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  • Suspect’s father refuses to discuss Salman Rushdie assault

    The father of the person charged with making an attempt to homicide creator Salman Rushdie has refused to discuss the assault.

    Salman Rushdie was attacked by Hadi Matar whereas giving a lecture in western New York (Photo: File)

    The father of the person charged with making an attempt to homicide novelist Salman Rushdie has locked himself in at his house in southern Lebanon and is refusing to talk to anybody, city mayor Ali Tehfe stated on Sunday.

    The suspect in Friday’s assault in New York state has been recognized by police as 24-year-old Hadi Matar from New Jersey. He has pleaded not responsible. Matar is initially Lebanese and his household comes from the south Lebanon city of Yaroun.

    Tehfe stated his mother and father emigrated to the United States and Matar was born and raised there, however his father returned to Lebanon a number of years in the past.

    “His father is in the country now but he has locked himself in and is not accepting to give any kind of statement to anyone. We tried with him, we sent people, we went and knocked on the door but he is not agreeing to speak to anyone,” Tehfe informed Reuters.

    An official from the Iran-backed Lebanese armed group Hezbollah stated on Saturday the group had no further info on the assault on Rushdie.

    “We don’t know anything about this subject so we will not comment,” the official informed Reuters, talking on situation of anonymity.

    Hezbollah is backed by Iran, whose earlier supreme chief, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in 1989 pronounced a fatwa, or non secular edict, calling upon Muslims to kill Rushdie for blasphemy.

    When requested if Matar or his mother and father have been affiliated with or supported Hezbollah, Tehfe stated he had “no information at all” on the political beliefs of the mother and father or Matar.

    Indian-born Rushdie, 75, was off a ventilator and his situation was bettering, his agent and a son stated on Sunday.

    READ | Salman Rushdie occasion host thought assault was ‘unhealthy prank’

    READ | ‘Barbaric, surprising’: Voices in solidarity with Salman Rushdie

    — ENDS —

  • Salman Rushdie off ventilator and situation bettering, agent says

    “He’s off the ventilator, so the road to recovery has begun,” his agent, Andrew Wylie, wrote in an e mail to Reuters. “It will be long; the injuries are severe, but his condition is headed in the right direction.”

    Rushdie, 75, was set to ship a lecture on creative freedom at Chautauqua Institution in western New York when police say a 24-year-old man rushed the stage and stabbed the Indian-born author, who has lived with a bounty on his head since his 1988 novel “The Satanic Verses” prompted Iran to induce Muslims to kill him.

    The suspect, Hadi Matar of Fairview, New Jersey, pleaded not responsible to expenses of tried homicide and assault at a court docket look on Saturday, his court-appointed lawyer, Nathaniel Barone, advised Reuters.

    Following hours of surgical procedure, Rushdie had been placed on a ventilator and was unable to talk as of Friday night, Wylie stated in a previous replace on the novelist’s situation, including that he would doubtless lose a watch and had nerve injury in his arm and wounds to his liver.

    Wylie didn’t present additional particulars on Rushdie’s well being in his e mail on Sunday.

    The stabbing was condemned by writers and politicians world wide as an assault on freedom of expression. In a press release on Saturday, President Joe Biden recommended the “universal ideals” of fact, braveness and resilience embodied by Rushdie and his work.

    “These are the building blocks of any free and open society,” Biden stated.

    Neither native nor federal authorities have provided any further particulars on the investigation, together with a attainable motive.

    An preliminary legislation enforcement overview of Matar’s social media accounts confirmed he was sympathetic to Shi’ite extremism and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), though no definitive hyperlinks had been discovered, in response to NBC New York.

    The IRGC is a robust faction that controls a enterprise empire in addition to elite armed and intelligence forces that Washington accuses of finishing up a world extremist marketing campaign.

    Authorities in Iran have made no public remark in regards to the assault, though hardline state media retailers have celebrated it with headlines together with “Satan has been blinded” and a few Iranians voiced assist on-line for the stabbing.

    Many different Iranians expressed their sympathies for Rushdie, nevertheless, posting on social media about their anger on the Islamic Republic’s clerical rulers for issuing the 1989 fatwa, or non secular edict, that advised Muslims to kill the writer.

    BOUNTY WORTH MILLIONS

    Rushdie, who was born right into a Muslim Kashmiri household in Bombay, now Mumbai, earlier than shifting to Britain, has lengthy confronted dying threats for “The Satanic Verses,” considered by some Muslims as containing blasphemous passages. The e book was banned in lots of nations with massive Muslim populations.

