geoff: good evening. i'm geoff bennett. amna nawaz is away. on the newshour tonight. hundreds are arrested as more pro-palestinian protests spread across college campuses. a key witness takes the stand in

donald trump's hush money trial after the judge holds a hearing into whether the former president violated his gag order. and, with national elections underway in the world's largest democracy, democracy we examine , the ethnic violence that has killed hundreds and displaced tens of thousands in india. >> the mob killed my husband after brutally assaulting him like an animal. i don't think even animals are subject to such levels of violence. ♪ >> major funding for the pbs newshour been provided by -- the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions, and friends of the newshour, inc. including kathy and paul anderson and camilla and george smith.

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foundation, fostering informed, engaged communities. >> and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. geoff: welcome to the newshour. college campuses in several parts of the country are struggling tonight with just where to draw the line between allowing protests and free speech and preventing

antisemitism and intimidation. as the school year nears its end, columbia university announced it would stay on a hybrid schedule until the end of the spring semester next week. and, students were arrested at new york university last night. >> police arrested more than 100 people at nyu, as the term all to other schools. >> it's a really outrageous crackdown by the university. geoff: university officials said protesters breach barricades and behaved in a disruptive and antagonizing manner. some faculty disputed that characterization by the school, coming as a wave of palestinian protests and encampments have spread in the last weeks since a columbia university president testified about anti-semitism on

campus. many are students, but not all are from the respective school where they are protesting. earlier in the day, at least 60 people were arrested at yale. there have been similar protests at emerson, m.i.t., boston university, the university of michigan, and the university of california. columbia has been the flashpoint for a week now. hundreds of students have turned out for protest. on thursday, the police department was called to break up tent encampments in more than -- and more than 100 protesters were arrested. many students and faculty felt the crackdown has been excessively harsh in squelching free speech. but some students, jewish students in particular, as well as some alumni and faculty say there is too much hostility on campus, leading some to feel threatened for their safety. michael is a junior at the engineering school. he's not jewish, but says he has

watched what as happening too often. >> is full of hate in disagreement and it is sad to see. i've seen some awful things said to not only practicing jews but people who are historically do is, simply for wearing the star of david. >> public safety, nypd, where are you? geoff: but protesters say the crackdown is not justified. >> barnard students have been evicted from dorms they're paying for, have been given 15 minutes to gather up any belongings and are not allowed to eat in any dining halls, not allowed to use their meal plans, and have been really criminalized. geoff: she also said the

administration's approach has backfired. >> the atmosphere on campus has been really tense, and i and many other students attribute that to the administration's actions, that people are feeling unsafe, because there's a ton of cops in riot gear here. geoff: for his part, president biden also criticized many of the protests yesterday. today, before he went into court, former president donald trump. >> what is going on at the colleges columbia, nyu and others, it's the wrong signal, it's got the wrong tone and the wrong words. geoff: the situation is also starting to affect the commencement season. the university of southern

california canceled all outside speakers, it says because of concern for public safety. that followed a much criticized decision to cancel the remarks of a muslim student over unspecified safety concerns. while columbia university's administration has faced criticism for how it's handled the events and the arrest of students, concerns remain about the safety of jewish staff and students on campus. we'll get both of these perspectives. first from irene mulvey, president of the american association of university professors. she spent 37 years teaching mathematics at fairfield university before retiring. thank you for being with us. we should say that members of the columbia university chapter of their organization are expected to move to since you're the university president for her decision to call in the nypd last week to arrest demonstrators. why is that warranted, in your view? >> i think the idea of calling

in police in riot gear on peaceful protesters of testing outside is a remarkably disproportionate and wrongheaded response to the events we are seeing on campus. because higher education is founded on listening, learning, discussion, debate, free and open inquiry. we challenge students to challenge their most deeply held beliefs in order to justify them to themselves and to others. our goal is communication and service of understanding. instead, we saw the suppression of speech and silencing of voices because somebody might not like what they are saying. and that is a real danger to democracy. geoff: how should a university balance the expression of free speech and student safety? >> there is harassment and anti-semitism, it is not new. it's not the first time hate

