Meta suspends Iran's Khamenei social media accounts

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's Facebook and Instagram accounts have been taken down by Meta for violations of their content policies, India Today reported.

Meta announced the decision on Thursday, citing, "We have removed these accounts for repeatedly violating our Dangerous Organisations and Individuals policy."

According to Meta, the Facebook and Instagram accounts of Khamenei were reportedly part of a network that engaged in "inauthentic activity" and "misleading people" about "who they are and what they are doing."

According to a local Iranian source, Al Bawaba, Meta reportedly removed 200 Facebook and 125 Instagram accounts, nine groups, and 29 pages linked to the said Iranian network.

Meta's policy, on which the decision was based, says that organisations or individuals that "proclaim a violent mission or are engaged in violence to have a presence on our platforms" are not permitted on the firm's social media portals in an "effort to prevent and disrupt real-world harm."

Although banned in Iran, Khamenei, who has held power in Iran for 35 years, had more than 5.1 million followers on his Persian-language Instagram page and more than 204,000 on his English-language account.

Though Meta did not mention the Israel-Hamas war, Mohammad Marandi, an academic and former Iranian government advisor, accused Meta of hypocrisy, saying Israeli officials had not faced similar restrictions over their support for their country's actions in Gaza.

"Ayatollah Khamenei is the only world leader who supports and empowers the resistance in Palestine. That is his crime."