Editor’s spotlight — updated daily
Ayatollah Khomeini
Iran
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini led the 1979 Iranian Revolution that overthrew Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, ending the Persian monarchy. As the first supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran from 1979 until his death in 1989, he oversaw the Iran-Iraq War and issued a 1988 fatwa against author Salman Rushdie. His legacy includes founding an Islamic theocracy and being named Time Person of the Year.
