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FIRST ON FOX – A brand new report by United In opposition to Nuclear Iran (UANI) is urging the U.S. authorities to impose sanctions on senior Iranian clerics and regime-controlled establishments which have issued or promoted Islamic authorized rulings — referred to as fatwas — calling for the torture and assassination of President Donald Trump, different Americans and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
The fatwas invoke the Islamic cost of mohareb — “waging warfare in opposition to God” — a time period in Iran’s penal code that mandates brutal punishments, together with crucifixion and cross-amputation, underneath the regime’s interpretation of Sharia regulation.
“In the present day UANI is exposing the people and entities in Iran hiding behind faith to foment terrorism overseas. Threats in opposition to the president of the USA and different People are a federal crime. Every of those people and entities must be sanctioned, indicted, and banned from journey, together with their households, to the USA and its allies,” a joint assertion by former Gov. Jeb Bush, UANI’s chairman, and Ambassador Mark Wallace, its CEO and former U.S. ambassador to the U.N. for Administration and Reform, informed Fox Information in an announcement.
TOP IRANIAN CLERIC CALLS FOR TRUMP’S EXECUTION
President Donald Trump speaks to reporters on the South Garden earlier than boarding Marine One and departing the White Home on July 1, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Photographs)
“The final fatwa in opposition to one other American citizen, Salman Rushdie, nearly price him his life, with him being stabbed by an Iranian regime sympathizer. It’s time to make sure that those that threaten People face the complete drive of the regulation.”
UANI’s new record identifies 11 people and two regime-aligned entities that haven’t been sanctioned underneath U.S. counterterrorism legal guidelines. The group is looking for all of them to be designated as Specifically Designated World Terrorists underneath Government Order 13224, which is reserved for these engaged in or supporting terrorism.
Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi, second from left, seems at a turban being carried by a cleric throughout a turban-wearing ceremony at a seminary within the holy metropolis of Qom, south of Tehran, Iran, on Feb. 8, 2024. (Picture by Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto by way of Getty Photographs)
Among the many prime targets is Ayatollah Naser Makarem-Shirazi, a strong cleric referred to as the “Sultan of Sugar” for his domination of Iran’s profitable sugar commerce. Makarem-Shirazi has referred to as for President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu to be executed underneath mohareb, which he interprets to incorporate torture earlier than loss of life.
One other senior determine, Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani, a scholar of Ayatollah Khomeini who served as his consultant in Europe from 1979 to 1980, has issued a collection of threats in opposition to the Jewish neighborhood through the years. He has additionally issued fatwas focusing on Trump and Netanyahu. UANI warns that such rulings quantity to the incitement of terrorism.
“These aren’t summary spiritual statements,” Jason Brodsky, UANI’s coverage director, informed Fox Information Digital. “They’re focused threats by regime officers in opposition to the president of the USA. The U.S. ought to reply accordingly—with sanctions, regulation enforcement motion, and immigration critiques.”
Former Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, proper, and Ayatollah Mohsen Araki, secretary common of the World Discussion board for Proximity of Islamic Colleges of Thought, look on throughout the twenty eighth Worldwide Islamic Unity Convention within the capital Tehran, Iran on Jan. 7, 2015. ( Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu Company/Getty Photographs)
The record additionally consists of Ayatollah Mohsen Araki, the supreme chief’s former consultant to the UK and head of the Islamic Heart of England, which has been used as a platform to export the Islamic Revolution in Europe.
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Araki this month threatened President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu, saying “their lives and property are now not protected. The U.S. authorities and president are actually thought of a hostile infidel authorities by all Muslims.”
Brodsky emphasised that Araki’s background illustrates how Iran makes use of spiritual establishments within the West to export its revolutionary ideology. “This raises critical issues about how the regime spreads radicalism by way of so-called spiritual charities overseas,” Brodsky mentioned.
One other cleric, Alireza Panahian, is tied to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and is described by UANI as a key architect of Iran’s extremist ideology of Mahdism — which promotes the annihilation of Jews and the destruction of Israel as conditions for the return of the Hidden Imam. He has vocally advocated for terrorist assaults on U.S.-led forces within the Center East and past.
Kiran Desai and Salman Rushdie communicate onstage at The Heart for Fiction 2023 Annual Awards Profit at Cipriani 25 Broadway on Dec. 5, 2023 in New York Metropolis. (Ilya S. Savenok/Getty Photographs for The Heart for Fiction)
UANI can be calling for counterterrorism sanctions in opposition to the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB), the regime’s state-run tv community. Based on the report, IRIB aired programming that promoted a $10–$20 million bounty on President Trump’s head and solicited donations to fund the assassination.
The IRIB TV studio in Tehran was bombed by the Israeli Air Power throughout the 12-day warfare.
UANI additionally focused the Qom Seminary, Iran’s prime spiritual coaching heart, for publicly endorsing and pledging to implement the fatwa in opposition to Trump and Netanyahu. The seminary’s college and college students reportedly signed statements declaring their intent to propagate the decree.
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“We solely have to recollect what occurred to Salman Rushdie to see how these fatwas can encourage real-world violence,” Brodsky mentioned, referring to the 2022 knife assault that left the writer blind in a single eye. “Now these similar incitements are being directed at President Trump whereas he’s in workplace.”
Efrat Lachter is an investigative reporter and warfare correspondent. Her work has taken her to 40 international locations, together with Ukraine, Russia, Iraq, Syria, Sudan, and Afghanistan. She is a recipient of the 2024 Knight-Wallace Fellowship for Journalism. Lachter may be adopted on X @efratlachter.
