IRAN MUSLIM CLERIC HATE!


Powerful Iranian cleric killed in attack at bank


Payam DOOST MOHAMADI
Wed, April 26, 2023
AFP


A powerful Iranian cleric, a member of the Assembly of Experts that selects the country's supreme leader, has been killed in an armed attack, officials said Wednesday.


The attack is believed to be the most significant in years against a cleric in Iran.


"Ayatollah Abbas Ali Soleimani was killed this morning in an armed attack... the assailant was also arrested and is now being investigated," IRNA news agency reported, citing a security official for the northern province of Mazandaran where the killing occurred.


The attack took place inside a bank in Babolsar city, the official said.


"The motive of the assailant is not yet clear and will be announced after it is clarified," the official added.


The governor of Mazandaran, Mahmoud Hosseinipour, said the attacker was a local security officer of the bank.


"So far, our information and documents indicate that this was not a security or terrorist act," Hosseinipour told state television, adding that "the assailant did not know the ayatollah."


CCTV camera footage released by Tasnim news agency showed the security guard, wearing a blue and white jacket, shooting the cleric from behind as he was sitting in a chair at the bank.


Following the killing, Iranian Prosecutor General Mohammad Jafar Montazeri ordered provincial authorities to "investigate the issue from different angles, do the necessary follow-ups and report the results."


Soleimani, 75, was previously a representative of the country's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.


He had also been the imam who led the weekly Friday prayers in the cities of Kashan, in Isfahan province, and Zahedan in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan.


Under the constitution, the 88-strong Assembly of Experts is mandated with supervising, dismissing and electing the Supreme Leader.


The all-powerful deliberative body is now headed by ultra-conservative 96-year-old cleric Ahmad Jannati.


Its members are chosen in popular elections for eight year-terms from a pool of candidates vetted by the country's Guardian Council.


- Previous attacks on clerics -


In April 2022, a suspected jihadist knife attack in the northeastern shrine city of Mashhad in Razavi Khorasan Province led to death of two clerics and injury of another.


The chief suspect, identified as Abdolatif Moradi, 21, was an ethnic Uzbek who had entered Iran illegally via the Pakistani border a year earlier, Tasnim news agency said at the time.


Moradi was hanged in June in the same city on the accusation of "moharebeh", or "war against God".


The assailant struck on the third day of the holy month of Ramadan as large crowds of worshippers gathered at the shrine of Imam Reza, one of the most revered figures in Shiite Islam.


The attack in Mashhad came days after two Sunni clerics were shot dead outside a seminary in the northern Iranian town of Gonbad-e Kavus.


Senior Cleric In Iran Says 'Secular' Coronavirus Was Made By West To Weaken Islam

 

Radio Farda

May 11, 2020

 

The head of the "Academy of Islamic Sciences" in Iran Mohammad Mehdi Mirbaqeri, says there has been excessive exaggeration about the dangers of the novel coronavirus, and that is an "enemy plot".

 

Speaking to the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC)-linked Fars News Agency on Saturday, May 9, he cited unidentified analysts as saying that the coronavirus was a "secular virus" that "attacks religious institutions".

 

The senior Shiite cleric, who is also a member of the powerful Assembly of Experts, described the deadly outbreak as a war on "religious civilization" and accused Western countries of creating the virus.

 

Earlier, the Islamic Republic Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had also accused the United States of producing coronavirus and quoted "some individuals" as saying that a version of the virus had also been made to infect Iranians.

 

Meanwhile, Mirbaqeri maintained that the aim of Westerns by "creating coronavirus" was to push people of the world into quarantine, force them to live in a "virtual environment" and defeat the rival civilizations through dominance over the cyberspace.

 

The Islamic Republic authorities have been criticized for their handling of the health crisis by not having clear preventive policies and are also accused of covering up the initial phase of the epidemic.

 

Furthermore, they vehemently resisted to lock down the religious city of Qom, the epicenter of the outbreak in the country.

 

The Academy of Islamic Sciences, presided by Ayatollah Mirbaqeri, is also located in the city of Qom, where Chinese Muslims studying at Shiite seminaries might have brought the novel coronavirus to Iran.

 

Iranian hardline cleric slams UNICEF as ‘enemy of Islam’

Arab News

April 25, 2020

UNICEF provides humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide

DUBAI: An Iranian cleric has accused the US of using the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) as a tool to target Iran, Persian media Radio Farda reported on Monday.

