The chairman of Parliament's all-party
In an interview with ePolitix.com, Conservative MP Stewart Jackson launched a furious attack over the honour for the controversial author and suggested that it threatened anti-terrorism co-operation.
"If you are going to give a knighthood to someone then you have to bear in mind the message, what the message you are giving is going to be.
"It is for her Majesty and the government to decide who they give honours to and not open to the veto of a foreign power, but it does convey an important message and the timing was very insensitive, particularly with ongoing problems with
Jackson, who leads the Friends of Islam group, also questioned the merits of honouring Rushdie, saying he was ungrateful and his books are "rubbish."
"I am not entirely certain myself whether Salman Rushdie is deserving of a knighthood given his ingratitude to the taxpayers of this country for protecting him from the fatwah for the best part of 10 years, and the fact that he is not normally resident in the United Kingdom, and the fact that essentially he writes rubbish books - for all those reasons he does not deserve a knighthood."