speech has reared its ugly head on campus. there are policies in place to deal with these kinds of things. that's where we should go, policies that ensure due process for the students, and then what we are seeing instead is new policies being drafted, a protest has to be in a tiny space on campus. this is so spread -- suppression of speech. the idea that if you are suppressing speech in order to keep students safe, that is a false choice. you can do both. geoff: thinking about this from the perspective of jewish students who say that feel intimidated, if there's a climate of harassment on campus, isn't the administration morally compelled, and also compelled by law, by title ix, to address it and shut it down? >> the institution is required to allow for the most free and

open expression while also ensuring that conversations are civil and dialogue is respectful. but in situations like this, people have extremely wrong positions, and these are polarizing times. debates are heated and messy. and so you have to err on the side of free and open inquiry. hate speech, antisemitism has no place on campus are anywhere in your policies to deal with that. but in higher education, our primary focus should be academic freedom, free speech, and associational rights for students. geoff: as protests spread to other campuses, what lessons could other college and university administrators take away from what is transpired at columbia? >> they could think about

creative ways to respond. they could think about ways to encourage communication and dialogue in open forums across the campus, and engaging all students so that all students have an opportunity to hear other points of view, to understand other points of view, to question other points of view. they should figure out creative ways to respond, because what happened at columbia and in my you is completely unacceptable. the silencing of speech and democracy, if somebody doesn't like it, this is a real danger. geoff: president of the american association of university professors, thank you for your insights. let's turn now to dr. andrew r. marks. he's the chair of the department of physiology and cellular biophysics at columbia university. thank you for being with us. how do you feel about the handling of the ongoing demonstrations at columbia? and what do you make of this

view that the old policies in place to deal with student demonstrations are sufficient? >> i think she is doing the best that she can. i think that her heart is in the right place. i think it is an incredibly difficult situation, and there are no easy answers. columbia university has had policies in place which i think are capable of dealing with this situation, if they are able to be enforced. geoff: have you witnessed incidents of anti-semitism on campus? >> yes, i have. i've seen anti-semitic slurs being hurled at jewish students, and it has been very painful to watch. i've seen anti-semitic hate language written on walls in the middle of campus and posters hanging that have been very offensive. geoff: what more could columbia we doing to make jewish students feel safer?

>> i think columbia university has already done quite a lot, love personal observation is that over the last several days, hate speech has been toned down on campus. the problem is that as you know, columbia's campus is in the middle of new york city, when you leave campus in either direction, there is a tremendous amount of anti-semitic hate speech being hurled at students and faculty from people outside the campus. geoff: when it comes to what is happening on campus, how should a university balance student safety and student expression? >> i think that student should be allowed to protest, absolutely. and i think that the limit has to be on hate speech. as long as the protests are civil and respectful of other members of the community, that needs to be protected and encouraged.

when it drifts over to hate speech it becomes offensive and i think threatening to the jewish community at the university. geoff: what do you think is informing and influencing the response to the ongoing protests? >> again, she has been in an incredibly difficult situation. i'd like to clarify a couple of things, i heard your previous speaker say, first of all, the actions taken again students had nothing to do with the content of their speech except when it comes to hate speech, of course, but in terms of what they were protesting, it really had to do with them breaking the existing rules of the university. the president is responsible for the safety of all students, and she took an action which i was not in favor of, at least i wanted to negotiate or talk with

students, but she did that because she felt it was necessary to preserve the safety of the jewish community and other people on campus. i was one of the people at the senate executive committee that helped write the event policy, and it is important to note that it was done incomplete collaboration and working very closely with students. while no policy is perfect, we tried to come up with one that was fair. the previous speaker mentioned that we were limiting protest to tiny parts of campus. that is not accurate. there were designated areas and times and place which is common for all universities, and had the students adhere to those guidelines, things would've gone much differently. geoff: thank you for being with us. >> thank you for having me.