Cleric Ali Shirazi, who is affiliated with the country’s Quds Force, called on Iranians to boycott the UN agency, which provides humanitarian and developmental aid to children worldwide.

In a note carried by Iranian news agency Tasnim, Shirazi singled out a fourth-grade textbook referencing UNICEF activities, and slammed authorities who allowed for its publication.

The enemies of Islam are pursuing their own aims through international and public educational institutions,” the hardliner stressed.

Shirazi, who was appointed by Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said the US “aims at turning the Islamic lifestyle into a western way of life,” and uses topics such as human rights advocacy or women’s rights as an excuse.

 

Iran Cleric Blames Trump For Coronavirus Outbreak In Religious City

February 22, 2020

Radio Farda 

The Friday Prayer Imam of the religious city of Qom, the epicenter of coronavirus outbreak in Iran, told his congregation Saturday that U.S. President Donald Trump targeted the city with coronavirus "to damage its culture and honor". 

Most of the coronavirus cases in Iran include people living in Qom and those who have visited the religious city recently. These cases have no clear epidemiological link to the outbreak in China. 

Qom is the religious capital of Iran, home to many seminaries and the Shrine of Masoumeh and a bastion for hardliners. The city's economy revolves around the Shrine which thousands of pilgrims from Iran and other countries visit every day. 

According to social media users after two deaths were reported in Qom on Thursday the usually crowded streets of the city look abandoned.  

Speaking during evening prayers Hojjat ol-Eslam Seyyed Mohammad Saeedi who is also the Custodian of the Shrine of Masoumeh said Trump has targeted the city because Qom is a "shelter for the Shiites of the world, the center of religious seminaries and the city where Shiite sources of emulation live". 

"The enemy wants to instill fear in people's hearts, make Qom look like an unsafe city and to take revenge for all its defeats," the Friday Prayer leader said. "Trump will die frustrated in his wish to see Qom defeated," he went on to tell his congregation. 

Iranian officials and clerics often make wild accusations against the U.S., Israel and other countries which have disagreements with the Islamic Republic. 

According to Saeedi, by targeting Qom Trump is fulfilling his promise of hitting Iranian cultural sites if Iranians took revenge for the U.S. killing of Qods Force Commander Qassem Soleimani. 

Trump had threatened in a January 4 tweet that the U.S. will target "52 Iranian sites … some at a very high level and important to Iran and the Iranian culture, and those targets, and Iran itself, will be hit very fast and very hard."

 

 

'Beat her in a way that doesn't turn her skin red': Visiting Islamic preacher from Iran tells Sydney mosque audience it's OK for a husband to bash his wife

•    Visiting Iranian Shia cleric Sheikh Taleb al-Khozaei justified domestic violence
•    He was a guest speaker at Hussainayet Ale Yassin Mosque in western Sydney
•    The imam said husbands could beat their wives as a 'last resort' citing Koran
•    Mosque founder and manager Ali Soorat condemned the sermon's message

By Stephen Johnson For Daily Mail Australia
PUBLISHED: 22:19 EDT, 16 October 2017

A visiting Islamic preacher from Iran told a Sydney mosque it is okay for a husband to beat his wife as long as he doesn't leave any red marks.

Sheikh Taleb al-Khozaei, a Shia cleric aligned with the Iranian theocracy, was a guest lecturer at the Hussainayet Ale Yassin Mosque at Sefton, in Sydney's west.

In an Arabic language sermon, he said it was permissible for husbands to lightly beat their wives 'as a last resort' if they had been disobedient.

The western Sydney mosque which organised the visit has condemned that sermon promoting domestic violence and has vowed to bar him from returning.

Citing verse 4.34 of the Koran, Sheikh al-Khozaei said husbands could abandon their wives if they had been disobedient.

'He must beat her only enough to bring her back home if she leaves,' he said in a June sermon that was live streamed.

'He must beat her in a way that doesn't turn the skin red or dark.'

He then proceeded to explain how husbands could abandon their wives in the bedroom.

'The first method is through advice, the second method is by abandoning them in the bedroom by turning his back towards her at night or sleeping in another place,' he said.

'The woman has honour, therefore by abandoning her you are humiliating her by making her feel that she has made a mistake by not serving her husband's rights.'

Sheikh Taleb al-Khozaei's fundamentalist sermon also described the method of beating 'as a last resort'.

'Here, beating takes place. But which type of beating? Don't get me wrong,' he said.

