Salman Rushdie Attack Suspect Pleads Not Guilty to Attempted Murder

A preliminary review by law enforcement of Matar’s social media accounts shows he is sympathetic to Shiite extremism and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, a law enforcement official with direct knowledge of the investigation said. NBC News.

Rushdie went into hiding for several years after the fatwa against him was issued, and was officially supported by the Iranian government after the Ayatollah’s death until 1998. Later, the writer resumed public speaking, wrote about his fatwa in his 2012 memoirs. Joseph Anton and even laughed at it Larry David in the ninth season of HBO Curb your enthusiasm in 2017.

However, the fatwa against Rushdie remained in effect, and a semi-official Iranian religious foundation paid a reward. New York Times reported On August 13, several hardline Iranian newspapers praised the Rushdie attacker. Reuters said

In addition to Rushdie, the moderator of the event Ralph Henry Rees, co-founder of the Pittsburgh nonprofit City of Asylum was also wounded in the attack. According to the police, a 73-year-old man suffered a minor head injury.

“Salman Rushdie is one of the great authors of our time and one of the great defenders of free speech and creative expression,” he said in a statement released on Twitter by PEN America, a press freedom group on whose advisory board he serves. “We honor him and our main concern is his life.”

(E! and NBC News are part of the NBCUniversal family.)

(Posted Aug 13 at 12:05pm PT)