NARRATIVE – Stabbed this Friday during a conference in the United States, the writer had been targeted by a fatwa from Imam Khomeini since 1989.
Correspondent in Istanbul
Imam Khomeini had made it his pet peeve. A heretic to be killed at all costs. Since that famous February 14, 1989, when the supreme guide of the Iranian Islamic revolution called “all zealous Muslims in the world to be promptly executed, wherever they are”Salman Rushdie and his publishers, the British writer of Indian origin knew he was in danger. At issue: his work, The Satanic Versespublished a few months earlier and accused of ridiculing the Koran and the Prophet Muhammad.
At the time, anger was already brewing in the Muslim world. As soon as the book was released in England in September 1988, Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Ghandi banned its distribution, hoping to recover Muslim votes for the upcoming legislative elections. Twenty countries are following suit. Everywhere, demonstrations are organized. In Bradford, in the north of England, copies are burned in a public square, forcing the British publisher to withdraw the text from sale…
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