First Israeli repatriation flight from Dubai lands in Tel Aviv

The move comes as investigators probe the attack on a FlyDubai captain that left passengers stranded in the UAE.

Tel Aviv: The first special flight carrying Israelis stranded in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) arrived in Tel Aviv early Saturday, October 3, following the suspension of commercial flights between the UAE and Israel after the Flydubai cockpit attack.

The Arkia-operated flight landed at Ben Gurion Airport shortly after 1am local time, according to the airport authority’s arrivals information. It had departed Dubai on Friday night.

The flight was the first Israeli-operated service to leave Dubai since Flydubai suspended its route to Israel following Wednesday’s incident involving a co-pilot and the captain of a Tel Aviv-bound aircraft.

The Flydubai flight was diverted to Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, after the co-pilot attacked Indian captain Smit Machchhar during the journey from Dubai to Tel Aviv. Passengers and crew members intervened before the aircraft made an emergency landing.

The incident disrupted air travel between the UAE and Israel, leaving a number of Israeli passengers stranded in Dubai. Israeli authorities subsequently arranged special repatriation flights to bring them back.

Arkia and Israir were among the Israeli airlines scheduled to operate flights from Dubai as part of the repatriation effort. El Al also planned to operate a service after obtaining the required permissions.

The circumstances surrounding the cockpit attack remain under investigation. Authorities are also examining the co-pilot’s actions and the security implications of the incident.

The UAE and Israel established diplomatic relations in 2020 under the Abraham Accords, after which Dubai became a popular destination for Israeli travellers.

Trump says he’ll hit Iran very hard if it had a hand in the attack

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed on Thursday, October 1, that the copilot, identified by Israeli officials as an Omani citizen, had undergone “Islamist radical indoctrination” but provided no evidence to back the assertion.

US President Donald Trump told reporters that early information he’s received suggests there are links between the attack and Tehran but did not elaborate.

Trump also said that if it is determined that Iranian agents were behind the attack, the United States will “hit them very hard.”

Israeli investigators are involved in the probe, but the Emiratis are in the lead, according to an official who wasn’t authorised to speak to the media and spoke on condition of anonymity. It’s unclear if the attacker was part of a group, said the official, adding that there is currently no evidence of a link with Iran.

UAE senior diplomatic adviser Anwar Gargash on Friday called the FlyDubai attack a “dangerous terrorist act” in a post on X. He credited the flight captain for preventing the incident from turning into a catastrophic event.

The moment is a test for the UAE government, which has burnished a reputation for building effective measures against extremist activities but has also bristled in the past over criticism of security lapses.

“The Emiratis are going to be interested in protecting their reputation,” said Jon Alterman, chair of Global Security and Geostrategy at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “They believe people should see them as a place that’s very secure, not a place that has serious lapses.”

The FlyDubai flight plummeted to 15,000 feet

Details of the harrowing flight, which made an emergency landing in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia, continue to emerge.

Smit Machchhar, the wounded captain who has been hailed as one of the heroes of the flight, and the copilot were transferred on Thursday from Saudi Arabia to the UAE, the kingdom said.

Machchhar is recovering in an Abu Dhabi hospital.

For the passengers on board, most of them Israelis, the first signs of trouble came more than two hours into the flight when the aircraft suddenly dropped down to 16,600 feet — the sharpest drop in altitude recorded by data tracking platforms.

Seconds later, it ascended to 21,725 feet before soon dropping back to 15,000 feet, which it maintained until safely landing more than an hour later.

Soon after levelling off, the plane dispatched its first distress signal, Squawk 7700, a code for general emergency, while flying along the Saudi-Jordanian border. It then sent a second distress signal, 7500, for “unlawful interference,” indicating something more serious like a hijacking attempt or an attack. It lasted for nearly an hour.

About 15 minutes after the second distress call, the aircraft turned west, briefly entering Jordanian airspace, then made a 180-degree turn and headed southwest to Tabuk, where it eventually landed, nearly four hours after taking off from Dubai.

Possible implications for US-Iran war negotiations

Trump’s suggestion that there could be an Iranian link adds a new layer of uncertainty to the on-and-off diplomatic efforts aimed at bringing an end to the seven-month war in Iran.

Iranian officials said Wednesday they received an official US response to Tehran’s latest proposal to end the conflict, which Trump had publicly rejected just days earlier. The officials did not say what the response contained and whether it was a rejection.

The US is meanwhile dispatching roughly 9,000 more troops on ships to the Middle East, a US official said Thursday — a move that could further complicate the political climate in the US, with looming midterm elections.

The move could mean there would be three carriers in the region as early as the end of October, according to the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations.

The move would bring the US naval presence in the Middle East to an unusually high number of more than 20,000 sailors and Marines, as well as hundreds of aircraft. The Navy previously had three carrier strike groups in the Middle East in April for the first time since 2003.

With inputs from PTI.