For Iran, the assassination attempt on Salam Rushdie comes at a political inconvenience. – Opinion

Hadi Matar did not live to see Ayatollah Khomeini. Matar, 24, was born almost ten years after the Iranian revolutionary leader’s death, nearly ten years after Khomeini capitalized on the anger of many Muslims at Salman Rushdie’s book The Satanic Verses and issued the fatwa restoring his claim to leadership of all Muslims and alienated Iran from the West for decades: the call to murder Rushdie. 33 years after this fatwa, Matar, who was born in California and lives in New Jersey, stormed onto the stage of an education center in Chautauqa and stabbed Rushdie. The writer barely survived.