Rushdie himself is expected to testify during the trial.
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The 77-year-old author was blinded in one eye in the attack and spent months recovering, a process he detailed in a memoir released last year. A speaker who was to appear with Rushdie also was wounded.
The trial is projected to last up to two weeks. Jurors are expected to be shown video and photos from the day of the attack.
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They are unlikely, however, to hear about a fatwa issued by the late Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini calling for Rushdie’s death, according to District Attorney Jason Schmidt.
Rushdie, the author of “Midnight’s Children” and “Victory City,” spent years in hiding after Khomeini announced the fatwa in 1989 following publication of the novel “The Satanic Verses,” which some Muslims consider blasphemous.
Schmidt has said discussing Matar’s motive will be unnecessary in the state trial, given the attack was seen by the live audience that was present to hear Rushdie speak.
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“This is not a case of mistaken identity,” Schmidt said during his opening statements on Monday. “Mr. Matar is the person who attacked Mr. Rushdie without provocation.”
The trial is taking place as the 36th anniversary of the fatwa — Feb. 14, 1989 — approaches.
Earlier, on the first day of the trial on Monday, a Chautauqua Institution employee testified that he rushed from backstage to intervene when he saw a man was on stage violently swinging his arms at Rushdie.
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“I ran as fast as I could, lowered my shoulder and got as much of him with as much of me as a I could to disrupt what was happening,” said Jordan Steves, who was the media relations coordinator.
Steves, one of two witnesses to testify Monday, identified Matar as the assailant.
In the trial, Matar’s defense faced a challenging start after his public defender, Nathaniel Barone, was hospitalised with an undisclosed illness preventing him from attending the start of the trial. Judge David Foley refused a defense request to postpone opening statements and instructed Barone’s associate to speak in his place.
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Assistant public defender Lynn Schaffer told jurors that prosecutors couldn’t prove Matar’s guilt, even with videos and photos. She said the case is not as straightforward as the prosecution portrayed.
“The elements of the crime are more than ‘something really bad happened’ — they’re more defined,” Lynn Schaffer said. “Something bad did happen, something very bad did happen, but the district attorney has to prove much more than that.”
In the federal indictment, authorities allege Matar believed the edict was backed by the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah and endorsed in a 2006 speech by the group’s then-leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
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A later trial on federal terrorism charges will be scheduled in U.S. District Court in Buffalo.
