Salman Rushdie testifies at Buffalo terrorism trial of his attacker

Salman Rushdie sat in a federal courtroom in Buffalo, New York, and again recounted the August 2022 stabbing he survived at the Chautauqua Institution. He described the moment he felt a punch on his chin, the blood that flooded the stage, and said, “I was on the stage, lying down, with an enormous pool of blood all around me.” He also noted that the knife was “a millimeter from my brain.”

The attacker, 28‑year‑old Lebanese‑American Hadi Matar, was previously convicted in state court of attempted murder and sentenced to 25 years. Prosecutors now charge him with terrorism, alleging that he acted on the 1989 Iranian fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini against Rushdie’s novel *The Satanic Verses* and that he received material support from Hezbollah. Evidence presented includes alleged communications with an individual in Iran identified as “Kamyar.” If convicted on the federal terrorism count, Matar faces a possible life sentence.

Matar’s defense argues that he acted alone, without direction from any terrorist organization, and disputes the government’s assertion of a terrorist motive.