Israeli papers turn the flydubai cockpit attack into an accountability story three weeks before the vote

The flight was forced into an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday 30 September after what CBS News described as a violent attempt by the co-pilot to seize control of the aircraft and crash it. Saudi authorities said two crew members were hospitalised with unspecified injuries and the co-pilot remained in custody the following day; the suspect was subsequently transferred to the UAE. The wounded captain, Indian pilot Smit Machchhar, was moved to Abu Dhabi for continued medical attention, India said. Benjamin Netanyahu put 174 people on board. Beyond that, the accounts diverge: CBS reported that the co-pilot stabbed the captain, while NBC News led with the pilot stabbing his co-pilot — both sourcing the same Israeli prime minister within twenty-four hours of each other.

Netanyahu has filled the evidentiary gap himself. On CBS Evening News he said: “I don’t think it was a hijacking. It looks like a suicide attempt, simply because of what this hero, Yaniv, has described” — passenger Yaniv Hayun. On the weapon he told CNN the attacker “might have gotten an ax from the equipment that might be standard on this aeroplane.” He has also said the co-pilot underwent “Islamist radical indoctrination,” though as of CBS’s 2 October report the man had not been publicly identified and questions about motive continued to swirl. Donald Trump said on 1 October that Iran would be hit “very hard” if it were behind the attack. No outlet has presented evidence of Iranian involvement. Times of Israel’s 1 October liveblog called him “the Omani copilot” before the US networks named a nationality at all.

Assessment: Watch the direction of travel in the Hebrew-language and Israeli English press: within four days the story stopped being about a cockpit and became about who was supposed to be checking foreign aircrews. Times of Israel’s 5 October front page — “Regev passes buck on probing pilots” — and the Jerusalem Post’s opinion line about a “deep accountability crisis” are election copy as much as aviation copy, twenty-two days out. Distrust three things: a head of government narrating physical evidence in an investigation run by Saudi and Emirati authorities; a motive asserted before an identity is published; and the “said to be” constructions carrying the Transportation Ministry’s supposed crackdown, which no minister has announced on the record.