Assassination trial tied to Israeli spies

The trial of the alleged assassin of an Iranian physics professor will shed light on Israel's anti-Iranian terrorist involvement, Tehran's prosecutor claimed. Defendant Ali Jamli Fashi, charged in the death of Tehran University Professor Masoud Ali Mohammadi, was allegedly trained by the Israeli national intelligence agency Mossad and given $120,000 to assassinate Ali Mohammadi, Prosecutor General Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi said. Fashi faces the death penalty on a charge of waging war against God, or moharebeh, in carrying out the killing. Any attempt to undermine Iranian national security is regarded under Iran's interpretation of Shariah law as an instance of moharebeh, which carries death penalty. Ali Mohammadi, 50, was killed June 12, 2010, by a bomb attached to his motorcycle that was detonated by remote control as he rode near his north Tehran home. He had taught particle and theoretical physics and was outspoken in the months before his death in support of anti-government student demonstrators at the university, two students told the Los Angeles Times shortly after his death. He supported the presidential candidacy of Iranian reformist opposition leader Mir Hussein Moussavi, signing a letter endorsing Moussavi before Iran's disputed June 2009 presidential election. The election triggered nationwide protests against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory and allegations of vote-rigging. Iranian authorities later used the charge of moharebeh against election protesters, saying political opponents were enemies of Islam, and clamped down on dissent in the educational system, suggesting dissident professors would be purged. "This is an old trick," a former senior Iranian official told The New York Times shortly after Mohammadi's killing. "They did it themselves but blame it on opposition groups so that they can easily begin issuing death sentences for protesters. I think this means there could be more violence against the opposition." Dolatabadi said that in addition to Fashi, at least 15 other people suspected of ties to an alleged Israeli spy network would be indicted within 10 days, the semiofficial Mehr News Agency reported.