Posted on 10/10/2026 9:48:10 PM PDT by Freeleesy
London | The co-pilot accused of attempting to hijack a passenger jet full of Israeli passengers watched terror videos and glorified attackers as part of his radicalisation while studying in Melbourne almost a decade ago, the United Arab Emirates top prosecutor said on Friday (Saturday AEDT). The Omani co-pilot planned to crash the plane into the passenger terminal at Tel Aviv airport to kill the most number of people in a September 11 style plot, UAE Attorney-General Hamad Saif Al Shamsi revealed. The co-pilot told investigators he had acted alone, the attorney-general said.
Omani pilot Hamam al-Hammami is accused of attacking his colleague on a flydubai flight to Israel. LinkedIn UAE investigators have spent the past week interrogating the co-pilot, who multiple media outlets citing sources close to the investigation have named as Hamam al-Hammami, after the alleged terror attack was foiled by brave passengers onboard Flydubai flight 1073 on September 30. The details offered by Al-Shamsi are the most comprehensive official account of the failed attack. They are based on al-Hammami’s detailed confession, according to UAE state media outlet WAM, which first published the attorney-general’s update. Al-Hammami had been issued a student visa and studied engineering at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology between 2015 and 2017. It was cancelled as a matter of process in 2019 after checks found he had left the country.
Al-Hammami ‘psychologically and physically’ prepared.
In an article published by WAM, Al Shamsi said investigators had traced the ideological and professional background of the 29-year-old co-pilot, finding that “his drift towards extremism and terrorism first emerged in 2017” while he was studying in Australia.
He was alleged during this period to have taken an interest in terrorism, including reading extremist literature and following online content that glorified terrorist organisations and suicide attacks. “This influence subsequently developed into the adoption of ideas advocating violence and terrorism,” WAM reported. “He also drew inspiration from the 11 September 2001 attacks, and the idea of carrying out a similar operation using an aircraft became firmly established in his thinking. According to his confession, this was linked to his decision to pursue a career in aviation.
“He also said that he prepared himself both psychologically and physically to carry out the plot by intensifying his exposure to material promoting terrorism and training in boxing under a private coach.”
The Australian Federal Police has confirmed it and the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation have been looking at al-Hammami’s time in Australia. The WAM report said al-Hammami had admitted to attending a mosque affiliated with the university, where he met individuals associated with an Islamic spiritual centre.
The spiritual centre, according to al-Hammami, had received support from an association linked to the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist organisation which some countries including the US and Gulf nations have deemed a terrorist group or banned but which remains legal in Australia.
The WAM report offered no further elaboration, including whether al-Hammami had maintained ties to individuals or groups in Melbourne or whether it was at the centre he was radicalised, or whether there was any involvement in his plot.
The WAM report said al-Hammami had twice before flown to Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport to familiarise himself with the flight route and airport before carrying out the attack on his third flight. The co-pilot tried to carry out a “premeditated terrorist plot to seize control of the aircraft and use it to launch a suicide attack targeting the passenger terminal at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, with the aim of causing the greatest possible loss of life”, WAM said. Investigators have also confirmed the man’s work history with several airlines. The investigation found he had met the security and professional requirements when Flydubai recruited him but none of this process uncovered signs of his extremist views or desire to conduct a terror attack.
News reports said a previous employer, Oman Air, had banned al-Hammami from the cockpit as his extremist views became known.
Al-Hammami is alleged to have attacked Indian pilot Smit Machchhar with an emergency axe in the cockpit before putting the plane, which had about 170 mostly Israeli passengers onboard into a rapid nosedive, breaking off its rudder. Despite being badly wounded Machchhar managed to unlock the cockpit door, allowing several Israeli passengers to storm into the cockpit and restrain al-Hammami and regain control of the aircraft. Two off-duty pilots onboard managed to perform an emergency landing at a Saudi Arabian airport. The captain and the passengers have been hailed as heroes for foiling the suicide attack.
Al-Hammami’s lawyer had been present during the interrogation and his legal rights safeguarded while he was in Emirati custody, the WAM article said. He is yet to be charged.
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FlyDubai co-pilot planned 9/11-style attack on Israel’s main airport, UAE says Hamam al-Hammami, a 29-year-old Omani national, intended to cause “the greatest possible number of human casualties,” the Emirati attorney general said.
October 9, 2026
256
A backup plane carries passengers to Ben-Gurion International Airport near Tel Aviv after a co-pilot attempted to commandeer their initial flight, according to authorities. (Ammar Awad/Reuters) Middle East Chevron right 5 min
256 More article actions
By Matthew Hay Brown The FlyDubai co-pilot who is accused of attacking his pilot with an ax and attempting to take over their Israel-bound commercial flight last week planned to crash the aircraft into the passenger terminal at Ben-Gurion International Airport, the United Arab Emirates says.
