The chair of the Baku-based Board of Muslims of the Caucasus, Sheikh-ul-Islam Allahshukur Pashazadeh, recently raised eyebrows by declaring that Azerbaijan owes its victory in its 2020 war against Armenia to a religious edict—a fatwa—by Iran’s supreme leader. Pashazadeh claimed that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had issued the fatwa to bless the military effort.

In reality, there was no such edict...