November 15, 2026
The Iranian Parliament is moving towards introducing fundamental amendments to the structure of the Ministry of Intelligence and its oversight mechanism, in a way that expands the powers of Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, in a step that may redraw the security landscape within one of the families and most sensitive state agencies.
In this context, Iranian representatives agreed on Sunday to grant one degree of urgency status to a draft law that abolishes the requirement of reaching the degree of religious diligence to assume the intelligence portfolio. This vote came to speed up the discussion of the amendments in preparation for voting on them, after the sponsors of the project requested that it be granted a two-level urgency status.
The draft stipulates the deletion of the first clause from the single article of the law specifying the controls and conditions for appointing the Minister of Intelligence of 1983, which required the minister to obtain the qualification of religious jurisprudence, which allows the issuance of fatwas in accordance with the Twelver Shiite doctrine. If the amendment is approved, the Iranian president will be able to nominate a person who does not meet the requirement of diligence, while maintaining the conditions of justice, piety, a clear political and administrative record, and lack of party affiliation. Supporters believe that the move allows for benefiting from administrative and security competencies instead of restricting the position to religious figures.
The most prominent aspect of the project is the transfer of the oversight model in place in the Ministry of Defense to the Ministry of Intelligence, through the creation of two new devices: the first for information protection to protect the ministry and its confidential information and confront internal threats, and the second for ideological and political affairs to enhance the regime’s values. Most importantly, the appointment of the heads of these two agencies will be by a direct decision from the Iranian Leader.
Under these arrangements, the Minister of Intelligence will remain subject to the mechanism of presidential nomination and obtaining the confidence of Parliament, while the reins of the two new agencies will be held by two officials appointed by the Leader, which may change the balance of powers within the ministry, and raise questions about the limits of the minister’s authority, the independence of the two agencies, and the coordination mechanisms between them.
The introduction of these amendments comes at a time when the Ministry of Intelligence has been administered actingly since its former minister, Ismail Khatib, was martyred in Israeli strikes during the recent 40-day war between Iran on the one hand and Israel and the United States on the other hand in March 2026, without the government announcing the appointment of a new minister or presenting a candidate to Parliament.
The continued management of the ministry by a charge d’affaires has raised parliamentary criticism, especially since Article 135 of the Constitution specifies the term of the acting minister to a maximum of three months, while there were reports that the government obtained permission from the Leader to continue work after the expiration of the deadline. The spokesman for the Presidency of Parliament, Abbas Kudarzi, explained that amending the law will contribute to resolving the status of the ministry and creating conditions for appointing a new minister.
It is noteworthy that the requirement of religious diligence was approved under a parliamentary law in 1983 and not an explicit constitutional text, while the model for the protection and doctrinal affairs services is based on the Ministry of Defense Law of 1989, which gives the Supreme Leader the authority to appoint them within the military system. These amendments gain double dimensions due to the security breaches witnessed in the recent war, during which Israel was able to access sensitive information and target high-ranking Iranian figures in fortified sites.
Thus, the project is not limited to facilitating the conditions for selecting the Minister of Intelligence, but rather re-engineering the relationship between the government apparatus and the Supreme Leader’s institution, establishing a direct and institutional presence for the latter within the joints of the Iranian intelligence system.
