Wounded FlyDubai captain recounts fight to save passengers, and other Mideast developments

The Indian airline captain who helped avert an apparent attempt to crash a FlyDubai flight said in a live video call that he knew he had to get back on his feet to save passengers after being stabbed by his copilot.

Meanwhile, a Palestinian citizen who was running in Israel’s upcoming election is withdrawing his candidacy following comments over Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel.

Here is the latest news from the Middle East on Friday. Full coverage is available here.

Wounded captain says he had to get back on feet to save passengers

The FlyDubai captain told Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that he knew he had to regain control to save everyone on board, after he was stabbed by his copilot and the aircraft plunged into a steep descent.

“I had so many wounds. I had fallen down,” Capt. Smit Machchhar said in the video call that was broadcast live from a hospital in Abu Dhabi. “I was fighting for my life. At one point I realized that if I didn’t get up … then passengers would lose their lives.”

Machchhar was seriously injured in Wednesday’s attack but managed to open the cockpit door, allowing passengers to enter and restrain the attacker as the Boeing 737 descended sharply, witnesses and Israeli authorities said.

The flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv, with 182 people on board, was diverted to Tabuk in northwestern Saudi Arabia for an emergency landing.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the attacker, an Omani national, was arrested in Saudi Arabia and was undergoing interrogation there. His motive for the attack was not immediately clear.

Israel was set to begin repatriation flights to bring back passengers stranded in the United Arab Emirates after commercial travel between the two countries was suspended following the attack.

— More coverage on the attempt to crash the plane is available here.

Palestinian running in Israel’s upcoming election withdraws candidacy

Sami Abou Shehadeh, the chairman of the left-wing Balad party, said he would withdraw from Israel’s upcoming election after the country’s Supreme Court president said a majority of justices were prepared to uphold his disqualification.

Abou Shehadeh’s candidacy was challenged over an editorial he wrote in the newspaper Al-Araby al-Jadeed the day after Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel. The article did not condemn Hamas and argued that, given conditions in Gaza, it was surprising violence hadn’t erupted earlier.

In a subsequent article, Abou Shehadeh, a former member of Israel’s Knesset, called Hamas’ attack both unacceptable and a crime. He said he hadn’t known the scale of the violence when he wrote the first.

The court weighed whether his remarks violated an Israeli law barring candidates who reject Israel’s existence, incite racism or support armed struggle against Israel. His lawyers said that barring him would reinterpret the law and create a new threshold.

For Abou Shehadeh, who was running on the Arab parties’ Joint List, withdrawing avoids a court precedent that could be used to disqualify Palestinian candidates in future Israeli elections, his party said.

About 20% of Israel’s citizens are of Palestinian descent.

Egypt expels Ethiopian diplomat in tit-for-tat move

Egypt has expelled a diplomat from the Ethiopian Embassy in Cairo in a reciprocal move after Addis Ababa declared an Egyptian diplomat there unwelcome, Egyptian state media reported, marking a further escalation in tensions between the two countries.

Egypt’s al-Qahera News said Egypt declared a councilor at the Ethiopian Embassy persona non grata, giving him 48 hours to leave the country. On Thursday, Ethiopia ordered an Egyptian Embassy staff to leave the country, according to al-Qahera.

Tensions between Ethiopia and Egypt have recently intensified after Ethiopia accused Egypt of supporting rebel forces in renewed fighting in the Tigray region. At the heart of their longstanding tensions is the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, or GERD, which aims to double Ethiopia’s electricity-generating capacity. However, Egypt fears it could significantly reduce Nile water flows.

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This report will be updated throughout the day as new developments emerge.