Author Salman Rushdie attacked on lecture stage in New York

Salman Rushdie, the author whose writing caused outrage among Muslims in the 1980s, was attacked Friday as he was about to give a lecture in western New York.

An Associated Press reporter witnessed a man storm the stage at the Chautauqua Institution and begin punching or stabbing Rushdie as he was being introduced. The author was taken or fell to the floor, and the man was restrained.

Rushdie's condition was not immediately known.

Rushdie’s book “The Satanic Verses” has been banned in Iran and most other Islamic countries since the late 1980s, with Muslims taking offence at its blasphemous depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.

A year later, Iran’s late leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini issued a fatwa, or edict, calling for Rushdie’s death.

A bounty of over $3 million has also been offered for anyone who kills Rushdie.

Iran’s government has long since distanced itself from Khomeini’s decree, but anti-Rushdie sentiment lingered. In 2012, a semi-official Iranian religious foundation raised the bounty for Rushdie from $2.8 million to $3.3 million.

Rushdie dismissed that threat at the time, saying there was “no evidence” of people being interested in the reward.

That year, Rushdie published a memoir, “Joseph Anton,” about the fatwa.