Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met today at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv with passengers who returned from Saudi Arabia, where their flight had been diverted, according to his spokesperson. In a video released by the Israeli Prime Minister’s office, Netanyahu is seen embracing a man named Yaniv, who is identified as one of the passengers who managed to enter the cockpit where a violent struggle had broken out.
With bloodstains on his shirt: One of the Israeli civilians who helped subdue the hijacker on the Flydubai flight meets Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after arriving back in Israel. pic.twitter.com/uipyPt32g7
— Israel National News – Arutz Sheva (@ArutzSheva_En) September 30, 2026
According to Israeli authorities, one of the Flydubai aircraft’s pilots stabbed his colleague and attempted to crash the plane. The same authorities described the incident as an “attempted jihadist attack.”
Flydubai: The gripping account of the man who subdued the Omani pilot
Yaniv, the Israeli passenger who helped restrain the suspect, said he knew how to react thanks to the TV series Air Disasters, which presents and analyzes serious aviation accidents and incidents.
Speaking to Channel 12, Yaniv said that when the aircraft began to rapidly lose altitude, he realized there was no one in the cockpit to operate the flight controls.
He explained that watching Air Disasters had taught him that, in order to stop the descent and bring the plane back up, he needed to pull back on the controls.
