It described the operation as successful and said the famous writer, who is now out of danger, had been shifted to a normal room in the hospital. The newspaper quoted his eldest son, whom it did not name, to be saying that his father had passed the critical phase and was feeling better but needed rest. Khal, who is also a novelist and columnist, has won the Arab Booker Prize for his novel "Spewing Sparks as Big as Castles."