Netanyahu Calls the Flydubai Co-Pilot Indoctrinated, and Stops Short of Blaming Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says the co-pilot accused of stabbing his captain and trying to bring down a flydubai jet full of Israel-bound passengers had been radicalized before he ever took his seat in the cockpit. "We know that he underwent Islamist radical indoctrination," Netanyahu told Fox News, in remarks reported by CBS News and others.

What the prime minister would not say is whether Tehran had a hand in it. Asked about Iran, he answered that "it's too early to say." That caution sets him apart from President Trump, who told reporters he believes there is a link.

The man has not been publicly named or, so far as the coverage reviewed here shows, formally charged. He is described by officials only as an Omani national, and the account of his motives is, for now, the Israeli government's.

What happened on Flight 1073

The flight left Dubai for Tel Aviv on Wednesday, September 30, with 174 people aboard a Boeing 737. As the plane crossed Saudi Arabia, the co-pilot attacked the captain, an Indian national named Smit Machchhar, and the aircraft dropped sharply. Reports differ on how far and how fast: Reuters, in a dispatch carried by Australia's ABC, put it at more than 14,000 feet in under 30 seconds, while CBS described a fall of more than 17,000 feet over about two minutes.

Machchhar, though badly wounded, got the cockpit door unlocked. Passengers, Israelis among them, went in and overpowered the co-pilot. Other pilots who were on board took the controls and landed at Tabuk, in northwestern Saudi Arabia. Nobody was killed. CBS reported that two crew members besides the captain were hospitalized and that no passengers were hurt.

Accounts of the weapon also vary. Most reports say the captain was stabbed; Ynet reported that the co-pilot apparently used an axe kept aboard as emergency equipment. The airline's own description was a good deal more modest: flydubai said that "an altercation occurred in the flight deck."

What Netanyahu is claiming

Netanyahu has gone considerably further than the airline. Besides the indoctrination claim, he told Fox the co-pilot was suicidal and had shouted "Kill me, kill me" at the crew, according to Breitbart News. Defense Minister Israel Katz called the episode "an attempted jihadist terror attack."

None of that has been tested in a courtroom, and Israel has not released the evidence behind it. An Israeli official told the Times of Israel that the man's social media activity showed signs of radicalization, Breitbart reported.

The prime minister also conceded a failure closer to home. Oman has no diplomatic relations with Israel, and Netanyahu said Israel has constraints on pilots from such countries. This one got through anyway. "There was a loophole here," Netanyahu said. His spokesman said Israel is now vetting every pilot who flies into the country, according to a Bloomberg report carried by the Spokesman-Review.

The Iran question

On Iran, the president and the prime minister are not saying the same thing. Trump, asked whether the co-pilot was tied to Tehran, said: "I would say the answer, based on what I'm hearing, is yes, but we're working on it right now."

Netanyahu promised to find out "whether he had accomplices, whether Iran was behind it," and the Israeli outlet reported that he expects an answer within days. Two Israeli security officials told Reuters they had found no Iranian involvement so far and that the co-pilot likely acted alone. Iran's mission in Geneva did not respond to the wire service's request for comment.

A regime that has spent years plotting against Israelis abroad has earned the suspicion. Suspicion is still not evidence, and it is to Netanyahu's credit that he drew the line where the facts currently stop.

What happens next

The co-pilot was arrested in Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates has opened an investigation into the motives and any terrorist connection. The Omani government has not publicly confirmed his nationality, though an Omani official did so to CBS News. Flydubai has suspended its Tel Aviv flights, and Israel is arranging to bring stranded passengers home. The questions for the days ahead are whether the Emiratis file charges, whether Israel shows its evidence, and how a pilot Israel's own rules were supposed to screen out ended up at the controls.