Salman Rushdie on a ventilator, likely to lose an eye after on-stage attack

[The Bobster]

Salman Rushdie on a ventilator, likely to lose an eye after on-stage attack

The 75-year-old writer’s agent, Andrew Wylie, told The New York Times that Rushdie is still unable to speak.

nypost.com

Salman Rushdie on a ventilator, likely to lose an eye after on-stage attack​

By
Patrick Reilly


August 12, 2022 8:27pm
Updated









Distressing video shows moment Salman Rushdie is attacked on stage in New York




Author Salman Rushdie is likely to lose one of his eyes and is currently on a ventilator after he was attacked on stage at a literary event in upstate New York on Friday, a report said.
“The news is not good,” the 75-year-old writer’s agent, Andrew Wylie, told The New York Times.
“Salman will likely lose one eye; the nerves in his arm were severed; and his liver was stabbed and damaged,” said Wylie.
Rushdie, who is still unable to speak, was attacked by a lone man while speaking at an event at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, NY, about 75 miles south of Buffalo.
He was scheduled to speak about the United States as a place for exiled authors “as a home for freedom of expression,” according to the institute. After the stabbing, he was transported by helicopter to a hospital in Erie, Pennsylvania.

A witness who was in the audience told The Post that Rushdie tried to run off the stage, and the two men scuffled before audience members rushed onstage to subdue the attacker.


His alleged attacker, 24-year-old Hadi Matar, of Fairview, New Jersey, was arrested by a state trooper at the scene, the Times reported.






Police presence around the home of accused Salman Rushdie attacker


New Jersey native Hadi Matar was arrested by New York state police after the attack.AP Author Salman Rushdie is still unable to speak as he recovers from Friday’s attack, his agent said.AP Police presence around the home of Hadi Matar.Christopher Sadowski
Rushdie’s controversial 1988 novel “The Satanic Verses,” prompted Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to issue a fatwa calling for Rushdie’s death over what he claimed were blasphemous references to Islam.


The author, who was born into a Muslim family in Mumbai, India, lived in hiding under the protection of the British government from 1989 until 2002.





“We ask for your prayers for Salman Rushdie and Henry Reese, and patience as we fully focus on coordinating and cooperating with police officials following a tragic incident at the Amphitheater today,” the Chautauqua Institution said in a statement on its website. “All institution programs are canceled for the remainder of the day.

Rushdie had been scheduled to speak about the United States as a place for exiled authors “as a home for freedom of expression,”zz/KGC-107/STAR MAX/IPx

 

[The Bobster]

NJ man, Hadi Matar, with sympathies toward Iranian government ID’d as suspect in Salman Rushdie stabbing

Rushdie suffered stab wounds to the neck and abdomen, and remained in surgery at a nearby trauma center Friday evening, according to police.

nypost.com

NJ man, Hadi Matar, with sympathies toward Iranian government ID’d as suspect in Salman Rushdie stabbing​

By
Joe Marino and

Evan Simko-Bednarski


August 12, 2022 5:09pm
Updated









Distressing video shows moment Salman Rushdie is attacked on stage in New York





The man arrested in Friday’s stabbing of famed novelist Salman Rushdie was identified by police as a New Jersey man, who law enforcement sources tell The Post he had sympathies toward the Iranian government that has called for Rushdie’s death.
Hadi Matar, 24, of Fairview, New Jersey, was arrested after he stormed the stage at the Chautauqua Institution in Western New York and allegedly stabbed the author multiple times, New York State Police said Friday.
Rushdie suffered stab wounds to the neck and abdomen, and remained in surgery at a nearby trauma center Friday evening, according to police.
Law enforcement officers detain a person outside the Chautauqua Institution.Charles Fox via AP
Law enforcement sources told The Post that an initial investigation suggests Matar has made social media posts in support of Iran and its Revolutionary Guard, and in support of Shi’a extremism more broadly.
New York State Police, however, said that Matar’s motive remained unclear.
“We don’t have any indication of a motive at this time,” Major Eugene J. Staniszewski told reporters. He added that police believe Matar acted alone.
Author and social commentator Salman Rushdie was attacked at an event in New York.AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis
Regardless, the attack comes amid a slew of foiled Iranian plots on American soil, including a plot against former National Security Advisor John Bolton and an apparent attempt on the life of an Iranian-American journalist in Brooklyn.
Rushdie, 75, has been the subject of death threats from the Iranian regime since the late 1980s.
His 1988 novel “The Satanic Verses” was considered blasphemous by some Muslims, and led to Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issuing a fatwa, or edict, calling for Rushdie’s death in 1989.
In 1991, two translators involved in the book’s publication abroad were stabbed — one fatally.
By the late 90’s, the Iranian government said the fatwa would not be carried out.
Law enforcement stand watch outside at the Chautauqua Institution.AP Photo/Joshua Goodman
But as recently as 2012 a semi-official religious organization inside Iran placed an over $3 million bounty on the author’s head, and in 2019 Khomeni’s successor was temporarily banned from twitter for calling for Rushdie’s death.



The author was stabbed ahead of a planned talk about “the United States as [an] asylum for writers and other artists in exile and as a home for freedom of creative expression,” according to the institution’s website.


Charges against Matar have not yet been announced.