'Islam is not a terrorist religion. The beating that doesn't cause an affect and is not a beating for revenge.'

His sermon was based on section 4.34 of the Koran which advises husbands to abandon their disobedient wives. 

'Admonish them, and leave them alone in the sleeping-places and beat them,' it says.

The Hussainayet Ale Yassin Mosque denounced the sermon promoting domestic violence.

'We don't condone it and in our community we don't accept hitting of any kind,' it told Daily Mail Australia in a statement on Tuesday.

'I didn't know that he was going to say something like that and after he finished his speech I did tell him that he shouldn't have said it.

'Because of that we are not inviting him back anymore.

'I also was going to take that video of off website but I had forgotten about it, thanks for the reminder.'

In February, Islamic Friendship Association of Australia founder Keysar Trad told Sky News presenter Andrew Bolt husbands could lightly beat their wives after trying to reconcile with flowers or a box of chocolates.

'This verse is saying really, is playing on the psychology of the man saying violence is a last resort,' he said, before apologising a few days later.

Two months later, Women of Hizb ut-Tahrir made a video describing domestic violence as a 'beautiful blessing'.

Sydney primary school teacher Reem Allouche told the women's arm of hardline Islamist political group Hizb ut-Tahrir that men could hit women with sticks, during a 30-minute discussion in Sydney's west with fellow panellist Atika Latifi.



Iran Supreme Leader calls on Palestinians to pursue intifada against Israel

Feb 21, 2017
Reuters

Iran’s Supreme Leader called on Palestinians on Tuesday to pursue an uprising against Israel, suggesting the Israeli government was a "cancerous tumor" that should be confronted until Palestinians were completely liberated.

"... by Allah’s permission, we will see that this intifada will begin a very important chapter in the history of fighting and that it will inflict another defeat on that usurping regime," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said, according to his website.

The Supreme Leader’s bellicose comments, made during a two-day conference in Tehran focused on its support for the Palestinians, come at a time of increasingly heated rhetoric between Iran, Israel and the United States.

While on a visit to Washington last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Fox News that Israel and the United States had a "grand mission" to confront the threat of a nuclear Iran.

U.S. President Donald Trump has already been highly critical of a deal hammered out between Iran and world powers, including the United States, in 2015 intended to partially lift sanctions on Tehran in exchange for curbs on its nuclear program.

Iran says its program is for purely peaceful means.

When Iran carried out a ballistic missile test in late January, Trump’s then national security adviser Mike Flynn said the administration was putting Iran "on notice".

Ordinary Iranians have been posting their concerns about a possible military confrontation between Iran and the United States on social media.

Khamenei did not mention any Iranian military attack against Israel in his comments on Tuesday and was focused on gains that Palestinians could make in any confrontation with Israel, which he described as tumor developing into "the current disaster".

"The Palestinian intifada continues to gallop forward in a thunderous manner so that it can achieve its other goals until the complete liberation of Palestine," he said, according to the transcript of the speech posted on his website.


‘Behead, Burn, And Crush Gays’ Islamic Preacher To Deliver 10 Days Of Lectures In London

A Islamic preacher who has referred to non-Muslims as “kuffar” and preached on how to kill homosexuals is due to deliver a set of nightly lectures at an Iranian government-backed organisation in London, Breitbart London can reveal.

Breitbart.com
October 3, 2016

Shaykh Hamza Sodagar – who gained notoriety earlier this year for his lecture on “one of five” ways to kill homosexuals – is due to speak at the Islamic Republic of Iran School in north-west London between October 4th – 12th.

According to a speaker biography, Mr. Sodagar regards himself as a “role model” for “young Muslims all around the world”. A recent video of the preacher features Mr. Sodagar stating:

“If there’s homosexual men, the punishment is one of five things. One – the easiest one maybe – chop their head off, that’s the easiest. Second – burn them to death. Third – throw ’em off a cliff. Fourth – tear down a wall on them so they die under that. Fifth – a combination of the above”.

As noted in 2014, he has also claimed Europeans and Americans are controlled by a “Zionist web of media is trying to control the minds of the people”.

The event is being organised by a group called the Ahlulbayt Islamic Mission, which also hosted Mr. Sodagar in 2014. The Stand for Peace organisation notes that Ahlulbayt is a pro-Iranian regime group.

The group advertises “tours” of Iraq and Iran on its website, as well as organising “swimming for brothers” – swimming events catering solely for men and children – at a local pool in north London.


