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Indian-born author Salman Rushie was stabbed before a speech in Chautauqua, New York on Friday in which he represented a stark reminder of the “fatwa” that was issued on his life by the late Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Rushdie was stabbed in the neck before giving a speech at the Chautauqua Institution on Friday after living for over thirty years under the threat of an edict demanding his death issued by Ayatollah Khomeini in response to his book “The Satanic Verses”.
The Iranian government has long since distanced itself from Khomeini’s decree, but anti-Rushdie sentiment has remained. In 2012, a semi-official Iranian religious foundation raised a bounty for Rushdie from $ 2.8 million to $ 3.3 million.
Rushdie dismissed that threat at the time, saying “there was no evidence” that people were interested in the reward.
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Author Salman Rushdie is cured after being attacked during a conference on Friday, August 12, 2022, at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, New York, about 75 miles (120 km) south of Buffalo. (AP Photo / Joshua Goodman)
(AP Photo / Joshua Goodman)
In the same year, Rushdie published a memoir, “Joseph Anton”, on the fatwa.
The 1988 publication “The Satanic Verses” was considered blasphemous by many Muslims. Often violent protests against Rushdie erupted around the world, including a riot that ended in violence, killing six protesters.
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Over the years, Rushdie has been an outspoken advocate for freedom of expression and has faced death threats that once forced him to go into hiding around the clock.
Author Salman Rushdie, behind the screen on the left, is accused of being attacked during a conference on Friday, August 12 at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautauqua, New York.
(AP / Joshua Goodman)
“It is freedom of speech that makes it possible for us to be free people. Unfortunately, there are those who wish we are not free, who would rather use the killer’s veto to coerce faith and silence dissent,” The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression told Fox News Digital in a statement following the attack on Rushdie. “Mr. Rushdie has long understood the need for free speech. He is among his strongest supporters:” Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game. “
Richard Goldberg, a senior advisor to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, said that given the attack on Rushdie and the planned assassination of John Bolton, it is time for the American people to be informed of the presence of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. (IRGC) in the United States.
The Iranian state media condemns SALMAN RUSHDIE ‘APOSTATE’, WRITTEN ‘BLASPHEMI’ AFTER THE ATTACK
“This is a really horrible event,” Goldberg said. “We need a full court from the federal law enforcement and intelligence community to determine the extent of foreign influence and direction. We need facts, and those facts should not be prejudiced or censored on the basis of politics of an already disastrous nuclear deal with Iran. And we need an honest account from our leaders on the threats posed by Iran and other foreign countries to the US homeland. “
The Islamic Republic news agency, which described Rushdie as “attacked with a knife”, called him an “apostate author” after the attack.
He also described “The Satanic Verses” as a “blasphemous novel about Islam”.
Meanwhile, FARS News, another regime-owned newspaper, also described him as an “apostate” and accused him of “insulting the Prophet of Islam (PBSL)” with the book’s “anti-religious content”.
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Rushdie’s assailant has not yet been identified and the status of his condition is not immediately clear, but reports from the scene state that he was alive and breathing with no need for resuscitation while being flown to a nearby hospital.
Ashley Bittay, Adam Shaw, and The Associated Press of Fox News contributed to this report