♪ geoff: in the day's other headlines, the u.s. senate advanced a bill this afternoon to send billions of dollars in aid to ukraine, israel and taiwan. final passage is expected later tonight or tomorrow. in total, it contains $95 billion in support, with $61 billion dedicated to ukraine. today the pentagon clarified where those funds would go. >> this security assistance package ll be based on ukraine's most urgent needs, again without getting into details, i think it's a good assumption to expect that it will include air defense capabilities as well as artillery ammunition. geoff: the associated press is reporting that pentagon officials stand ready to's -- to

send an additional $1 billion military aid package to kyiv. israel ordered new evacuations of northern gaza today as it carried out a wave of strikes throughout the strip. smoke was seen rising over central and southern areas of nausea as residents reported nonstop from bartman's. separately, the israeli military released footage of what it claims were strikes against hezbollah targets in lebanon. the rn backed group has clashed with israel since the start of the war in gaza. hezbollah in turn says it launched a drone attack 10 miles inside israel, its deepest incursion to date. norway is calling on international donors to resume payments to the unrwa after an independent review released yesterday found that israel provided no evidence to support accusations that unrwa employees are related to terrorist groups. officials say the finding should

be enough for countries to end the freeze on unrwa. >> i hope the voices are heard and the measure will be put in place, that the last group of donors will get the necessary confidence to come back as a partner with the agency. geoff: a separate internal you an investigation is still looking into israel's allegations that staffers were involved in the october 7 attacks. the u.s. is among those who paused funds t the agency back in january. a moscow court has rejected the latest appeal of the american journalist, the wall street journal reporter will remain in russian detention through the end of june. he appeared in court today with his lawyers to seek an end to his pretrial detention. he was arrested in march of last year on espionage charges. 32-year-old was seen to be in good spirits, at one point

making a heart-shaped gesture with his hands. he denies the allegations against him. five migrants died as he tried to cross the english channel from france to the u.k. and among them was a seven-year-old girl. their deaths came after -- hours after the british denied them entry. >> we will see more deaths, more dangerous risks being taken. it definitely will not act as a deterrent. nothing else has. so i don't know why people are thinking that this will. geoff: more than 6000 people have made the perilous journey to britain is far -- this year on small, overloaded boats. police and friends cleared migrants from a makeshift camp in paris less than 100 days before the summer olympics get

underway there. in a predawn operation, authorities evicted dozens of teenage boys and young men from west africa. many were in the process of seeking official residency. a group say officials are ramping up what they call a social cleansing campaign ahead of the olympics. >> there being targeted by the police because they want to have a clean place for the olympics. they don't want to see paris as a place full of migrants. geoff: last week, police evicted hundreds of migrants from the biggest squatter camp south of the capital the federal trade commission voted to ban so-called noncompete agreements for most employees. that means companies can no longer bar workers from taking jobs with their competitors. cording to the ftc, one in five workers are currently subject to such restrictions. the u.s. chamber of commerce has said it will sue to block the

measure. on wall street, markets closed higher after some strong corporate earnings. the dow jones industrial average gained 263 points of the nasdaq jumped to 45 points, the s&p 500 added nearly 6 -- nearly 60. the u.s. supreme court hears the case that has major implications for labor relations. congress passes a bill forcing tiktok's chinese parent company to sell or be banned. an author salman rushdie discusses his new memoir about the murderous knife attack that changed his life. >> this is the "pbs newshour" from weta studios in washington, and in the west, from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. geoff: it was the second testimony in former president trump's criminal hush money trial in new york city. on the witness stand today, the former national inquirer

publisher who described a 2015 agreement with donald trump to try to kill negative stories about him and run negative stories about his political rivals. william brangham joins us with more. the judge now has to rule on mr. trump's behavior outside the courtroom, is that right? william: that's right. today begin with a very tense hearing over whether the former president has been violating the gag order that was imposed on him after trunk criticized witnesses, the judge, and the judge's daughter. a former acting attorney general national security is been following this and all of trump's case is very closely. so nice to see you again. than for being here. this hearing, whether trump was violating the gag order, that gag order prohibits him from making statements about the witnesses and certain members of the court and jurors. prosecutors allege she has violated that 10 different times. what is he accused of doing?

