Dubai: No one has the right to assess the accusations of Iran on Friday’s attack on Salman Rushdie, whom he and his supporters must only be blamed, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tehran said on Monday.
The novelist, who has lived under threats for decades since making an annoying clerrical authority in Iran through his writings, is recovering after repeatedly stabbed in public appearance in the state of New York.
In Iran’s first official reaction to Friday attacks, ministry spokesman Nasser Kaanani said that freedom of speech did not justify the insult of Mr. Rushdie towards religion. The 1988 novel “The Satanic Verses” is seen by some Muslims that contain parts of the blasphemy.
During the attack on Salman Rushdie, we did not consider other people other than himself and his supporters deserve to be reproach, reproach and punishment,” Kanaani told Briefing of the News. “No one has the right to accuse Iran in this matter.”
Writers and politicians around the world have condemned the attack.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Sunday that Iranian state institutions had incited violence against Rushdie for several generations, and the media affiliated with the state had struggled to his life efforts.
The Indian-Born Writer has lived with a bounty on his head since “the satanic verse” was published in 1988. The following year, Iran’s then supreme leader ayatollah ruhollah khomeini issued a fatwa, or edict, calling on Muslims to killing the novelist and Anyone involved in the publication of this book.
The Iranian government said that in 1998 it would no longer support the fatwa.
But in 2019, Twitter suspended the highest leader account of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei over the tweet that said that the fatwa against Rushdie was “solid and could not be canceled”.
Hardline reaction
Mr Rushdie, 75, has lived relatively open in recent years.
He will deliver college at the Chautauqua Institution in West York about the importance of the United States as a paradise for artists who are targeted when police say a 24 -year -old man rushed to stage and stabbed him.
The suspect in the stabbing, Hadi Matar from Fairview, New Jersey, said he was innocent for the accusation of attempted murder and attack on the court’s performance on Saturday, the lawyer appointed by his court, Nathaniel Barone, told Reuters.
Early law enforcement review of Matar social media accounts showed that he sympathized with Shi’a extremism and the guardian corps of the Iranian Islamic Revolution (IRGC), according to NBC New York. IRGC is a strong faction accused by Washington to carry out a global extremist campaign.
Ministry of Finance Spokesman Kanani said Rushdie had “exposed himself in a popular anger by insulting the sanctity of Islam and crossing a 1.5 billion Muslim red line.”
He said Iran had no other information about the alleged novelist attackers except what appeared in the media.
Outlets -Iran’s state media outlets celebrate attacks with headlines including “Satan have been blinded” and some Iranians voiced online support for stabbing.
Matar is the son of a man from Yaroun in South Lebanon, according to Ali Tehfe, mayor of the city. Matar’s parents emigrated to the United States, where he was born and raised, said the Mayor, added that he had no information about their political views.
Iranian-supported armed groups, Hizbullah, hold significant power in Yaroun, where Khomeini posters and IRGC Commander Qassem Soleimani, who were killed by US drone attacks in 2020, adorned walls on weekends.
A Hizbullah official told Reuters on Saturday that the group had no additional information about the attack on Rushdie.