In recent days the IAEA has released a damning report accusing Iran of pursuing research with the goal of attaining nuclear weapons capability. Iran has responded by calling the report “biased” and that it serves the political ends of the United States. The Iranian parliament responded with a resolution demanding a reduction in cooperation with the IAEA.

For now, let us believe that the claims in the report are supported and verifiable. Indeed, part of the firestorm around this issue is that the IAEA is a generally trusted institution; their lack of support for the American position on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction was a massive obstacle for the Bush Administration’s goal of garnering international support for the invasion of Iraq. But beyond the news that Iran may be working towards a weapon of mass destruction, there’s another important consequence.

In 2005, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a fatwa, a binding religious ruling, forbidding the production and stockpiling of nuclear weaponry. As far as I know a Farsi text of the fatwa has never been released, though it has been reported on in Persian since 2004.

…The Leader of the Islamic [...]