mary: originally that sought to have a hearing on whether he was in contempt of the courts order based on three initial social media post that attacked potential witnesses, like michael cohen and stormy daniels herself. then after they file that motion for contempt, which trump posted seven more posts,ometimes attacking esther cohen, calling him a serial perjurer, but also troublesome to the court, attacking jurors, he did this by reposting a different post talking about liberal individuals lying, and then he added to that to get onto this trial. that caused the government to file another motion for contempt. i will note that in today's hearing, prosecutors said we are going to be filing another motion for contempt. it just keeps going. william: his lawyers argue this

is an unconstitutional infringement on his free-speech rights, that he has every right to say that. what are a defendants rights in this regard? mary: defendants to have constitutional rights, like all people in the united states. but when you are a defendant in a criminal trial, those rights are not limitless. they can be restricted things that you are saying, when your speech has an impact negatively on the administration of justice. meaning that the court cannot properly enforce the rule of law and administer justice in the courtroom because of your speech. notably, mr. trump has been making this argument about the constitution, not just in this case in the manhattan courtroom, but he made it in the january 6 federal case here in washington dc that went all the way up to the d.c. circuit, which upheld the restrictions, made some modifications to them and upheld them, and then the judge has

basically adopted pretty much the same order that the d.c. circuit had upheld here. he is not bound by the d.c. circuit, saying the needs for the administration of justice justify these minimal restrictions. william: russell gold, a law professor at the university of alabama was quoted saying i cannot imagine a defendant posting on social media about a judges family and not being quickly incarcerated. this is in reference to trauma attacking the judge's daughter. do you agree that trump has been getting a disposition that other defendants would not get? mary: yes. i cannot say that every defendant would be immediately detained for attacking a member of the judge's family, but we do see repeat violations.

the judge is sanctioned -- has sanctioned him twice monetarily in the civil fraud trial. i suspect we will see jury sanctions him of the judge did not make a decision today. i think judges are very reluctant to detain a former president, not only because it would be immediately branded and attacked as political, and they are trying very hard to maintain that they are being fair and impartial, even though some may say their attempts to be fair and impartial means they are putting a thumb on the scale in favor of mr. trump. but also, logistically, it is incredibly complicated when you are talking about somebody with secret service protection, etc. i think the judges are conscious of the fact that he is a candidate for president, this is the election season, and i think they're really hesitant to shut down all opportunity for his campaign. william: i just want to read and

excerpt from the gag order where he was talking about the practical implications of this. he wrote that the average observer, after hearing the financer recent attacks, must draw the conclusion that if they become involved in these proceedings, even tangentially, they should worry not only for themselves, but for their loved ones as well. such concerns will undoubtedly interfere with the fair administration of justice and constitutes a direct attack on the rule of law itself. do you agree with that? mary: absolutely. i think that not only has the judge -- what happens is that first of all, threats get made against witnesses and potential jurors, the judge's family, the prosecutor's family has reported how many millions of dollars they are having to spend for security for the prosecution's team and their families. but also, witnesses might color

their testimony because they are worried or scared about what will happen if they testify truthfully. we've already seen one juror pull out being selected because her own friends were able to identify her just based on the information on her name. she was worried on her safety and her ability to be impartial. so there are real-world consequences. william: mary, thank you so much, as always. ♪ geoff: the u.s. supreme court heard arguments in case it could have major implications for labor rights. the court looked at a decision -- a charge against starbucks for employees who were fired by the company after they announced plans to unionize.

