For threatening to kill their Supreme Leader, Trump, Netanyau face assassination call as Iranian clerics pass fatwa to effect
*Analysts explain how US, Israeli leaders caused calls for their assassination *But Iran's President says calls have nothing to do with government
Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi and Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani, both senior religious authorities, issued separate fatwas targeting Trump and Netanyahu. Shirazi stated: “Any regime or individual threatening the leaders of the Islamic Ummah (nation) and acting on those threats qualifies as a mohareb.”
According to a Monday 7 of July, 2025, report by Iran International English, a controversial fatwa issued by two senior Iranian clerics calling for the assassination of the United States (U.S.) President, Donald Trump, and Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has gained backing from several state-appointed religious figures, and has allegedly prompted a fundraising campaign.
The decree, which classifies Trump and Netanyahu as “infidel combatants”, a term used in Islamic jurisprudence to describe non-believers at war with Muslims who may be lawfully killed, has been endorsed by at least 10 additional clerics. These figures released an open letter on Monday aligning themselves with the fatwa.
This development, however, comes after Trump had made it a free fall to issue what some analysts call unguarded statements about knowing where the Supreme Leader of a sovereign country “is hiding” and how I pay not take hi out now”.
Recall that Trump had said “I may attack Iran and I may not. Nobody knows what I am going to do”. He aso gave two weeks window to decide US position on Iran but 20 hours into it, he went with his country’s B-12 fighter his hailers claim is invisible and bombed Iran there by joining Israel in its unholy unprovoked war on Iran.
Benjamin Netanyahu has never hidden his mission to have the Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei assassinated, thus justifying the fatwa passed on him and Trump as a justifiable payback for their evil witch-hunt against Iran’s leaders.
One observer had said “If US truly wants to be the peacemaker it clams to be, when Israel is the aggressor that starred the war, he should have stopped Israel from carrying out another attack after the retaliatory attack from Iran knowing Iran has a history of no surrender to aggressors especially when it is not the starter of the war.”
In a provocative address delivered in Azeri, Mansour Emami, head of the Islamic Propagation Organization in Iran’s West Azerbaijan Province, announced a bounty on Trump’s life. “We will give 100 billion tomans to anyone who brings the head of Trump,” Emami declared. The sum is equivalent to roughly $1.14 million.
Further amplifying the controversy, an Iranian website, thaar.ir, has reportedly launched a crowdfunding campaign to support the fatwa. The site claims to have raised more than $20 million. However, there has been no independent verification of this figure.
Iran’s newly elected president, Masoud Pezeshkian, attempted to distance the government from the incendiary religious rulings. In an interview aired Monday with U.S. media personality Tucker Carlson, Pezeshkian denied state involvement.
“To the best of my knowledge, they have not issued decrees or fatwas against any individual or against Donald Trump. It has nothing to do with the Iranian government or the Supreme Leader of Iran,” Pezeshkian said.
Despite this, hardline clerics appear undeterred. Last month, prominent preacher Alireza Panahian, an influential figure close to Iran’s Supreme Leader, urged Muslims to assassinate Trump and Netanyahu in retaliation for their alleged threats against Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during recent regional hostilities. Panahian invoked Islamic rulings labeling such threats as acts of a mohareb, or “enemy of God.”
Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi and Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani, both senior religious authorities, issued separate fatwas targeting Trump and Netanyahu. Shirazi stated: “Any regime or individual threatening the leaders of the Islamic Ummah (nation) and acting on those threats qualifies as a mohareb.”
Backing their position, Ahmad Alamolhoda, Khamenei’s representative in Razavi Khorasan Province, praised the clerics’ fatwa. “Labeling those who insult or violate the sanctity of the Supreme Leader as apostates and enemies of God will strengthen the foundations of the Islamic Republic and the Revolution,” he said.
The incident echoes Iran’s 1989 fatwa against author Salman Rushdie which culminated in a 2022 stabbing attack in New York that left Rushdie blind in one eye.
