In this courtroom sketch, Salman Rushdie, left, testifies in federal court during the terrorism trial for Hadi Matar, Rushdie’s alleged attacker, shown second from bottom left. File
| Photo Credit: AP
A man was convicted Wednesday (July 29, 2026) of federal terrorism charges in the 2022 stabbing of Salman Rushdie, the author who has faced a decades-old death threat over his novel “The Satanic Verses”.
A jury found Hadi Matar guilty of all the charges against him, including engaging in an act of transnational terrorism.
Matar, 28, is already serving a 25-year New York state prison sentence on an attempted murder conviction in the August 2022 attack on an amphitheatre stage. The federal conviction carries a potential life sentence.
Rushdie, who was about to speak on writers’ safety, was slashed 15 times in front of a stunned audience. He was gravely wounded and lost the sight in his right eye.
Published – July 30, 2026 02:43 am IST