a recorder -- reporter was that the case and joins us. walk us through the arguments the justices heard today and how this is all linked to the starbucks union dispute. >> when workers unionize, if they are retaliated against by their employers, the the national labor relations board, the federal agency that oversees union rights has the right to vote on -- go to federal court and asked for immediate relief in the form of forcing a company like starbucks to reinstate fired workers. that is actually what happened a few years ago at the very beginning of the starbucks drive that has spread like wildfire across the country. starbucks fired seven union activists at a memphis store and a court ordered that they have

to reinstate them. starbucks is arguing that that reinstatement should not of happened, they said they fired those workers because they invited a tv crew into their store after hours, against policy and that they were totally within the rights to fire those pheresis. starbucks was challenging was the tactics used in determining whether they could order the reinstatement of those. -- those barristas. they were going to the federal courts to grant that relief. geoff: based on the justices questions, do you have a sense of where they are leading in this case? >> it seemed there were ploys to agree with starbucks on this one, they feel like the nlrb has yielded too much power in that

memphis case, that there should be a consistent standard applied across all circuit courts in the united states, which there is not right now. it would modify the test across the united states, which labor advocates say could have a chilling effect for union organizing in the united states. the majority of the justices, with the exception of justice ketanji brown jackson agreed with that point. she appeared to support the case that congress bestowed authority on the national labor relations board to conduct investigations and that the weight of the findings should be prioritized. geoff: tell us more about the possible implications of this case. >> labor activists believe this could have a chilling effect on labor organizing and unionizing

in the united states which is having a resurgent moment of popularity. part about it not just with starbucks, the auto workers unionize last friday in tennessee, rei, trader joe's, and these court orders at the heart of this case are not just use to reinstate fired workers, they also could be used to request marketing orders, to reopen closed doors, and retaliating against workers for unionizing. there could be much higher borrowing for getting that relief for workers which could make them more afraid to unionize or cause union campaigns to die out as employers retaliate against workers. geoff: thanks so much for sharing your reporting with us. the supreme court is back tomorrow with another high stakes case out of idaho, looking at accesss to emergency

abortions. we'll have the latest on what's shaping up to be a busy final week of the argument calendar. indian prime minister narendra modi hopes to secure a third term in elections that are now underway. his promise -- a rising, united india. but in india's northeast, a state is at war with itself. hundreds are dead, tens of thousands are displaced, and the central government is accused of looking the other way. producer zeba warsi got rare access to the deeply divided state of manipur. and a warning, some details in her report are disturbing. >> it feels like a militarized border between two warring countries. but it's a road between two districts in an indian state. across 40 miles, we crossed a dozen check-points controlled by indian security forces and

civilian militias. to reach the christian minority stronghold, churachandpur. >> our fathers and forefathers lived together in manipur. but the ethnic conflict in manipur, has been so sudden. >> 31 year old ichan lunginlal is a hindu from the majority meitei tribe, who was married to lalneo lunginlal, a christian of the minority kuki tribe. they fell in love as teenagers.s 6-year-old lamkholhing. >> we could not spend even one day apart. it felt like a love straight out of a movie. it was difficult for us to spend any time away from each other. >> they did not consider themselves star'crossed, but their love story ended when manipur's faultlines cracked. >> i spoke to him and asked, how is the situation right now? he responded and said the situation has become tense now. i could also hear his voice shaking but he still consoled me and said: don't worry.

at around 11:00 pm, 12:00 am, i received a call from my husband, and i could hear him shouting, ichan, ichan, they have found me and they are going to kill me. >> what began last may as a protest over political participation and state benefits, turned into an armed conflict between two tribes and religions, that engulfed the state in flames. entire villages were razed. and hundreds of churches burnt. the bulk of the dead and missing belong to the christian kuki minority including lalneo lunginlal. he was last seen in this video, with two other christian kuki men--left to bleed on the street. >> the mob killed my husband after brutally assaulting him like an animal. i don't think even animals are

