Salman Rushdie Attacker Charged With Attempted Murder
Hadi Matar, the pro-Iran fanatic that stabbed author Salman Rushdie at an event in New York state, has been charged with attempted murder and is being held without bond.
Hadi Matar, the pro-Iran fanatic that stabbed author Salman Rushdie at an event in New York state, has been charged with attempted murder and is being held without bond.
Chautauqua County district attorney, Jason Schmidt, said on Saturday that Matar, a 24-year-old man from Fairview, New Jersey, was arraigned late on Friday, accused of attempted murder in the second degree and assault in the second degree.
Schmidt said state and federal law enforcement agencies, including in New Jersey, were working to understand the planning and preparation which preceded the attack and determine whether additional charges should be filed.
Rushdie, who spent years in hiding after Iran urged Muslims to kill him over his novel "The Satanic Verses", was stabbed in the neck and torso on stage at a lecture on Friday. According to NBC New York, Matar was sympathetic to Shiite extremism and Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
Iran’s Kayhan daily linked to Iran’s Supreme Leader said “a thousand bravos” to the man who attacked Salman Rushdie, implying that his throat should have been cut.
The Iranian government has not officially reacted to the stabbing of the renowned writer who has been haunted for 33 years by a death edict issued by Iran’s former leader Ruhollah Khomeini. His book, the Satanic Verses was deemed as blasphemy against Islam’s Prophet Muhammad.
Iran International reported on Friday that Mohammad Marandi, an American-born academic who has acted as a spokesman-cum-advisor for Iran in nuclear talks in Vienna, tweeted he would not be “shedding tears for a writer who spouts hatred & contempt for Muslims & Islam.”