Iranian women's clothing ‘causing rivers to run dry’, says senior cleric


Seyyed Youssef Tabatabi-nejad criticised over claim women's European-style dress is having an impact on the local environment

Harriet Sinclair
Saturday 11 June 2016
Independent

Immorality among women is causing a river in Iran to dry up, according to a senior cleric from the Islamic Republic

Seyyed Youssef Tabatabi-nejad, who leads Friday prayers in Isfahan, encouraged the country’s morality police to crack down on ‘improper veiling’ and suggested women’s immodest clothing was having an impact on the environment.

In a sermon this week, he said: “My office has received photos of women next to the dry Zayandeh-rud River pictured as if they are in Europe. It is these sorts of acts that cause the river to dry up even further,” ISNA News Agency reported.

“I tell the Communications Ministry to clamp down on the instigators of the networks encouraging immodesty. If you don’t do so, then you will have failed to carry out your duty. The Communications Ministry can discover and suffocate these individuals.

“If we see a sin it’s useless that we only bicker about it. The police force can use the [paramilitary] Hezbollahi forces in carrying out their operations to root out vice,” he added.

His comments come following an increase in the number of morality police in Iran and subsequent crackdown on women failing to veil correctly, playing music too loudly in their cars or acting in a way that is perceived to be un-Islamic by the authorities.

Imam Tabatabi-nejad’s comments have been criticised by the National Council of Resistance of Iran, with a member of the group’s foreign affairs committee, Afchine Alavi, commenting: “This reflects the typical mindset of the theocratic regime ruling Iran which is no different to the culture of Daesh (Isis).

“Misogyny is a cornerstone of this mindset. The regime’s increasing isolation with each passing day results in more brutal methods of suppression being employed by the regime.”

The imam has previously made comments that women should stay at home while men work, as well as previously condoning violence against women who do not adhere to the country’s dress code, Iran Wire reported.



Cleric defends medieval punishments and decrees opposing Khamenei is 'evil'
          

Details Published on Tuesday, 09 April 2013

NCRI - Opposing the views of Iranian regime's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei is 'blasphemous and evil' a high-ranking regime cleric has decreed.

Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi - a member of powerful Assembly of Experts - also defended medieval punishment including being hurled off a cliff, stoning, public hanging, mutilation, taking out eyes, juvenile execution and torture.

Yazdi said in a speech: "If anyone rejects the verdict of the Supreme Leader who has been chosen by Imams, he is actually rejecting the words of those who have been chosen by God.

"Based on the commands of the Imams, opposing the Supreme Leader is profanity towards God, and God forbid if this shortcoming is for personal gains.

"Those who have studied in our religious schools believe that ...punishment verdicts cannot be carried out in the modern era. This kind of belief is blasphemy and the beliefs of these people is evil."

 

Full text of Supreme Leader's message to Hajj pilgrims

Islamic Republic News Agency

Tehran January 9, 2006

The Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei on Monday stressed the perpetrators of crimes in Guantanamo, Abu Ghuraib and clandestine prisons in Europe have no right to speak of human rights.

The Supreme Leader made the remark in his message to the Hajj pilgrims, which was read by his representative for Hajj affairs, Hojjatoleslam Mohammad Mohammadi Reyshahri during the disavowal of pagans ceremony held in Arafat Desert on Monday.

The full text of the Supreme Leader's message reads as follows:
"In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful,
"So when you have performed your devotions, then laud Allah as you lauded your fathers, rather a greater lauding" (2: 200)
"Dear Muslim brothers and sisters:
"The Hajj season is an occasion for hope and good tidings. On the one hand, the magnificence of solidarity among the travelers of the House of Unity raises hope in the hearts, and on the other, the refreshing of the souls through the blessing of the divine lauding gives the good tiding of the unbolting of gates of mercy.

"After the pilgrims have performed the rituals of Hajj, which are full of secrets and are brimful of lauding and humbleness, once again they are called to laud Allah. The reason for this stress is that lauding of Allah illuminates the saddened hearts, raising hope and granting light of faith to them. Once the heart is hopeful and faithful, it enables man to properly go through the slippery and challenging bottlenecks of life to reach the summits of material and spiritual perfection.

"The spirituality of Hajj lies in this very celebration of the praise of Allah which has been incorporated in each and every Hajj ritual.

"This auspicious spring must continue to simmer after the Hajj season and this accomplishment should go on.

