The co-pilot of a passenger plane flying to Israel had been exposed to radical Islamist indoctrination and appeared to be suicidal when he stabbed the captain in what may have been an attempt to bring down the aircraft, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday.
A disaster was narrowly avoided aboard Wednesday’s flydubai Flight FZ1073 from Dubai to Tel Aviv. Despite suffering stab wounds, the captain managed to open the cockpit door, enabling passengers to restrain the attacker.
A reserve crew traveling on the aircraft then took control and landed the jet, carrying more than 170 people, at Tabuk airport in Saudi Arabia.
“We know that he underwent Islamist radical indoctrination. That appears to be something we are gathering from his personal information,” Netanyahu told Fox News.
Two Israeli security officials said Israel’s preliminary assessment was that the co-pilot, identified by Israeli officials as an Omani national, most likely acted alone. They stressed, however, that the investigation remained in progress.
The aircraft dropped more than 14,000 feet in under 30 seconds during the incident as it crossed Saudi Arabian airspace, according to flight-tracking website Flightradar24.
Netanyahu said there was little doubt the co-pilot responsible for the stabbing had intended to end his own life.
“It looks very likely that he was going to down the plane,” Netanyahu said. He added that the suspect’s “Islamist tendencies” and apparent radicalization provided “a pretty good clue,” while cautioning that he would not elaborate further.
The co-pilot accused of stabbing the captain had undergone radical Islamist indoctrination and appeared to be suicidal, Israel’s prime minister said
Pictured: A Flydubai Boeing 737 MAX operating from Dubai to Tel Aviv landed at Tabuk Airport in Saudi Arabia on September 30
Israeli passengers arrive at Ben Gurion International Airport after traveling on a Flydubai flight from Tabuk, Saudi Arabia
“But again, I don’t make final conclusions yet. Those are the indications we have now,” he said.
The United Arab Emirates has opened an investigation to determine what led to the incident and what motivated it. Authorities are also examining “whether the incident was linked to any terrorist activity or purpose, or involved prior planning or direction,” the UAE state news agency reported Thursday.
Yossi Shelley, Israel’s envoy to the UAE, said earlier that it was too soon to reach conclusions and that no motive had yet been established.
Another Israeli official said Israel had not received all the information it requested from Saudi authorities. Israel’s Mossad and Shin Bet intelligence services were also investigating the incident, the official said.
Israeli officials have identified the suspected attacker as an Omani national. Authorities in Oman have not issued a public comment.
In a separate Fox News interview, Netanyahu said the suspect was being questioned in Saudi Arabia and that he expected the man would eventually be transferred to the UAE.
Asked whether there were signs of Iranian involvement, Netanyahu said it was too early to determine.
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“We’ll get to the root of this attacker, whether he had accomplices, whether Iran was behind it. I think we’ll find out very soon,” Netanyahu said.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said Wednesday that preliminary information indicated the co-pilot had intended to crash the aircraft and described him as a terrorist. Netanyahu, by contrast, referred to the episode as “a serious security incident.”
The incident heightened security fears in Israel weeks before Israelis vote in the first election since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, attacks, with Israel’s security figuring prominently in the campaigning.
The US and Israel launched strikes against Iran in February, in a conflict that quickly spread to the Gulf and Lebanon, where Israel has been fighting Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
Netanyahu and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi have hailed the flight FZ1073 captain and Indian national Smit Machchhar as a hero.
The Indian ambassador to United Arab Emirates met with the wounded captain from the flydubai flight on Thursday, with the embassy saying he was in ‘good health and recovering well’.
Israel has also lauded the passengers who subdued the attacker.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog said Thursday he would present ‘heroism’ awards to five of the Israelis who helped overpower the knifeman and stop him from crashing the plane.
‘You put yourselves at risk to save others and prevented a terrible disaster. Today, the whole world saw the beautiful and courageous face of Israeli society,’ Herzog, who holds a largely ceremonial role, said in a statement.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets Yaniv, who broke into the cockpit, at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv
‘I am proud of you, and I thank you on behalf of the State of Israel.’
Yaniv Hayoun, one of the men who incapacitated the attacker, described running to the cockpit as the plane nosedived.
‘We pulled the assailant out, I pulled him out. After I pulled him out we took control of the plane, I pulled up the yoke (steering control of the plane), I straightened the plane out a bit,’ he said, talking to reporters upon his return to Israel on Wednesday.
Speaking to Our News Outlet, Hayoun said he knew what to do from watching plane documentaries.
‘I leaned over the seat, reached forward with my hands and pulled the controls toward me because the aircraft was pointing downward. I pulled the controls back toward me. It was only for a few seconds.’
‘There’s a programme called Air Crash Investigation…The images are frightening and they make my wife afraid of flying, so I watch it secretly when she isn’t watching with me.
‘I saw on it that when an aircraft is going downward, you have to bring the controls back — pull them backward — to bring the nose level. It really was only for a few seconds. It wasn’t as though I flew the plane.’