    Iranian organizations, some linked to the federal government, have raised a bounty value tens of millions of {dollars} for Rushdie’s homicide. The fatwa was issued 33 years in the past by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, then Iran’s supreme chief. His successor, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, stated as just lately as 2019 that the decree remained “irrevocable.”

    Matar was born in California and just lately moved to New Jersey, the NBC New York report stated, including that he had a pretend driver’s license on him. He was arrested on the scene by a state trooper after being wrestled to the bottom by viewers members.

    Witnesses stated he didn’t communicate as he attacked the writer. Rushdie was stabbed 10 instances, prosecutors stated throughout Matar’s arraignment, in response to the New York Times.

    Prosecutors stated in court docket that Matar traveled by bus to the Chautauqua Institution, an academic retreat about 12 miles (19 km) from the shores of Lake Erie, and acquired a go that admitted him to Rushdie’s discuss, the Times reported. Attendees stated there have been no apparent safety checks.

    Asked to touch upon the case, Matar’s lawyer Barone stated, “We’re kind of in the early stages and, quite frankly, in cases like this, I think the important thing to remember is people need to keep an open mind. They need to look at everything. They can’t just assume something happened for why they think something happened.”

    Ali Tehfe, mayor of Yaroun in southern Lebanon, stated Matar was the son of a person from the city. The suspect’s dad and mom emigrated to the United States and he was born and raised there, the mayor added.

    Asked whether or not Matar or his dad and mom have been affiliated with or supported the Iran-backed Hezbollah armed group in Lebanon, Tehfe stated he had “no information at all” on their political beliefs.

    A Hezbollah official advised Reuters on Saturday that the group had no further data on the assault on Rushdie.

  • Severed nerves in arm, Salman Rushdie is placed on ventilator, ‘may lose an eye’

    After creator Salman Rushdie was stabbed on Friday on the Chautauqua Institution in western New York, state and federal investigators had been attempting to find out the suspect’s motivation, plans, communication and actions as Rushdie remained in a precarious situation on Saturday.

    Rushdie, who had spent a long time beneath proscription by Iran, was on a ventilator after present process hours of surgical procedure and couldn’t converse, Andrew Wylie, his agent, mentioned.

    Salman Rushdie attends the 68th National Book Awards Ceremony and Benefit Dinner on Nov. 15, 2017, in New York. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)

    Wylie mentioned on Friday that the creator’s situation was “not good”. Rushdie would possibly lose an eye fixed, his liver had been broken and the nerves in his arm had been severed, he mentioned.

    Antonio Guterres, the secretary basic of the United Nations, mentioned on Saturday that he was appalled by the assault on the creator, who a long time in the past grew to become a logo of freedom of expression within the face of repression.

    “In no case is violence a response to words spoken or written by others in their exercise of the freedoms of opinion and expression,” Guterres mentioned in an announcement.

    The New York State Police mentioned at a information convention on Friday afternoon that there was no indication of a motive, however that they had been working with the FBI.

    Hadi Matar, a 24-year-old New Jersey man, was arrested on the scene and charged with tried homicide and assault, the New York State Police mentioned. He is being held on the Chautauqua County Jail, the place he was to be arraigned on Saturday, in response to officers.

     

    Law enforcement stand watch exterior on the Chautauqua Institution after creator Salman Rushdie was attacked throughout a lecture, Friday, Aug. 12, 2022, in Chautauqua, N.Y., about 75 miles (120 km) south of Buffalo. (AP Photo/Joshua Goodman)

    Matar was born within the United States to Lebanese dad and mom who emigrated from Yaroun, a border village in southern Lebanon, the mayor of the village, Ali Tehfe, advised The Associated Press.

    A video on TikTok that was subsequently taken down confirmed the chaotic scene on Friday, moments after the attacker had jumped onto the stage on the usually placid centre for mental discourse. Rushdie, who had been dwelling comparatively overtly after years of a semi-clandestine existence, had simply taken a seat to provide a chat when a person attacked him.

    A crowd of individuals instantly rushed to the place the creator lay on the stage to supply help. Stunned members of the viewers might be seen all through the amphitheater. While some had been screaming, others obtained up and moved slowly towards the stage. People began to congregate within the aisles. An individual might be heard yelling “Oh, my God” repeatedly.

    A sheriff’s deputy and one other legislation enforcement officer with a canine ran to the scene a couple of minute later.
    In an announcement on Friday, the US nationwide safety adviser, Jake Sullivan, known as the assault in opposition to Rushdie “reprehensible”. “This act of violence is appalling,” he mentioned.