subject to such levels of violence. >> at the wall of remembrance, kukis display death, empty coffins in a line, one for every life lost. this wall bears the human cost of this conflict. the kuki community calls it state sponsored ethnic cleansing and they tell us each picture on this wall has its own story to tell. prime minister narendra modi portrays india's future as strong and united. but election day in manipur was marred by violence. the hindu majority metei militia allegedly captured polling booths. they are heavily armed and throughout the conflict, accused of killing with impunity. civil rights advocates accuse the state government run by modi's bharatiya janata party, or bjp, of protecting the perpetrators, and exploiting ethnic divisions. >> this is a war crime. this is ethnic cleansing. and plus, this is a religious

persecution. >> kim gangte is a kuki women rights activist who has documented sexual crimes. >> most of our women who are there in the valley. they were being tortured. they were being raped. they were being killed. last may, two kuki women were paraded naked, beaten, and sexually assaulted by a mob of hundreds. one of them was allegedly gangraped. >> we are very much indian. we are very much the daughters and sons of india. we really wonder why the central government is still keeping silent. >> repeated requests for an interview with state government officials were ignored. after months of silence, modi addressed the turmoil in manipur, only after the report of a gangrape. >> in this country, in any corner of this country, in any state government rising above politics,law and order and respect for women is important. i want to assure the countrymen that no culprit will be spared.

>> but for the christian kuki community, that reassurance rings hollow. they no longer believe in living with the hindu meiteis. they want separate union territory, as we saw in the hillside town of moreh. last year this local economic hub was engulfed in flames. today, it is heavily guarded by indian armed forces and nearly inaccessible to anyone outside. after a 6 hour wait at a security checkpoint,e were allowed to enter. >> the moment one community sees the other community, they want to kill each other. >> david wapei is a kuki activist in moreh. he says there is an invisible boundary between these hillside towns and the capital, forged on hate. >> there's so much of, divisions or mistrust between the two communities that the two communities cannot live together now. >> but manipur's violence is on both sides. during our visit, an angry kuki mob set the police station on fire.

and more hindu majority meteis have been forced out of their homes and now live in camps restricted to a small corner of the state. >> on that day i couldn't take her to her private tutor, as i usually could, as there was pain in my eye. this thought haunts me to this day. >> hijam kulajit, a hindu meitei is still to bury his 17 year old daughter with dignity. she was last seen with a classmate, after they were abducted by kuki militias. after weeks of outrage and protests the accused were arrested, but her body was never found. kulajit has made a shrine of memories of his daughter, who had big dreams. >> she had a cup with 'future doctor' written on it. she wanted to become a doctor to help the underprivileged. >> the last drawing she made, the last book she read, her last father's day card

bring pain, tears, and rage. >> prime minister narendra modi did not utter a single word about this case or the violence in manipur all these months. even though the prime minister's so called slogan is save daughter, educate daughter. will they be able to bring back my daughter? >> there is no justice for a father who lost his daughter. and there is no closure for victims on both sides, who say they've been neglected. for the pbs newshour, in manipur, india i'm zeba warsi. geoff: tiktok might soon be banned are under new ownership in the u.s.. that's what the u.s. senate expected through legislation as far -- part of an aid package. but tiktok doesn't plan to go down without nice without a fight. lisa: this bill is unprecedented

in scope. the legislation would force tiktok's parent company to either sell within nine months or face a ban within the united states. it won wide suit -- what support but tiktok says it has been millions to wall off u.s. data and that this is an unconstitutional violation of free speech. president joe biden plans to sign the law. to drill down, i'm joined by david mckay who color -- covers technology apology -- policy for the new york times. how do you ban something used by almost 200 million people? >> the bill says app stores run by companies like apple or google could not carry tiktok or maid get available for download. servers that host apps and help maintain them.

lisa: is also the sale aspect about this. how much do people think tiktok could be worth? we know there is an issue with its algorithm that perhaps the parent company might not have to sell the algorithm. how does all that way in here. >> these are key questions. it would limit the pool of financial buyers to groups of investors like private equity firms that can pull capital together. there's a question of will they sell the algorithm to users? will they sell it along with the app? it's obviously a very important teacher and something the government has six -- suggested they want to restrict leaving the country. lisa: you said extremely expensive. i'm curious, what are we talking about, tens of billions of dollars? what is the range? >> analyst have generally

estimated at least tens of billions of dollars. lisa: something that expensive, who can actually buy it, and can it be done within nine months? >> that is a question, the senate push to extend the deadline and there are questions, how would you separate tiktok from bytedance, what amount of time with that take, and questions about could the sale survive? you could imagine that potential buyers could get a lot of scrutiny from the government and that could slow down the process as well. lisa: tiktok has said in a statement that it tramples on the free-speech rights of this country and would devastate businesses and the economy. what do we know about the potential economic effect?

>> any questions about the economic effect would come down to how it -- obviously a lot of people make a living on tiktok as creators are by advertising as small businesses. tiktok has tried to focus on saying it's not about a big company, it's about small businesses who use the app. lisa: how unprecedented is this i the u.s. government to? ? -- for a deal like this >> the u.s. generally forbids some ownership of traditional media, and the u.s. forced the chinese government to sell grinder, which is relatively small compared to tiktok which has about 100 70 million users in the united states.

lisa: congress overwhelmingly supported this idea of enforcing a ban or a sale. generally members of congress are not using tiktok, as opposed to young people who are using tiktok who opposed this and think it is an infringement on the rights. can you talk about the generational divide, and could there be cultural impact beyond just the sale or the ban? >> you seem president biden in his campaign got on tiktok to reach young voters. the administration is also supporting the efforts. does it result in a sale of the company or a ban? other products have tried to capture some of tiktok synergy, think about youtube or instagram. lisa: what about the world reaction here?

>> we've reported with digital rights activists around the world. they are worried the measure could impact the u.s. ability to make the case abroad for a free and open internet. lisa: david mckay with the new york times, thank you. geoff: august 12, 2020 two, salman rushdie, one of the world's best-known riders, was attacked and nearly killed by young man with the knife. now rushdie has written of that harrowing day and all that's followed in a new book. he spoke recently to jeffrey brown for our arts and culture series, canvas. jeffrey: as we sit here a little more than a year and a half after the attack, how are you? >> i'm surprisingly good. i mean, it's surprising to

myself certainly, but also actually surprising to quite a lot of the army of doctors that i've been involved with, many of whom have said that the recovery is much in excess of what they would have expected. jeffrey: the knife attack, 15 stabs, came at the chautauqua institution in western new york, during a public talk on, of all things, the importance of keeping writers safe. it left salman rushdie near death. he would lose the use of his right eye and suffer numerous other injuries to his hand, and, chest and abdomen, , and undergo multiple surgeries, numerous setbacks, a painful, slow recovery. when he decided to write about it, he says now, the first word that came: the title, knife. >> at its most basic, it's the story of a knife attack, you know? but then i came to think of it in another way, a kind of metaphorical way. i came to think like language is a kind of knife, you know, it's a kind of also a sort of tool which you could use to cut through things to the truth.

and i thought, well, that's my knife. you know, i don't, i don't, and if you're going to be in a knife fight, you may as well have a knife. so i think in a funny way, i came to think that the book itself is a knife. but it's my knife. it's a way of fighting back. jeffrey: was this one harder to to write because it was so , personal? >> the first chapter was very hard to write. the first chapter, which actually details the attack itself, that was really hard to write, to go back into that moment, to try and be as honest and truthful about it as i could be, to get such a good look at the end. you know, i mean, i had a really good look at it. jeffrey how did it look? :>> well, not great. on the one hand, it was quite prosaic, you know. i was lying there bleeding, and

neutral way, i found myself thinking, oh, this is, i'm dying. but in that kind of tone of voice. nothing dramatic, you know, just that's probably what is happening. and then i, then i felt very lonely because i felt how sad it was to be dying among strangers, you know. and far away from people you love. jeffrey: most of all, his wife rachel eliza griffiths, a poet and novelist, with whom he's been together since 2017. knife, he wants us to know, is also a love story. meeting us at the office of his longtime agent, andrew wylie, rushdie, now 76 is still quick with jokes and wit: he's happy with his weight loss, he says, but doesn't recommend the route he took to drop the pounds. he also showed us a photo on the wall from another dramatic time in his life, the publication of his novel, the satanic verses in 1988. iran's ayatollah khomeini, denouncing the book as an insult to islam, issued a 'fatwa'

calling for rushdie's death. there were violent demonstrations in the muslim world and the book's japanese translator was murdered in 1991. rushdie himself, then living in london, went into hiding, with police protection, for 9 years. he would write about that period in his first memoir, joseph anton. >> to my surprise, i've now written two autobiographical books. when i became a writer, i had zero interest in autobiography. but then i acquired the problem of an interesting life. jeffrey but for the past 20 : years, now in new york, he's lived a fairly normal life, often in public, including with us on the staten island ferry when we talked of his 2015 novel, two years, eight months and twenty-eight nights. he had moved on. >> i thought, okay, this, this is behind me. the world moves on. so much else to be, for people to be upset about.

i mean, like, this kid, 24, he wasn't even born at the time that that trouble happened. jeffrey: this kid, hadi matar. born in california, living in new jersey before the attack, now awaiting trial for attempted murder. in his book, rushdie chose not to name him, calling him the a for my assailant, my would assassin, the asinine man who made assumptions about me. and, in a very rushdian twist, he imagines a series of talks with his attacker, a fictional section within this very non-fiction book. you clearly had to address him or think about him as person. >> yes. jeffrey: but you also clearly, i think, had to make a decision, how much of a character in your life, in your book, in your story? >> yeah. i mean, i think he obviously is a character in it, but the reason i wanted to think about him imaginatively is that i think there's sort of a puzzle

about him which that he, you know, he was very, very young. and one of the things he must have known he was doing was to ruin his life. by, by committing murder, it would also be a terrible catastrophe in his life, not just in mine. and why would somebody so young be so willing to sacrifice their own freedom and future? initially i wanted to meet him, to ask him. then i thought, i'm not going to get anything useful out of that, i'll just get a bunch of slogans. and then i thought, let me use what talent i have, you know, which is, as you say, imagination and storytelling. and let me just try and imagine my way into him and try and fill that hole. you know, at least to my satisfaction, i can construct a narrative that feels plausible. jeffrey: now, do you, are you you done with him? >> yeah. i kind of dealt with him, as far

as i'm concerned. jeffrey: you write at one point: i understood that the strangenesses of my life had put me at the heart of a battle. and that battle is between the book and the bomb, the word and now the knife? >> yes and kind of, between , bigotry and tolerance. between, between openness and closedness, between humorless and humor. not a battle that i picked, you know, but given that i'm in it, it's the right battle. in the end, that's what writers can do. they can tell the story. and, you know, dictators, tyrants, powerful people can own the present. but i've always believe writers own the future. jeffrey: and for you? >> if you're my kind of writer, what you most want to do is to write books that will endure. you know, you want them to outlast you. you want, i mean my dear friend martin amis, we just, we just lost, used to say that what you hope to leave behind you is a shelf of books. you want to be able to say, 'you know, like from here to here,

it's me'. and, i don't know, you know i've got 22 now. so that's a shelf. jeffrey that's a good shelf. : and now, for salman rushdie, no doubt a shelf that will continue to grow. for the pbs newshour, i'm jeffrey brown in new york. geoff: and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm geoff bennett. for all of us here at the pbs newshour, thanks for joining us. have a good evening. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by -- >> consumer cellular, this is sam, how can i help you? with consumer cellular, you get nationwide coverage with no contract. that's kind of our thing. have a nice day. ♪

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