The writer Salman Rushdie is hospitalized after being attacked with a knife during a presentation in the state of New York and having been rushed to the hospital. As soon as the writer’s presentation began, and always according to witnesses, a guy with a black mask jumped onstage and assaulted Rushdie, reports Europe Press.
“The country and the world witnessed today a reprehensible attack on writer Salman Rushdie. This act of violence is horrific. All of us in the Biden-Harris Administration pray that he recovers soon,” the security adviser said in a statement. national of the White House, Jake Sullivan.
Rushdie, 75 years old and threatened with death since 1989 by a fatwa issued by the Iranian regime, was attacked with a knife this Friday by an individual during a conference he was going to deliver in Chautauquain upstate New York, near Lake erie and the border with Canada.
The aggressor, who was immediately arrested, is a young man identified by the police as Hadi Matar24 years old and resident in Fairview, NJwho five hours after his arrest had still not revealed the motives for the attack, according to a state police spokesman from the door of the police station where he is being held.
Rushdie is surviving on a ventilator, his agent said. Andrew Wyliein a message to the newspaper New York Times. “There is no good news,” the agent said. “Salman will probably lose an eye and has severed nerves in one arm, and his liver was also stabbed and damaged.”
Shortly before this statement, the New York State Police revealed that the writer had been admitted to the hospital Eirein Pennsylvaniawhere Rushdie “was still in surgery” six hours after the attack, which gives an idea of the seriousness of his condition, as reported by Eph.
Silence of the Government and religious authorities after the attack
The political and religious authorities of Iran remain silent in the face of the attack on the writer Salman Rushdie, who was threatened with death since 1989 by a fatwa issued by the Iranian regime.
Rushdie, who survives on assisted breathing, has been living since 1989 under threat of death by a fatwa issued by the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iranthe ayatollah Ruholah Khomeinifor his book ‘the satanic verses‘.
At the moment, neither Government nor the religious leaders have made statements about the attack on the writer, although some conservative media, a minority, have celebrated it.
the conservative newspaper Keyhanclose to the supreme leader, praised the attack and offered “100 blessings from God” to the attacker, while the newspaper Khorasan stated on its cover that “Satan is on his way to hell” in relation to Rushdie. For its part, Mohamad MarandiIran’s communications adviser in talks to save the 2015 nuclear deal, questioned the motives for the attack.
“But it’s not uncommon when a potential nuclear deal approaches, the US talks about a attack on Bolton (National Security Advisor during the Donald Trump administration) and now this is happening,” Marandí said on Twitter.
But not everyone celebrated the attack on the author of ‘Midnight’s Children’. the iranian activist Athena Daemirecently released after five years in prison for criticizing the executions, condemned the attack and accused the Islamic Republic of committing “crimes throughout the planet.”
‘The satanic verses’ aroused the anger of Muslims Shiiteswho considered it an insult to the Koran, Mohammed and the Islamic faith and was banned in the India, Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and South Africa.
Within a few months of its publication, Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for Rushdie’s assassination, forcing him to spend years in hiding. “I would like to inform the proud Muslims of the world that the author of the book ‘The Satanic Verses’, who is contrary to Islam, the Prophet and the Koran, as well as those involved in its publication aware of its content, have been sentenced to death. death,” Khomeini announced on February 14, 1989. “I ask all Muslims to execute them,” said the religious leader, who also offered several million dollars for the murder of the writer.
Years later, the then moderate Iranian president Mohammad Khatami he distanced himself in the late 1990s from the fatwa and claimed that the government was not seeking Rushdie’s death. However, the supreme leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, reiterated the fatwa in 2017: “The decree continues as Khomeini issued it.” Two years later, he would emphasize again that the fatwa “is irrevocable“.
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