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The mother of the 24-year-old suspect, accused of attempting to murder author Salman Rushdie, said that her son changed after a trip to the Middle East in 2018 and she was not even aware of who the author was.
Speaking to the Daily Mail, the accused, Hadi Matar’s mother, Silvana Fardos, said that her outgoing son turned into a moody and introvert person following a visit to the Middle East in 2018.
“I was expecting him to come back motivated, to complete school, to get his degree and a job. But instead, he locked himself in the basement. He had changed a lot, he didn’t say anything to me or his sisters for months,” she said.
Silvana also detected that her son was becoming more religious and he would criticize her for not giving him a strict Muslim upbringing. He also barred her from entering his basement.
“One time he argued with me asking why I encouraged him to get an education instead of focusing on religion. He was angry that I did not introduce him to Islam from a young age,” Silvana added.
The woman further told the Daily Mail that she had never heard of Rushdie before getting a frantic call from her daughter on Friday.
As FBI agents raided her Fairview, New Jersey home on Friday afternoon, it was the first she heard of the incident.
“I just cannot believe he was capable of doing something like this. He was very quiet, everyone loved him. As I said to the FBI, I’m not going to bother talking to him again. He’s responsible for his actions,” Silvana Firdos said.
Matar was born in the US to Lebanese parents who emigrated from the southern border town of Yaroun, a stronghold of the Iranian-backed terror group Hezbollah.
The author, 75, was stabbed nearly 10 times, including in the neck and the abdomen, on Friday by a man who rushed onto the stage as the author was about to give a lecture in New York.