    The state police didn’t present an replace on Rushdie’s situation on Saturday morning. A spokeswoman for a hospital in Erie, Pennsylvania, the place Rushdie is being handled, mentioned it could not present info on affected person circumstances.
    At a home listed as Matar’s residence in Fairview, New Jersey, nobody answered the door on Saturday morning. A lady in a grey Jeep Rubicon within the driveway saved her home windows up, waving off reporters as she sped away. Many of Matar’s neighbours mentioned they didn’t know him.

    Antonio Lopa, who lives throughout the road from Matar, mentioned he noticed between 10 and 15 FBI brokers exterior Matar’s dwelling on Friday afternoon. They stayed till almost 1.30 am, he mentioned.

    Officials mentioned at a information convention on Friday that they had been working to get search warrants for a backpack and digital gadgets that had been discovered on the establishment.

    Rushdie had been dwelling beneath the specter of an assassination try since 1989, about six months after the publication of his novel The Satanic Verses. The e book was considered blasphemous by some Muslims. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who led Iran after its 1979 revolution, issued a fatwa on February 14, 1989. It ordered Muslims to kill Rushdie.

    In 1991, the novel’s Japanese translator was stabbed to demise and its Italian translator was badly wounded. The novel’s Norwegian writer was shot thrice in 1993 exterior his dwelling in Oslo and was critically injured.

    (With inputs from AP)

  • ‘You are subsequent’: Author JK Rowling receives loss of life menace over tweet on Salman Rushdie

    Author JK Rowling has acquired a public menace from an Iran-backed extremist, following her denunciation of yesterday’s assault on fellow British creator Salman Rushdie.

    JK Rowling has instructed her followers that the police are concerned after a tweet about Salman Rushdie prompted a loss of life menace on Twitter (Photo: AP)

    Author JK Rowling has acquired a loss of life menace for a tweet condemning the assault on Salman Rushdie. Rowling, 57, took to Twitter to share screenshots of the menace message from a consumer.

    The Harry Potter creator had reacted to the stabbing incident involving Rushdie with a tweet saying she felt very sick and hoped the novelist can be okay. In response, a consumer wrote: “Don’t worry. You are next.”

    The Twitter deal with, which issued the loss of life menace, had additionally praised Hadi Matar, the assailant from New Jersey who stabbed Rusdhie a number of instances throughout a literary occasion in western New York on Friday.

    Salman Rushdie is on a ventilator with a broken liver and will lose a watch after he was stabbed by Hadi Matar, who apparently sympathised with Shia extremism and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

    Matar has since been charged with tried homicide within the second diploma and assault within the second diploma, and police are probing the motive behind the assault.

    Rushdie’s ebook ‘The Satanic Verses’ has been banned in Iran since 1988, as many Muslims contemplate it to be blasphemous.

    READ | Salman Rushdie on life help after stabbing, Iranian newspapers reward assailant | Top Points

    READ | Who is Hadi Matar, the 24-year-old man who stabbed Salman Rushdie in New York

    — ENDS —

  • Salman Rushdie as soon as complained about ‘too much security’ round him: Report

    Salman Rushdie, who was attacked and stabbed on stage at a literary occasion right here, has beforehand complained about having an excessive amount of safety round him, based on a media report on Saturday.

    The Mumbai-born author, who confronted Islamist dying threats for years after writing “The Satanic Verses”, was stabbed by a 24-year-old New Jersey resident recognized as Hadi Matar on stage on Friday whereas he was being launched on the occasion of the Chautauqua Institution in Western New York.

    A bloodied Rushdie was airlifted from a discipline adjoining to the venue to a hospital in northwestern Pennsylvania the place the 75-year-old author underwent surgical procedure.

    In 2001, Rushdie publicly complained about having an excessive amount of safety round him, The New York Post reported.

    While attending the Prague Writers’ Festival, he advised reporters, “To be here and to find a large security operation around me has actually felt a little embarrassing… I thought it was really unnecessary and kind of excessive and was certainly not arranged at my request.”

    “I spent a great deal of time before I came here saying that I really didn’t want that. So I was very surprised to arrive here and discover a really quite substantial operation, because it felt like being in a time warp, that I had gone back in time several years,” he was quoted as saying.

    ALSO READ| Author Salman Rushdie stabbed 10-15 instances, claims eyewitness | Top Points

    Rushdie was stabbed within the neck as he was on the stage on the Chautauqua Institution, a not-for-profit neighborhood on Chautauqua Lake in southwestern New York State, the place roughly 7,500 persons are in residence on any day throughout a nine-week season.

    Following the assault on Friday, questions had been raised in regards to the safety precautions — or lack thereof — on the host establishment, which sits in a rural lake resort about 110 km south of Buffalo, New York.

