Israeli officials quickly announced that the bloody “brawl” aboard Flydubai Flight FZ1073 from Dubai to Tel Aviv on Wednesday was in fact a thwarted hijacking attempt, in which the copilot of the plane tried to knife the captain and then crash the aircraft.
An Israeli official told the Jerusalem Post on Wednesday morning that “a major disaster was narrowly averted” when flight crew and passengers joined forces to subdue the knife-wielding copilot.
“The growing assessment among the Israeli security establishment, including the IDF, Mossad, and Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), is that the incident was intended as an act of terror,” the Jerusalem Post reported.
Flight FZ1073, a Boeing 737 aircraft, departed from Dubai with 174 passengers aboard, 166 of them Israeli nationals, according to Israeli media reports.
The plane went into a steep descent, suddenly dropping almost 14,000 feet in less than 30 seconds, before transmitting an emergency signal. The signal initially indicated a “general emergency” before switching a code that means “unlawful interference” with the plane’s operations, and then later returned to the “general emergency” code.
Early reports suggested a “brawl” or “altercation” among the flight crew caused the aircraft to be diverted to Saudi Arabia for an emergency landing, and initial comments from Israeli officials did not describe the incident as a terrorist attack.
Within a few hours, however, officials were describing the situation as an attempted hijacking in comments to international media, and videos posted to social media by the passengers depicted a bloody and frightening battle for the cockpit.
Fox News quoted passengers who said the crisis began when “the copilot stabbed the captain.” Eyewitnesses described “screaming, a loss of power, and blood onboard” during the struggle for control of the plane.
“The co-pilot tried to murder the pilot and basically carry out a suicide attack on the plane,” one of the passengers told Agence France-Presse (AFP).
According to some of the passengers, disaster was averted by brave passengers quickly joining forces with the flight crew to subdue the attacker, and by a “great miracle,” qualified pilots who were traveling as passengers were able to take control of the plane after the captain was stabbed.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said a “jihadist terrorist attack” on the plane was “thwarted only thanks to the heroism of a number of Israeli passengers.” Several other Israeli politicians and officials saluted the bravery of the passengers on Wednesday morning.
“Israeli passengers on today’s flight from Dubai showed extraordinary determination and resourcefulness, helping prevent a major disaster,” said Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Dannon.
In a video statement released several hours after the incident, Prime Minister Netanyahu said that “one of the pilots stabbed the other pilot” as the plane was approaching Israel, and the attacker “apparently tried to crash the plane with everyone on board.”
Netanyahu said one of the passengers told him how he teamed up with a member of the flight crew, and “together they overpowered the pilot who had carried out the stabbing while he was attempting to sabotage the aircraft’s systems.” Another crew member then “entered the cockpit and managed to stabilize the aircraft.”
Various Israeli media reports have described the pilots of the plane as Omanis, Emiratis, Russians, or Ukrainians. At least one Israeli official said the pilot who launched the attack was an Omani national.
The Jerusalem Post reported that many of the passengers left in Saudi Arabia by the emergency landing refused to board another flydubai plane that was sent to pick them up, “citing concerns that neither the aircraft nor the pilot were Israeli.”
Defense Minister Katz and Lt. Gen. Eyeal Zamir, chief of staff for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), are reportedly considering sending an Israeli military plane or chartered commercial aircraft to pick them up. An Israeli official told CNN that Saudi Arabia, which has not joined the Abraham Accords and has no formal diplomatic relations with Israel, is refusing to allow Israeli military planes to land at its airports.
Zamir canceled a planned trip to the United States to meet with Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Dan Caine and CENTCOM commander Adm. Bradley Cooper to deal with the crisis. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a security meeting with his defense officials.
“The incident is under control, and all measures are currently being deployed in order to return the Israeli passengers safely to Israel,” Netanyahu’s office said after the meeting.