An Iranian Muslim cleric was hospitalized for three days after being kicked and beaten up by two girls, one of whom he warned was “badly covered.”
The incident in northern Iran was reported by the country's Mehr News Agency, whose outlook can be understood by the fact that it is owned by the Islamic Ideology Dissemination Organization.
The report was picked up first byBloomberg News, which noted that the regime in Iran often sends out police to enforce strict Islamic dress codes, especially in the summer when women may be prone to wearing less covering.
The cleric, Hojatoleslam Ali Beheshti, told Mehr he was on the way to a mosque when he admonished one of the girls.
She startled the cleric with her feminist reply, “Cover your eyes.” He stood his ground and repeated the warning, and the girl and her friend teamed up to promptly hurl insults at him and then followed up with a few kicks while pushing him.
“I fell on my back on the floor,” Beheshti said. “I don’t know what happened after that, all I could feel was the kicks of this woman who was insulting me and attacking me.”
After recuperating for three days in the hospital, Beheshti said he was carrying out his religious responsibility by “commanding right and forbidding wrong” and that he would risk attacks by women, despite experiencing what he “the worst day of my life.”
Mehr told its readers that there have been previous attacks on Muslim clerics by women.