    The establishment’s management had rejected suggestions for fundamental safety measures, together with bag checks and steel detectors, fearing that will create a divide between audio system and the viewers, based on two sources who spoke with CNN.

    The management additionally feared that it might change the tradition on the establishment, the sources stated.

    — ENDS —

  • Salman Rushdie assault: Praise, fear in Iran as authorities stays quiet

    Iranians reacted with reward and fear on Saturday over the assault on novelist Salman Rushdie, the goal of a decades-old fatwa by the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini calling for his demise.

    It stays unclear why Rushdie’s attacker, recognized by police as Hadi Mattar of Fairview, New Jersey, stabbed the writer as he ready to talk at an occasion on Friday in western New York.

    Iran’s theocratic authorities and its state-run media have assigned no motive to the assault.

    But in Tehran, some keen to talk to The Associated Press supplied reward for an assault focusing on a author they imagine tarnished the Islamic religion together with his 1988 ebook “The Satanic Verses”.

    In the streets of Iran’s capital, photos of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini nonetheless peer down at passers-by.

    The second Salman Rushdie’s attacker was led off stage on the @chq. Via @AP.

    For greater than a century the Chautauqua Institution has been a summer time oasis for reflection, examine and prayer. Today it’s additionally against the law scene. pic.twitter.com/wP6J7doF1Y

    — Joshua Goodman (@APjoshgoodman) August 12, 2022

    “I don’t know Salman Rushdie, but I am happy to hear that he was attacked since he insulted Islam,” stated Reza Amiri, a 27-year-old deliveryman. “This is the fate for anybody who insults sanctities.” Others, nevertheless, apprehensive aloud that Iran might develop into much more lower off from the world as tensions stay excessive over its tattered nuclear deal.

    “I feel those who did it are trying to isolate Iran,” stated Mahshid Barati, a 39-year-old geography trainer. “This will negatively affect relations with many — even Russia and China.” Khomeini, ill within the final 12 months of his life after the grinding, stalemate Eighties Iran-Iraq conflict decimated the nation’s financial system, issued the fatwa on Rushdie in 1989.

    The Islamic edict got here amid a violent uproar within the Muslim world over the novel, which some seen as blasphemously making recommendations in regards to the Prophet Muhammad’s life.

    “I would like to inform all the intrepid Muslims in the world that the author of the book entitled Satanic Verses’ … as well as those publishers who were aware of its contents, are hereby sentenced to death,” Khomeini stated in February 1989, in line with Tehran Radio.

    This June 4, 2007 file picture reveals Iranians in Tehran attending ceremonies on the 18th anniversary of the demise of Iran’s late chief Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, exterior his shrine. (AP, File)

    He added: “Whoever is killed doing this will be regarded as a martyr and will go directly to heaven.” Early on Saturday, Iranian state media made some extent to notice one man recognized as being killed whereas attempting to hold out the fatwa.

    Lebanese nationwide Mustafa Mahmoud Mazeh died when a ebook bomb he had prematurely exploded in a London resort on August 3, 1989, simply over 33 years in the past.

    At newstands on Saturday, front-page headlines supplied their very own takes on the assault.

    The hard-line Vatan-e Emrouz’s predominant story coated what it described as: “A knife in the neck of Salman Rushdie.” The reformist newspaper Etemad’s headline requested: “Salman Rushdie in neighbourhood of death?” But the fifteenth Khordad Foundation — which put the over USD 3 million bounty on Rushdie — remained quiet at the beginning of the working week.

    File picture of novelist Salman Rushdie (AP)

    Staffers there declined to right away remark to the AP, referring inquiries to an official not within the workplace.

    The basis, whose identify refers back to the 1963 protests in opposition to Iran’s former shah by Khomeini’s supporters, usually focuses on offering assist to the disabled and others affected by conflict.

    But it, like different foundations often called “bonyads” in Iran funded partially by confiscated belongings from the shah’s time, usually serve the political pursuits of the nation’s hard-liners.

    Reformists in Iran, those that need to slowly liberalise the nation’s Shiite theocracy from inside and have higher relations with the West, have sought to distance the nation’s authorities from the edict.

    Law enforcement officers detain Hadi Matar, 24, of Fairview, New Jersey, exterior the Chautauqua Institution, August 12, 2022, in Chautauqua, New York. (AP)

    Notably, reformist President Mohammad Khatami’s overseas minister in 1998 stated that the “government disassociates itself from any reward which has been offered in this regard and does not support it”.

