Afatwa, or religious decree, issued by senior Iranian clerics calling for the assassination of U.S. President Donald Trump has attracted online funding worth tens of millions of dollars, reports say.
Afatwa, or religious decree, issued by senior Iranian clerics calling for the assassination of U.S. President Donald Trump has attracted online funding worth tens of millions of dollars, reports say.
I’m not asking whether there have been any previous similar bounties—I’m asking whether any of them were the primary incentive for a successful assassination.
The attempt against Rushdie failed, and the attacker claims to have had religious rather than financial motivations (and doesn’t seem to have planned to escape to collect payment in any case).
If they got away with it, we won’t have heard about it.
That’s why I’m specifically wondering about the public aspect of the bounty—it presupposes that the assassin will be publicly known and able to conduct financial transactions afterward, and that the sponsor will be able to openly make good on their promise.
One way they could do it:
The sponsor would have to be able to publicly demonstrate that the assassin was paid, though—otherwise they could claim to have paid the bounty while keeping the money, and the assassin couldn‘t protest without exposing their identity.
Since the payment address has been published, anyone can verify whether or not it’s received any payments.
But they could publish another hash.
https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2025/02/palestinian-authority-ends-martyr-payments-possible-gesture-trump