Salman Rushdie’s stabbing is part of an American phenomenon
I escaped the ayatollahs’ intolerance when my family left Iran. But Rushdie’s stabbing shows authors are silenced here, too.
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Shortly after its publication, and soon before
Khomeini’s death in 1989, someone had told him that the book made the Prophet Muhammad seem irreverent and insulted the prophet’s wives by naming prostitutes after them. The
supreme leader issued a fatwa calling for Rushdie to be killed. Twenty countries banned the book. A Japanese translator
of “Satanic Verses” was murdered and three others were attacked. Riots over the book left 45 people dead, 12 of whom perished in Rushdie’s hometown of Mumbai. Copies were burned in the streets and bookstores were firebombed.