The co-pilot, who has been identified as 29-year-old Omani national Hamam al-Hammami, took inspiration from the al-Qaeda attacks of 9/11, Emirati Attorney General Hamad Saif al-Shamsi said Friday, according to the state-run Emirates News Agency. He had used two previous flights to scout the route and the airport, Shamsi said.
Shamsi’s report, which alleges Hammami underwent a decade-long process of radicalization, raises new questions about how he managed to elude FlyDubai’s screening measures. Investigators found that Hammadi “met the professional and security employment requirements” at the state-owned airline, Shamsi said, “without any indications appearing during those procedures that reveal his extremist tendencies or his intention to carry out a terrorist plot.”
Passengers on board FlyDubai Flight 1073 on Sept. 30 say Hammami struck the pilot with a crash ax, an emergency tool kept in the cockpit, and sent the Boeing 737 Max 8 into a nosedive. Pilot Smit Machchhar suffered life-threatening head injuries but managed to open the cockpit door, allowing passengers to subdue Hammami. Two pilots who were on board to fly the return trip then landed the aircraft safely in Saudi Arabia.
Israeli authorities did not respond immediately to a request for comment Friday. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said last week that Hammami had undergone “Islamic radical indoctrination” and was “suicidal.” A spokesman for Netanyahu described Hammami as “radicalized.”
“He talks on his social media about killing Jews,” spokesman Doron Spielman told The Washington Post. “So it’s very clear he had the intent and the motive to kill Jews before.”
Most of the roughly 180 people on board the flight from Dubai International Airport were Israelis, authorities have said.
Shamsi, the Emirati attorney general, said Hammami, “in the presence of his lawyer and with all the legal guarantees provided to him, gave a detailed confession of his motives and the stages of planning and execution,” the Emirates News Agency reported.
Hammami told investigators he acted alone, Shamsi said. They’re working to verify the claim. They have also taken statements from Machchhar, an Indian national, now recovering in an Abu Dhabi hospital, the other pilots and members of the crew, Shamsi said.
Shamsi said Hammami “had begun to implement a pre-prepared terrorist plan aimed at controlling the plane and using it to carry out a suicide operation” on the Ben-Gurion passenger terminal “with the intention of causing the greatest possible number of human casualties,” the news agency reported.
Signs of Hammami’s “inclination towards extremism and terrorism” began appearing in 2017, Shamsi said, when he was studying at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia, the news agency reported.
He read “extremist writings,” followed content that “glorifies terrorist organizations and suicide operations” and was influenced by Takfirism, which advocates killing Muslim apostates, Shamsi said.
Drawing on the 9/11 attacks, Shamsi said, Hammami pursued a career in aviation that took him from Oman Air to Royal Air Maroc and, in January, to FlyDubai.
Hammami was “dismissed” from Oman Air, Yossi Avraham Shelley, Israel’s ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, told The Washington Post last week, and subsequently departed Royal Air Maroc.
At Oman Air, a person familiar with the matter told The Post, Hammami was blocked from flying plans because he held radical views. He was assigned to a desk job and resigned, according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing investigation. The person did not detail the views.
The employment requirements that Hammami met at FlyDubai included holding a pilot’s license and a certificate of good conduct, and achieving satisfactory examination results, Shamsi said.
Hammami prepared himself psychologically and physically for the attack by “intensifying his monitoring of materials that incite terrorism, and by training in boxing under the supervision of a private trainer,” Shamsi said.
Machchhar is responding well to treatment, the Indian Foreign Ministry said Wednesday. Hammami remains in Emirati custody.
Interesting that he was radicalised in a western country. The UAE monitors what goes on inside its mosques
Australia...same country that allowed hundreds of Nazi war criminals to immigrate to the country after WWII, and the fact was hidden for years. And it didn’t stop with just the Nazis. Australia has continued to take plenty other criminals from other wars and shady governments.
If you checkout these mosques in the West, just like the linked 1993 bombing here in the US, it’s usually by immigrants, so is this “Abu hamza” in Australia = by an Arab from Lebanon...
Melbourne Forward Operating Base for Islam. Shut every one of these barracks down in every country. Who allows foreign enemies to set up operations inside their civilization?
Qhatever happened to the Australia that banned Mooselimb immigration?
Religion and politics aside, THAT is at the top of the list for a sociopath's, criminal mentality
His functioning inside of the society and 'in our face' says more about our society than it does about HIS metal problems!
Their Deep State happened.
People in the West are so soft and historically ignorant.
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