Photo: Collected
US President Donald Trump personally believes Iran was involved in the attack on a flydubai aircraft. Yet the country’s Vice President JD Vance has said he has not yet seen any conclusive evidence about Iran’s role.
On Monday, Trump was asked whether he considers Iran responsible for the flydubai incident. In reply, he said, ‘Personally, yes.’
Meanwhile, new information has emerged in the investigation centring on the co-pilot of flydubai flight FZ1073. Citing three sources familiar with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) investigation, it has been learnt that the co-pilot, an Omani national, had planned to crash the aircraft at Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv. Two Israeli officials claim he made this plan even before getting a job at Dubai’s state-owned flydubai.
The UAE’s prosecutor general has said the co-pilot of the flight from Dubai to Israel attacked the main pilot with the emergency crash axe. He described the incident as a ‘terrorist attack’. Two sources said the co-pilot’s name is Hamam al-Hamami. However, the UAE authorities and flydubai have not officially disclosed his identity.
A major disaster was averted as passengers and crew overpowered him. The main pilot, Indian national Smit Machhar, survived the attack. There were more than 170 passengers and crew on the aircraft, most of them Israelis. A reserve pilot who was on the flight later took control of the aircraft and landed it at an airport in north-western Saudi Arabia. From there, the co-pilot was handed over to the UAE.
Israeli officials said the co-pilot had applied for a job at flydubai precisely after finding out an airline that operates flights to Tel Aviv. A source linked to the investigation said he had operated another Tel Aviv-bound flight earlier this year and there had been a plan to hijack and crash that one too.
The co-pilot studied at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia. He also spent some time in New Zealand, that country’s police said. The authorities in Australia and New Zealand are investigating matters related to him.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claims the co-pilot was influenced by ‘extremist Islamic ideology’. However, no detailed evidence has been released in support of this claim.
Source: Arab Weekly
