The American accused of stabbing Salman Rushdie said Wednesday, August 17, to be “surprised” that the author of satanic verses survived the attack, perpetrated on Friday August 18 at a conference in New York State. “When I heard he had survived, I was surprised”Hadi Matar told the New York Postwhich indicates having contacted him in prison.
The suspect, arrested immediately after the attack, pleaded not guilty to attempted murder on Saturday and is due to appear in court again on Friday. hadi Matar, 24, did not say whether he was inspired by the fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989 from Iran, calling for the death of the author of the satanic versesconsidered blasphemous.
“I have esteem for the Ayatollah. I think he is a remarkable person. That’s all I would say about it”he assured the New York tabloid, which writes that the lawyers of hadi Matar, advised him not to talk about this subject. Hadi Matar told the newspaper that he read “a few pages” from Salman Rushdie’s novel.
The 75-year-old British author, stabbed a dozen times and evacuated by helicopter to a hospital, was briefly placed on a ventilator before his condition improved. “The road to recovery has begun”had underlined his agent on Sunday.
“I don’t like this person. I don’t think he’s a good man”launched the suspect to the New York Post about the intellectual. “I don’t like him, I really don’t like him.” “He is someone who attacked Islam”, he added. Watching videos of the author on YouTube, he found it “hypocritical”. He assured not to be in contact with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and to have learned of the presence of salman Rushdie at a cultural center conference in Chautauqua, upstate New York, via Twitter.