New details have emerged about the attempted hijacking of FlyDubai flight 1073, a Dubai-to-Tel Aviv flight carrying 174 people, after an Omani co-pilot stabbed the lead pilot in the cockpit and allegedly attempted to bring down the aircraft.
In a Thursday interview with Fox & Friends, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the co-pilot had undergone “Islamist radical indoctrination.”
“The attacker, the copilot who attacked the captain, is now being interrogated, but here’s what we do know: First, we know that, he underwent Islamist radical indoctrination,” Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu added that this information appears to be coming from material gathered on the suspect’s personal background.
A colleague of the co-pilot, speaking to Israel’s Channel 16 journalist Yosef Yisrael on condition of anonymity, described the man as exhibiting “very strange behavior, especially around religious observances that were out of step with his surroundings.” The colleague said the co-pilot “used to pray a lot, and would not shake hands with women.”
The co-pilot, an Omani national who had worked for the airline for less than a year, has not been publicly named. Israel’s defense minister has called the incident “a jihadist terrorist attack.” The colleague who spoke to Channel 16 said the airline had effectively endangered passengers by employing him.
“There is no other way to put it, we hired the services of a terrorist and nearly caused the deaths of 180 people,” the colleague said, adding: “Usually only Emiratis fly to Israel. It is not clear how he got on this flight.”
Investigators are now examining how the co-pilot was able to board a flight to Israel at all, since passengers generally must hold a passport from a country with diplomatic relations with Israel to land there — and Oman is not among those nations.
Israel sends investigators to the UAE
A spokesman for Netanyahu, David Mencer, said Israel is sending investigators to the United Arab Emirates to help determine whether anyone directed the co-pilot’s actions. The suspect has already been transferred back to the UAE.
“We’ll get to know a whole lot more information now that he’s in the UAE and we can join the investigation,” Mencer said.
Mencer also relayed an account Netanyahu received from a passenger who entered the cockpit during the incident, describing the co-pilot as standing over the aircraft’s controls and using his feet to try to destroy them while attacking the captain.
“His objective was to bring down that airplane,” Mencer said.
This is a developing story and further details may emerge as the joint Israeli-UAE investigation continues.
You must be logged in to post a comment Login