Iran has opened an elaborate, days-long farewell to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, transforming central Tehran into a vast stage for grief, defiance and political theater after his killing in a joint U.S.-Israeli airstrike.

The late leader’s casket, encased in glass, was unveiled at the Grand Mosalla prayer complex, a sprawling site long associated with state ceremonies and Friday prayers. Draped in the Iranian flag and crowned with Khamenei’s black turban, the coffin was positioned above the smaller caskets of family members who died alongside him in the strike that obliterated part of his compound.

From early morning, dense crowds pressed toward the complex, many clutching portraits of Khamenei or the green, white and red of the national flag. Loudspeakers recited Quranic verses as lines of men beat their chests in unison, a traditional Shiite expression of mourning that lent the gathering a steady, drumlike rhythm.

Chants rolled through the crowd, shifting from religious slogans to raw calls for vengeance. “Our word is one! Revenge! Revenge!” mourners shouted, their voices echoing off nearby high-rises where billboards bearing Khamenei’s image had been hastily erected. State media framed the turnout as a spontaneous outpouring of loyalty and anger, while security forces maintained a heavy but mostly discreet presence on surrounding streets.

The staging at the Grand Mosalla was deliberate and symbolic. The main platform was designed to evoke the husseiniyah at Khamenei’s former compound in downtown Tehran, where he delivered many of his most consequential speeches over decades in power. That hall, a nerve center of the Islamic Republic, now lies in ruins after the airstrike that marked a dramatic escalation in the Iran war.

Officials say they expect millions to participate in the funeral processions and public viewings, drawing explicit comparisons to the mass mourning that followed the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the republic’s founding leader. Water trucks and volunteers with hoses sprayed fine mists over the crowds, while aid workers handed out cold drinks as temperatures climbed.

The ceremonies will move through several key religious and political sites before Khamenei’s burial, underscoring both the state’s effort to project continuity and the uncertainty that now hangs over Iran’s future leadership and its confrontation with the West.