‘You’re next’: police investigate JK Rowling threat as writers fear for freedom

As Salman Rushdie’s family reveal he’s suffered life-changing injuries after being stabbed in the neck and liver, police confirm an ‘online threat’ against the author of the Harry Potter series.

J. K. Rowling has been threatened on Twitter. Picture: AFP.

Police are investigating a threat to JK Rowling amid calls to protect authors and defend freedom of expression.

As Sir Salman Rushdie’s family revealed yesterday that he had suffered life-changing injuries after being stabbed in the neck and liver, police confirmed that they were investigating an “online threat” against the author of the Harry Potter series.

Rushdie, 75, who spent nearly a decade in hiding after his novel The Satanic Verses was published in 1988, remains in a critical condition after the attack at the Chautauqua Institution in upstate New York on Friday where he had been due to give a lecture. His son Zafar, 42, led calls to defend freedom of expression for authors, saying: “Free speech is life itself. Free speech is the whole thing, the whole ball game.”

Warner Bros Discovery (WBD), which produced the Harry Potter films, condemned the threat to Rowling and said it stood “with her and all the authors, storytellers and creators who bravely express their creativity and opinions”.

Rowling, 57, was among dozens of prominent authors to express anger over the assault on Rushdie, tweeting her hope that he would be OK. She later shared screenshots of a message from a Twitter user who had written “don’t worry you are next” in response.

Rowling tweeted: “To all sending supportive messages: thank you. Police are involved (were already involved on other threats).”

To all sending supportive messages: thank you 💕
Police are involved (were already involved on other threats).

— J.K. Rowling (@jk_rowling) August 13, 2022

Police Scotland said: “We have received a report of an online threat and officers are carrying out inquiries.”

The same Twitter account posted messages praising Rushdie’s attacker. The tweet to Rowling, from an account in Pakistan, was later taken down. Other authors who faced threats online after expressing support for Rushdie included Taslima Nasrin, who had to flee her home in Bangladesh after a court said her novel, Lajja, offended Muslims’ faith.

The threat that was made against JK Rowling.

WBD said in a statement that it believed in “freedom of expression, peaceful discourse and supporting those who offer their views in the public arena. Our thoughts are with Sir Salman Rushdie and his family following the senseless act of violence in New York. The company strongly condemns any form of threat, violence or intimidation when opinions, beliefs and thoughts might differ.”

The alleged attacker, Hadi Matar, 24, of Fairview, New Jersey, denied attempted murder and assault when he faced a court on Saturday.

While authors including Stephen King, Neil Gaimon and Khaled Hosseini expressed horror after the attack along with leaders such as President Macron, Labour faced criticism because Sir Keir Starmer made no comment about it for more than 24 hours. Starmer said on Saturday evening that Rushdie “has long embodied the struggle for liberty and freedom against those who seek to destroy them”, adding that the attack was “cowardly” and that the Labour Party was praying for a full recovery.

Rushdie, whose other novels include the Booker prizewinning Midnight’s Children, was under 24-hour police guard for years after the Iranian leader Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa in 1989 calling for his death in response to The Satanic Verses. In 1998 the Iranian government said it would no longer try to enforce the fatwa and Rushdie emerged from hiding and moved to New York.

Salman Rushdie is still in critical condition. Picture: Getty Images.

Hadi Matar is arrested in Chautauqua, New York State, after the stabbing attack on Salman Rushdie

Yesterday (Sunday) the charity Humanists UK, of which Rushdie is a patron, said anyone who believed in freedom of speech should support the author. Andrew Copson, the chief executive, said: “This is a moment for everyone who believes in freedom of choice, of thought, of expression and the values of an open and democratic society to be full-throated in their defence.”

Lisa Appignanesi, a friend of Rushdie and former president of the writers’ organisation English PEN, said the “ghastly” attack was a reminder to publishers to back writers.

“Freedom of expression is best defended by writers writing what they see and publishers being open to imaginative excellence and daring and less to what they feel are forces of social demand.

“The Satanic Verses predicted our own day as much as it was of its time. The point about danger is you never know where it is in a text that it’s going to arise. When I read it I had no idea I was reading something people might see as blasphemous.”

The Times