"In different fields of life man is a victim of his own negligence. Where there is negligence there is also ethical degeneration, intellectual distortion and spiritual decline. And it is this very degeneration that on its turn can cause the defeat of the nations and disintegration of the civilizations besides the destruction of the personality of individual human beings.

"Hajj is one of the best means of Islam for the elimination of negligence. As if the universality of this ritual imparts the message that the Muslim Ummah in their collective identity, besides the individual duty of every Muslim, are duty-bound to remove negligence from themselves.

"The rites and rituals of Hajj provide us with an opportunity to temporarily give up servitude to and neglectful dependence on hedonism, caprice and comfort. The ihram (pilgrim's garb), tawaf (circumambulation), prayers, sa'i and woquf fill us with the celebration of the praise of Allah and bring us closer to the divine sanctorum, embedding the joy of acquaintance with Allah in our hearts.

"On the other hand, the glory and grandeur of this unique congregation acquaints us with the reality of the great Islamic Ummah, which transcends the nations, races, colors and languages. This intertwined and harmonic congregation, these tongues all chanting a single word, these bodies and hearts all marching towards a single Qibla and these human beings representing tens of countries and nations all belong to a great unit and collection, that is, the Islamic Ummah.

"As a matter of fact the Islamic Ummah has lived in negligence for a long time. Today's scientific and practical backwardness and inferiority in the fields of politics, industry and economy are the bitter fruits of the said negligence. Now, in the light of astonishing developments that have emerged or are emerging in the world, the Islamic Ummah must make up for the past negligence. Fortunately, some of the phenomena of the contemporary era point to the beginning of this compensating move.

"There should be no doubt that the world of arrogance considers the awakening of the Muslims, Islamic unity, and progress of our nations in the fields of science, politics and innovation the greatest obstacle in the way of its international domination and hegemony and will confront them by all means. Our Muslim nations have the experience of colonialism and neocolonialism in front of them. Now, during the period of postmodern colonialism we should take lessons from those experiences and should not once again allow the enemy to dominate our destiny for a long time.

"During those bitter, black periods, the dominant Western powers employed all cultural, economic, political and military means to weaken the Muslim nations and countries and imposed disunity, poverty and ignorance on them. The negligence, laziness and indolence of many of our political figures and the irresponsibility of many cultural elites helped them and the result was the plunder of our wealth, humiliation and even denial of our identity and obliteration of our independence. We, the Muslim nations, grew weaker day by day while the expansionist, hegemonic plunderers became stronger and stronger day by day.

"Thanks to the devotion of courageous strugglers and sincerity of the leaders in some parts of the Islamic world the waves of Islamic awakening are now spreading and the youth, elite and masses of many Islamic countries have been brought to the scene, exposing the bullying face of the domineering powers for many Muslim politicians and rulers. Hence once again the imperialist leaders are after new ploys to perpetuate and consolidate their domination over the Islamic world. The slogan of advocacy of human rights and democracy is one of those ploys.

"Today, the Great Satan - the embodiment of evil and cruelty against mankind - has hoisted the banner of advocacy of human rights and invites the Middle Eastern nations to democracy. The democracy the US advocates for these countries means the installation of some timid, obedient lackeys through plot, bribery, and deceptive propaganda in an apparently popular, but inherently, American election, who will be the US agents in the realization of the nasty imperialistic objectives.

"Top on the agenda of these objectives is the suppression of Islamist wave and isolation of Islamic values. All the propaganda and political means of the United States and other hegemonic powers are at work today to postpone and if possible suppress the Islamic awakening movement.

"The Muslim nations must be completely wakeful and vigilant today. The ulema, religious leaders, intellectuals, academics, writers, poets, artists, the youth and the elite all through wakeful and timely action must not allow the world-devouring US to begin a new period of colonial domination over the Islamic World.

"The slogan of democratization is not accepted from the hegemonic powers that for many years have been the supporters of dictatorial regimes in Asia, Africa and the Americas.

"The claim of campaign against terrorism and violence is abominating when made by the promoters of Zionist terrorism and perpetrators of harshest kinds of violence in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The claim of advocacy of civil rights by the devils, who have always praised and encouraged the crimes of a bloodsucking terrorist like Sharon against the oppressed Palestinians, is merely a blameworthy deception.

"The perpetrators of crimes in Guantanoma, Abu Ghuraib and clandestine prisons in Europe, the humiliators of the Iraqi and Palestinian nations and the promoters of the groups that in the name of Islam consider it permissible to shed the blood of Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan do not have any right to speak of human rights.

