Status: 08/12/2022 6:20 p.m
Writer Salman Rushdie has been attacked on a stage in the United States. According to police, he suffered a stab wound. Rushdie’s book The Satanic Verses resulted in death threats 30 years ago.
Author Salman Rushdie has been attacked on a stage in upstate New York. The police confirmed this. The AP news agency, citing its own reporter, reported that a man stormed onto the stage and hit or stabbed the 75-year-old. The author was pushed to the ground or fell, and the attacker was arrested.
Police and emergency services were called to the event venue in Chautauqua, western New York state, the police said. Rushdie suffered a stab wound to the neck and was flown to a hospital.
The “New York Times” quoted a witness: “There was only one attacker”. And further: “He was dressed in black. He was wearing a loose black garment. He ran towards him at lightning speed.” The TV station CNN also quoted a witness who had seen the attack.
Fatwa called for killing
Because of his 1988 work The Satanic Verses, Rushdie was once issued with a fatwa calling for his death. Some Muslims felt their religious sensibilities were offended by the work. Iran’s revolutionary leader Ayatollah Khomeini issued an Islamic legal opinion calling for the killing of Rushdie and everyone involved in distributing the book.
A Japanese translator was later actually killed. Rushdie had to go into hiding and was given police protection. According to his publisher last year, the ayatollah’s fatwa no longer had any meaning for Rushdie. He is no longer restricted in his freedom of movement and no longer needs bodyguards.
The author was born in the year of Indian independence in 1947 in the metropolis of Mumbai (then Bombay). He later studied history at King’s College, Cambridge. He had his breakthrough as an author with the book “Midnight Children”, which was awarded the renowned Booker Prize in 1981.