Rushdie tells trial of 'lake of blood' after stabbing

MAYVILLE, NY

Novelist Salman Rushdie described on Feb. 11 the moment a knife-wielding attacker stormed on stage and attempted to kill him in a frenzied attack that left him blind in one eye.

"The Satanic Verses" author told jurors at the trial of his alleged attacker, 23-year-old American-Lebanese Hadi Matar, that Matar "was stabbing and slashing" at him.

"I was aware of this person rushing at me on my right-hand side," he said, recounting how he was about to speak at an arts event in New York state in August 2022.

"I only saw him at the last minute. It was a stab wound in my eye, intensely painful, after that I was screaming because of the pain," Rushdie said, adding that he was left in a "lake of blood."

He said it "occurred to me I was dying" before he was stretchered out of the cultural center and helicoptered to a trauma hospital.

Matar's legal team have sought to prevent witnesses from characterizing Rushdie as a victim of persecution following Iran's 1989 fatwa calling for his murder over supposed blasphemy in "The Satanic Verses."

Matar is accused of stabbing Rushdie about 10 times. He previously told media he had only read two pages of "The Satanic Verses" but believed the author had "attacked Islam."

New York-based British-American Rushdie, now 77, was rescued by bystanders.

Venue employee Jordan Steves told the court how he launched himself "with my right shoulder with as much force as I could manage" to help others subdue the attacker.

He pointed to Matar, sitting just feet away in the ornate courtroom, when asked to identify the attacker.

Steves's colleague Deborah Moore Kushmaul said she picked up the discarded knife and gave it to police.

The optical nerve of Rushdie's right eye was severed, and he told the court that "it was decided the eye would be stitched shut to allow it to moisturize. It was quite a painful operation, which I don't recommend."

Asked to describe the intensity of the pain over the attack, he said it was "a 10" out of 10.

Last Rushdie, he published a memoir called "Knife" in which he recounted the near-death experience.