CNN fires its editor for Middle Eastern affairs for Twitter post

CNN on Wednesday removed its senior editor for Middle Eastern affairs, Octavia Nasr, from her job after she published a Twitter message saying that she respected Lebanon's top Shia Muslim cleric Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, who died on Sunday.

Ayatollah Fadlallah died at the age of 74. He was described as the spiritual leader of the militant movement Hezbollah when it was formed in 1982 - a claim both he and the group denied.

Octavia Nasr, a 20-year veteran of CNN, wrote on Twitter after Ayatollah Fadlallah’s death that it was “sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah … One of Hezbollah’s giants I respect a lot.”

CNN issued a statement on Tuesday calling it an error in judgment for Nasr to write such a simplistic tweet-message.

Nasr later said in a blog that she had been referring to Fadlallah's attitude toward women's rights. In particular, Ayatollah Fadlallah had issued edicts banning so-called "honor killing" of women and giving women the right to hit their husbands if attacked first.