FlyDubai co-pilot stabs pilot, attempts to crash plane; passengers thwart attack

A Boeing 737 carrying 174 people from Dubai to Tel Aviv became the site of a violent struggle for control on Wednesday morning when one of the two pilots in the cockpit attacked his colleague with a knife and began attempting to crash the aircraft. The co-pilot, an Omani national, stabbed Captain Smit Machchhar, an Indian national, and then tried to jam equipment between the pilot seats—not to stabilize the plane, but to disable it. What happened next unfolded in minutes that felt like hours to those aboard: passengers and crew members broke into the locked cockpit, overpowered the attacker, and allowed two off-duty pilots who were traveling as passengers to take control of the aircraft. The plane diverted to Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, where it landed safely. No passengers were injured. The pilot who was stabbed sustained wounds but survived. Two other crew members were hospitalized.

The attack was detected almost immediately by Israeli authorities. The Israeli Air Force noticed the aircraft deviating sharply from its flight path and descending at an alarming rate around 8:21 a.m. local time—the plane dropped more than 17,000 feet in two minutes. When the air force tried to contact the flight, there was no response. Then came an emergency alert specifying a hijacking. Within seconds, Israeli officials feared a September 11-style attack. The air force closed Israeli airspace and scrambled fighter jets. The entire sequence of decisions and alerts took place in roughly two to three minutes. The jets never left Israeli airspace because it became clear the plane was heading toward Saudi Arabia, which had also scrambled its own aircraft.

Passenger Asaf Rajuan was credited with being among those who fought the attacker in the cockpit. After the co-pilot had been subdued, Rajuan posted a video to social media from the plane: "Whoever is hearing me, we need help. We are in the Tabuk area of Saudi Arabia, which we don't know. All the passengers are OK, but not the pilot. We need help." Another passenger, Miryam Shira Ohayon, described the moment of attack. The plane dropped "very, very sharply suddenly" multiple times. "The co-pilot tried to murder the pilot and basically carry out a suicide attack on the plane," she said. "It was really on the way to crashing, and it was simply the resourcefulness of many people who took control of the co-pilot and neutralized him." She noted that a doctor on board provided first aid to the wounded pilot and that passengers worked together to remove the attacker from the cockpit before the off-duty pilots could take over.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released a video statement praising the intervention. "As they were approaching Israel, one of the pilots stabbed the other pilot and apparently attempted to crash the plane with everyone on board," he said. He instructed Israel's security establishment to prepare for potential additional threats. Defense Minister Israel Katz called it "an attempted jihadist terror attack, which was thwarted only thanks to the heroism of several Israeli passengers who broke into the cockpit, overpowered the terrorist, and with their own hands returned control of the aircraft to an additional flight crew that was present." The Israeli Foreign Ministry identified the wounded pilot as a hero and said that together, the passengers and crew "saved 174 lives."

The motive for the attack remains unknown. Netanyahu acknowledged this in a later interview, saying authorities were still investigating. An Israeli security official told CBS News that investigators were examining whether the incident could have been a September 11-style terror attack and whether the attacker was working alone. The co-pilot was arrested and is being questioned by Saudi authorities. An Omani official confirmed that the attacker was born in Oman and holds Omani citizenship. FlyDubai, the low-cost carrier owned by the UAE, issued a brief statement saying only that "an altercation occurred in the flight deck" and that the aircraft was "successfully secured by on-duty FlyDubai crew traveling on the flight." The airline said it was deploying two replacement aircraft to Tabuk to transport the passengers and crew onward, though many Israeli passengers told media outlets they would not reboard a FlyDubai plane.

The plane finally landed in Tel Aviv shortly before 8 p.m. local time on Wednesday. Passengers could be heard singing and chanting as they disembarked. Family members came to the airport to celebrate their loved ones' safe return. The incident occurred against a backdrop of heightened regional tensions. Netanyahu had warned in recent days of escalating security threats to Israel and its interests amid its ongoing military operations against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Israeli politicians seized on the event as evidence of national character. Benny Gantz, a politician running in upcoming elections, wrote on social media: "The resourcefulness and courage displayed by the passengers on this flight, in the face of clear mortal danger, are exactly the stuff our people are made of." U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee posted that the incident had put the Middle East on "FULL ALERT" that morning. Israel has not experienced a plane hijacking in decades, but it maintains some of the world's strictest airport security protocols. The investigation into the co-pilot's motives and any potential connections to organized extremist groups is ongoing.