"The American and British governments that permit the torture and even shedding of the blood of the accused on the streets and the eavesdropping of the telephone calls of the citizens without a judicial verdict do not have any right to introduce themselves as advocates of civil rights.

"The governments that have tarnished their contemporary history through production and employment of nuclear and chemical weapons do not have any right to consider themselves the custodians of nuclear non-proliferation.

"Dear Muslim brothers and sisters:
"Today, the world, particularly the Islamic World, is going through a crucial juncture. On the one hand, the waves of awakening have permeated the entire Islamic World, and on the other, the bullying face of the United States and other arrogant powers has been unveiled.

"At the same time the move towards restoration of identity and sovereignty has begun in some parts of the Islamic World and in a country as magnificent as Iran the saplings of indigenous knowledge and technology have yielded fruit and the self-confidence that had transformed the social and political atmosphere in Iran has now spilled over to the environment of science and reconstruction.

"On the other hand the cracks of weakness and decline have appeared in the edifice of political and military permutation of the enemies.

"Today, Iraq on the one hand and Palestine and Lebanon on the other are an exhibition of weakness and helplessness of the US and Zionist false power. The US Middle Eastern policy has faced great obstacles in its primary steps and the failure of this policy has been turned into a tool against its planners.

Today is the day the Muslim governments and nations take the initiative and a great measure. Assisting the oppressed Palestinian nation, supporting the wakeful nation of Iraq and safeguarding the stability and independence of Lebanon, Syria and other countries of the region is a general duty, while the responsibility of the political, religious, and cultural elites as well as that of the national figures, the youth and the academics is heavier than others.

"Unity and sympathy among the followers of the Islamic schools of thought and avoidance of sectarian and ethnic differences should be the boldest slogan of these elites. Scientific endeavor, political liveliness, cultural effort and mobilization of all forces in these main arenas should be top on the anvil of their call.

"The Islamic World does not need the flawed and frequently violated prescription of the West for democracy and human rights; democracy is inherent in the Islamic teachings and human rights is among the most outstanding themes of Islam. Knowledge should be learnt from anywhere and anybody, but the Islamic World should try not to remain a disciple for ever, rather must rely on its own talents and efforts for innovation and production of knowledge.

"The Western values that have led to the collapse of ethics and spread of revelry, violence, legalization of homosexuality and other such fiascos in their countries, cannot be followed. Islam with its sublime values is the highest source of salvation for human beings.

The elites of the nations shoulder the responsibility of rereading and promotion of these values.

"The blind, savage terrorism, which is a pretext for the occupiers of Iraq to attack Islam and the Muslims and an excuse for the perpetuation of the military occupation of this Islamic country is rejected and condemned according to the Islamic teachings. The prime accused of these criminal events are the US army and its intelligence services and Israel whose immediate nasty objective is to influence the trend of formation of government in Iraq.

"Dear Muslim brothers and sisters:
"Trust in God, belief in the definite promise of the Quran and consolidation of Islamic unity guarantee the accomplishment of all great objectives of the Islamic Ummah and the Hajj, with its rich, effective essence of celebration of the praise of Allah, and the great congregation of the Muslims during the Hajj rituals can be the starting point and the launching pad to march towards this comprehensive movement. And deliverance from the polytheist and arrogant leaders in saying and action during this worship should become a model for action and the first step in this line.

"I beseech the Almighty God that He may grant success to the pilgrims and may the Imam of Time pray for all the Muslims."

 

Muslim cleric sanctions nuclear weapons

TEHRAN, Feb. 19 (UPI) -- Influential Muslim clerics in Iran allegedly issued a new fatwa, or holy order, sanctioning the use of nuclear weapons against its enemies.

It is the first time the hard-line spiritual leaders have questioned the traditional stance that Sharia law forbade the use of nuclear weapons, the Sunday Telegraph reported.

The newspaper said one senior mullah now says it is "only natural" to have nuclear bombs as a "countermeasure" against other nuclear powers, thought to be a reference to the United States and Israel.

The pronouncement came from Mohsen Gharavian, a disciple of the ultra-conservative Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah-Yazdi, who is widely regarded as the cleric closest to Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the newspaper said.

The comments appeared on Rooz, an Internet newspaper run by members of Iran's fractured reformist movement, which picked them up from remarks by Mohsen Gharavian reported on the media agency IraNews, the newspaper said.

 

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