eslami pressed for engagement in an editorial: “We must not allow war to be accepted as the inescapable fate for Iran.”