Co-pilot stabs captain: emergency landing on flight to Tel Aviv

On a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv, the co-pilot stabs the captain. The plane has to make an emergency landing. Politically, the act hits a heated situation shortly before the elections in Israel.

Tel Aviv. When the replacement plane finally reached its destination in Tel Aviv late on Wednesday evening, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was already waiting at the airport. “You’re the hero,” he says, patting one of the passengers on the shoulder.

Yaniv Hayun's white shirt is still smeared with blood. He is one of the passengers who overpowered the co-pilot after he allegedly attacked the pilot and then tried to crash the plane. “How did you do that?” asks Netanyahu. Yaniv replies: “We are the nation of lions, aren’t we?”

Shortly afterwards, Netanyahu published a video of the meeting on his channels. In Israel, the entire country fears every time there is a suspicion of an attack. Too often in the past, terrorists have hijacked Israeli aircraft and used hostages for blackmail.

Netanyahu even knows this from close family ties: his brother Jonatan Netanyahu was shot fifty years ago as a lieutenant colonel in a special unit while freeing a hijacked plane in Uganda. But less than a month before a parliamentary election that could end Netanyahu's term, such violence is bound to be particularly political.