    Rushdie slowly started to re-emerge into public life round that point. But some in Iran have by no means forgotten the fatwa in opposition to him.

    On Saturday, Mohammad Mahdi Movaghar, a 34-year-old Tehran resident, described having a “good feeling” after seeing Rushdie attacked.

    “This is pleasing and shows those who insult the sacred things of we Muslims, in addition to punishment in the hereafter, will get punished in this world too at the hands of people,” he stated.

    Others, nevertheless, apprehensive the assault — no matter why it was carried out — might harm Iran because it tries to barter over its nuclear take care of world powers.

    Since then-President Donald Trump unilaterally withdrew America from the accord in 2018, Tehran has seen its rial forex plummet and its financial system crater.

    Meanwhile, Tehran enriches uranium now nearer than ever to weapons-grade ranges amid a collection of assaults throughout the Mideast.

    “It will make Iran more isolated,” warned former Iranian diplomat Mashallah Sefatzadeh.

    While fatwas might be revised or revoked, Iran’s present Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who took over after Khomeini has by no means achieved so.

    “The decision made about Salman Rushdie is still valid,” Khamenei stated in 1989. “As I have already said, this is a bullet for which there is a target. It has been shot. It will one day sooner or later hit the target.” As lately as February 2017, Khamenei tersely answered this query posed to him: “Is the fatwa on the apostasy of the cursed liar Salman Rushdie still in effect? What is a Muslim’s duty in this regard?”

    Khamenei responded: “The decree is as Imam Khomeini issued.”

  • Who is the 24-year-old man who attacked Salman Rushdie?

    Minutes after writer Salman Rushdie was stabbed on Friday, police took a 24-year-old man into custody. Rushdie, an Indian-origin best-selling writer based mostly within the UK, was attacked at a ebook occasion at New York’s Chautauqua Institution on Friday night. Eyewitnesses stated the incident occurred minutes after the writer took his seat on the stage and was about to be launched.

    The 75-year-old, who was born in Bombay, has confronted Islamist demise threats for years for writing the novel ‘The Satanic Verses’. The ebook was banned shortly after publication in a number of international locations, together with India, and triggered a fatwa in opposition to Rushdie by Iran’s then Supreme Leader.

    “A man jumped up on the stage from I don’t know where and started what looked like beating him on the chest, repeated fist strokes into his chest and neck,” Bradley Fisher, who was within the viewers, advised information company Reuters. Shortly afterwards, the attacker was taken into police custody. Here’s what we all know of him.

    Who stabbed Salman Rushdie?

    Law enforcement officers have recognized the attacker as Hadi Matar. The 24-year-old man reportedly hails from New Jersey.

    A plain-clothed police officer stands close to the doorway of the constructing the place alleged attacker of Salman Rushdie, Hadi Matar, lives in Fairview, New Jersey, US, August 12, 2022. (Reuters)

    Police didn’t describe the weapon used. They stated they haven’t zeroed in on the motive. “But we are working with the FBI, the Sheriff’s Office and we will determine what the cause of this was and what the motive for this attack was,” stated Major Eugene Staniszewski of the New York State Police, reported PTI.

    How the occasions unfolded

    Staniszewski stated at 10.47 am native time (8.17 pm IST), Rushdie had simply arrived on stage on the Chautauqua Institution for the occasion.

    “Shortly thereafter, the suspect jumped onto the stage and attacked Rushdie, stabbing him at least once in the neck and at least once in the abdomen,” he stated.

    Police recognized the person who attacked writer Salman Rushdie as Hadi Matar. He was arrested on the scene and was awaiting arraignment.

    State police Major Eugene J. Staniszewski stated the motive for the stabbing was unclear.https://t.co/zpbIbfBzWp pic.twitter.com/vpoIkImXk8

    — The Associated Press (@AP) August 12, 2022

    Staniszewski stated a number of members of the workers on the establishment and viewers members rushed the suspect and took him to the bottom. A trooper with the New York State Police, who was on the establishment, took the suspect into custody with the help of a Chautauqua County Sheriff’s deputy.

    Photographs confirmed a person, carrying a military fatigue shirt and jacket and sporting a buzzcut being frog-marched to a police car.

    Where is Matar from?

    While addressing a press convention, Staniszewski was requested of Matar’s nationality, to which he replied: “I don’t know yet.”

    He stated authorities are within the “process of obtaining search warrants for various items. There was a backpack located at the scene. There was also electronic devices”. He added that in the intervening time, it’s assumed that the suspect was “working alone”.

    Rushdie was supplied with fast assist by a physician who was current within the viewers, and was later tended to by the emergency companies and airlifted to a hospital, stated the police.