The “peaceful religion” doesn’t like criticism.
Signs point to Iran’s IRGC terrorist organization being involved.
Moments before novelist Salman Rushdie was to deliver a lecture on Friday at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York, a man rushed the stage and stabbed him repeatedly before being subdued.
Rushdie was immediately airlifted to a hospital for surgery. According to The Associated Press, Rushdie’s agent, Andrew Wylie, the author’s injuries included a damaged liver and severed nerves in his arm. Additionally, he will likely lose an eye.
The man allegedly responsible for the brutal attack, identified as Hadi Matar, 24, of Fairview, New Jersey, was arrested at the venue.
At his Saturday arraignment, Matar pleaded innocent to charges of second-degree attempted murder and second-degree assault, “with intent to cause physical injury with a deadly weapon,” according to CNN.
NBC News, citing a law enforcement source, reported “A preliminary law enforcement review of Matar’s social media accounts shows he is sympathetic to Shia extremism and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps causes.”
Chautauqua County District Attorney Jason Schmidt detailed Rushdie’s injuries during the arraignment which, according to CNN, included “three stab wounds to the right side of the front of his neck, four stab wounds to his stomach, a puncture wound to his right eye, a puncture wound to his chest, and a laceration on his right thigh.”
In September 1988, Rushdie published his most famous novel, “The Satanic Verses.” The Washington Post describes the novel as a “modern-day epic that uses magical realism — a mixture of realistic narration and fantasy elements. It begins with a hijacked plane exploding over the English Channel. As two of the passengers fall from the sky, they are transformed — one into the angel Gabriel, the other into the devil. Their experiences and visions make up the rest of the story as it moves in and out of dreams.”
The Indian-born British-American Rushdie makes several “creative references — some veiled, some not — to Muhammad, Islam and the Quran,” the report noted.
Additionally, The Washington Free Beacon reported that Rushdie refers to Muhammad as “Mahound” in the novel, “a derogatory term for the prophet used by Medieval Christians.”
n February 1989, Iran’s late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a “fatwa,” or religious edict, condemning Rushdie to death for the book, as well as “all the editors and publishers aware of its contents.” He called for “all valiant Muslims wherever they may be in the world to kill them without delay, so that no one will dare insult the sacred beliefs of Muslims henceforth.”
The fatwa goes on to say that “whoever is killed in this cause will be a martyr, God willing.”
A multimillion dollar bounty was placed on Rushdie’s head, which has been ratcheted up on at least three occasions. The amount of the original bounty differs among media outlets, however Reuters reports that it was increased to $2.5 million in 1997 and to $3.3 million in 2012. According to a separate Reuters article published in February 2016, the 27th anniversary of the fatwa, Iranian news outlets upped the bounty by $600,000.
Following the fatwa, Rushdie spent the next nine years in hiding in London.
The novel was banned in several countries and protests and book burnings took place around the world, the Free Beacon reported. Moreover, a Japanese translator was stabbed to death in 1991 and others associated with the book were attacked.
……On Saturday, a Reuters article about the attack said, although there had been no official response to this news from Iran, several hardline Iranian newspapers were applauding Matar’s attack on Rushdie.
Most notable was the Tehran newspaper Kayhan, whose editor, according to Reuters, is appointed by the Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Hosseini, Iran’s supreme leader.
“A thousand bravos … to the brave and dutiful person who attacked the apostate and evil Salman Rushdie in New York,” the newspaper wrote, all but putting the official imprimatur of the Islamic Republic’s regime on a murderous act on American soil.
“The hand of the man who tore the neck of God’s enemy must be kissed.”
Other Iranian outlets followed suit, according to Reuters.
According to Reuters, an Iranian news site carried an often repeated quote by Khamenei, the current supreme leader of Iran, which says that his predecessor’s “arrow … will one day hit the target.”
Cat Stevens, who converted to Islam and now calls himself “Yusuf Islam”, supported the death threats against Rushdie as soon as he became known for criticizing Islam.
The muzzies will be disappointed to learn that Rushdie is doing much better and recovering from his wounds.