One unfortunate but enduring truth of the Middle East is that the act of making peace with Israel, for an Arab leader—whether Christian or Muslim—is also the act of instantly becoming a target for assassination.

Bashir Gemayel didn’t even get as far as signing Lebanon’s peace treaty with Israel before the Syrians erased him. One man who did get that far was Anwar Sadat, and the legend of his assassin, the Islamist Khalid Islambouli, has been treated as the saga of a hero by Iran’s Islamist leadership ever since.

That reverence has been a point of contention between Iran and Egypt to this day—but that may be changing. Here is Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty yesterday: