Shiite Bomber’s Dream Was to Kill Author Rushdie

The Shiite Muslim suicide bomber who wounded five Israeli soldiers in south Lebanon said in a videotape released Friday his dream had been to kill British author Salman Rushdie.

“I wish I had executed the death sentence of the hypocrite agent Salman Rushdie, fulfilling the edict of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, but God graced me with the operation against Israel,” said Sheik Assad Birro in his videotaped final testament.

Khomeini died in June four months after ordering Muslims to kill Rushdie for blaspheming Islam in his novel, “The Satanic Verses.” Several pro-Iranian groups in Lebanon said they would carry out the command.

Birro, who died in the attack, urged “all strugglers” to find out where Rushdie was and kill him. The author has been hiding since Khomeini’s edict, which caused outrage in the West and led to the breaking of diplomatic ties between Britain and Iran.

Truck With Explosives

The videotape was distributed by Hezbollah (Party of God), which claimed responsibility for Wednesday’s attack in which Birro drove a truck rigged with explosives into an Israeli army convoy patrolling a buffer zone in southern Lebanon.

Hezbollah said the attack was to avenge Israel’s abduction of a prominent pro-Iranian cleric, Sheik Abdel Karim Obeid, from his home in southern Lebanon on July 28.