An Omani co-pilot aboard a FlyDubai Boeing 737 MAX bound for Tel Aviv stabbed his captain inside a locked cockpit on September 30, then drove the aircraft into a near-vertical plunge toward the earth — until a bleeding Indian pilot, an Israeli passenger who had never touched aircraft controls, and two off-duty airline pilots together pulled the plane back from catastrophe and landed it safely in Saudi Arabia.
Senior Israeli officials have characterized the episode as a jihadist terrorist attack attempt, and the political fallout is intensifying: a critical security gap allowed an Omani national — a citizen of a country with no diplomatic relations with Israel — to spend roughly nine months flying an Israel-bound route without triggering a security review.
