Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini

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Iran's Media Raises $600K for Renewed Rushdie Fatwa

'It will never lose its power,' Iran official says of death edict

(Newser) - Since 1989, Salman Rushdie has had to live a mostly underground life after Iran's then-supreme leader called for his assassination over the novel The Satanic Verses. Now that fatwa, which is occasionally paraded out by the country's religious leaders, has been reupped yet again, and this time 40...

Top Iranian Dissident Montazeri Dies
 Top Iranian 
 Dissident 
 Montazeri Dies 
OBITUARY

Top Iranian Dissident Montazeri Dies

Cleric had been in line to succeed supreme leader, fell from favor

(Newser) - Iran's most senior dissident cleric, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, who emerged as the spiritual father of its reform movement, died in his sleep overnight. He was 87. Once slated to succeed Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Montazeri instead led the charge in accusing the country's ruling Islamic establishment of imposing dictatorship...

Obama to Iran Leaders: Stop 'Unjust' Actions

(Newser) - President Barack Obama today challenged Iran's government to halt a "violent and unjust" crackdown on dissenters, using his bluntest language yet to condemn Tehran's postelection response. Obama has sought a measured reaction to avoid being drawn in as a meddler in Iranian affairs. His comments have grown more pointed...

Ex-President Leads Charge Against Ahmadinejad

Rafsanjani behind scenes in Iran election

(Newser) - Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s chief adversary in his reelection bid isn’t the candidate he’s trying to beat, it’s the candidate he beat 4 years ago, the New York Times reports. Ex-president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has been leading a massive behind-the-scenes effort on behalf of Ahmadinejad’s opponents...

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