Bill Maher Blasts ‘Dangerous’ Religious Fundamentalism Behind Attack On Salman Rushdie: ‘Don’t Come At Me With Islamophobic’

etcanada.com:

As Salman Rushdie fights for his life after being brutally stabbed Friday while delivering a lecture onstage, Bill Maher spoke out about the circumstances underlying the attack on the author.

Rushdie, Maher’s friend and frequent guest on his politically charged HBO talk show “Real Time”, has been living under a fatwa since 1989, when Iranian ruler Ayatollah Khomeini issued an order for Muslims to kill Rushdie due to the alleged blasphemy contained in his book The Satanic Verses. READ MORE: Author Salman Rushdie Attacked Before Lecture On New York Stage “The news is not good,” Rushdie’s agent, Andrew Wylie told the New York Times, revealing that doctors had placed Rushdie on a ventilator in order to breathe. “Salman will likely lose one eye; the nerves in his arm were severed; and his liver was stabbed and damaged,” Wyle said.

Maher addressed Rushdie’s attack on Friday’s edition of “Real Time”, telling viewers that “a friend of mine, a dear friend of mine, good friend of this show, got stabbed today.” Maher explained that “Sal did have some enemies in the past,” referring to the Ayatollah’s fatwa, and detailed the circumstances of the attack. “Sal was in Chautaugua, he was giving a lecture — how’s this for irony — about how the U.S.

is a safe haven for writers and other artists under threat of persecution,” Maher said. “And making that speech itself is unthinkable in most Muslim countries.