Ayatollah Khamenei’s ‘nuclear fatwa’ was a big lie. It never existed.

Only the willfully blind and clueless could possibly take the Islamic Republic of Iran at its word, and that’s exactly what Barack Obama and his global leftist cronies did, despite the fact that Iran itself admitted that the 2015 nuke deal was based on lies.

Now Iran’s lies are in the spotlight again as Trump attempts to negotiate with the head of the snake.

The Jerusalem Post published a story entitled, “Why Israel is even more fearful of Trump nuke deal than Obama’s,” which explains how this new attempt by Trump potentially  ties Israel’s hands. In a nutshell:

Trump’s better nuclear deal terms would leave Iran only months away from a nuclear weapon and would prevent Israel from attacking at its best opportunity in decades.

There is no argument that Trump’s presidency’s attitude toward Israel now is notably different from his stance during his first term, and Israel is rightly on edge. One must also remember that during Trump’s first term, Iran was crippled by his administration’s sanctions. Obama and Biden were the ones who sunk America so low on the world stage that there was little left to work with.

The fatwa that was supposedly issued by Khamenei was solely intended to play the Western world for fools, and it succeeded. Let’s hope the pattern doesn’t continue.

“Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s Nonexistent Nuclear Fatwa Reemerges In Iranian Discourse With Trump Administration,” MEMRI, May 29, 2025:

On the eve of the fifth round of U.S.-Iran nuclear negotiations, the fatwa allegedly issued by Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei banning Iran’s development, possession, and use of nuclear weapons as a guarantee that Iran would not seek to obtain them was brought up by two mouthpieces of the Iranian regime. Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi discussed it in a television interview on May 22, 2025, and the Iranian regime mouthpiece Kayhan discussed it in an article published May 21, 2025.

Over the years, no such fatwa has ever appeared on either of Khamenei’s two fatwa websites, and while the fatwa has been said to have been issued on several different dates and in a range of different versions, no one has ever actually seen it.

Although the regime mouthpieces have insisted for two decades that it does exist, the fact is that it does not; its existence was invented for Iranian diplomatic purposes (see Appendix: MEMRI Reports On Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s Nonexistent Fatwa).

The following is background on this nonexistent fatwa, the translation of excerpts of Foreign Minister Araghchi’s interview discussing it and Kayhan’s article about it, and a list of MEMRI reports over the years about it.

Background: The Nonexistent Nuclear Fatwa As A Guarantee That Iran Will Not Seek To Obtain Nuclear Weapons

For over two decades, Iranian regime mouthpieces and regime officials have presented the nonexistent fatwa allegedly issued by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as a legal and religious guarantee that Iran will not launch, produce, or possess nuclear weapons.

The claim about this “nuclear fatwa” has been presented to the West, with which the Iranian regime has been in a dialogue ever since 2002, when Iran’s illegal and undeclared nuclear activity was exposed. The fatwa is aimed at achieving legitimacy for Iran’s strategic goal of attaining “nuclear threshold state” status, and for conducting on its a full “nuclear fuel cycle,” including uranium mining, uranium enrichment, using uranium as fuel, and handling radioactive waste.

During the 2002-2006 Iran-EU3 (UK, France, and Germany) nuclear negotiations, Iran presented its position that a fatwa by Khamenei bans nuclear weapons. The EU3 demanded that Iran approve a clause in its state constitution similar to one in the constitutions of the “nuclear threshold states” Germany and Japan vis-à-vis a ban on nuclear weapons.

Iran rejected this demand, and, in order to circumvent it, Hassan Rohani, who had headed the Iranian nuclear negotiating team and who would in 2013 become Iran’s president, said in a May 2012 interview that it was he who had proposed claiming that Khamenei had published this fatwa in a Friday sermon in November 2004 (see MEMRI Inquiry and Analysis No. 1022, The Official Iranian Version Regarding Khamenei’s Alleged Anti-Nuclear Weapons Fatwa Is A Lie, October 3, 2013).

Again, this alleged fatwa has never been found on Khamenei’s fatwa webpages, not in November 2004 nor at any other time. Rohani’s proposal, as he attested, was to present this alleged fatwa to the Europeans as a guarantee that Iran would not strive to produce nuclear weapons.

It is worth noting that while the Iranian regime rejected a constitutional ban on nuclear weapons, it has added articles concerning scientific and technological advances to its constitution, as a result of which there has been extensive investment in space, nuclear technology, and industry. Majlis National Security Committee deputy chairman Abbas Moqtadei stated on May 24, 2025 that “based on the aims and the policy set out in the constitution, we are committed to a precise plan to achieve comprehensive advancement of the nation in a range of aspects. In this context, there have been extensive activities and investment in various scientific areas, including aviation, space, nuclear energy, science and medicine, agriculture, industry, and new technologies.”[1]

When in 2005 the EU3 demanded to see this fatwa, the regime representatives failed to produce it, and the EU3 did not accept the regime’s claim. All Iran would provide was a report by an Iranian news agency purportedly about the fatwa (see MEMRI Inquiry and Analysis No. 825, Renewed Iran-West Nuclear Talks – Part II: Tehran Attempts to Deceive U.S. President Obama, Sec’y of State Clinton With Nonexistent Anti-Nuclear Weapons Fatwa By Supreme Leader Khamenei, April 19, 2012)….