On Friday morning, author Salman Rushdie was stabbed multiple times just as he was about to commence a lecture at the Chautauqua Institution in Chautaqua, New York, about 75 miles south of Buffalo.
Rushdie was airlifted to a hospital in New York City where he spent hours in surgery. His agent Andrew Wyllie says the news is not good as Rushdie, who is 75, sustained damage to his liver and that he could lose an eye.
While New York State Police do not have a motive, it is loud and clear that the fatwa issued by the Iranian government back in 1989 has been carried out. The suspect is a 24-year old Shia Muslim from New Jersey named Hadi Matar who sympathizes with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Rushdie was under protection from the British government for nearly a decade before Iran said it would not enforce the fatwa though it was never lifted. Over time, Rushdie returned to public life and seemed to have to put fatwa behind him as there were no security precautions of which to speak.
At this point, one can only hope Rushdie will survive the attack. But it just goes to show and extremism (in this case of the radical Islamic variety) and the hatred which drives it might recede it never disappears and can return without warning as Rushdie would find out.
In the case of Islamic extremism, it also demonstrates that fatwas are forever whether they are issued by al Qaeda against American civilians or by the Iranian against writers.
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