IT was 50 years ago today that the world’s first major terrorist hijacking of a passenger aircraft took place.
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PLFP) hijacked an El Al flight from Rome to Tel Aviv on July 23, 1968. El Al was and remains the flag-carrying airline of Israel, but the PFLP was not then an Islamic group, rather it was a secular Marxist-Leninist revolutionary cadre.
There had been many ‘skyjackings’ before, with the first ‘mass’ hijacking of a passenger plane dating back to 1950 when three pilots of the Czechoslovakia Air Force flew their Douglas DC-3s to West Germany and sought asylum, with some 26 of the 85 passengers also joining them in fleeing from the Communist state.
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WHO WERE THE TERRORISTS?
WHAT made the PFLP’s hijacking different was that it was done to promote the Palestinian cause and free Palestinian prisoners in Israel.
The organisation had been formed from three Palestinian groups after the Israeli success in the Six Day War in 1967. Avowedly a Palestinian nationalist resistance group led by George Habash, by mid-1968 the PFLP claimed to have 2000 guerillas trained by the Syrian army, and was looking to promote the Palestinian cause after the Israeli occupation of their territory which, among other things, displaced 300,000 people from their homes.
WHAT HAPPENED?
ON July 22, a Boeing 707 El Al jet travelled from London to Rome and was due to fly on to Israel.
The original aircraft developed a fault and a replacement finally managed to take-off in the early hours of the following morning. There were just 38 passengers, including some El Al staff returning to Tel Aviv, plus a crew of 10.
The crew in the cockpit was chief pilot Oded Abarbanell, flight engineer Yonah Lichtman, training pilot Avner Slapak and first officer Maoz Poraz.
Soon after the aircraft took off and was over the Neapolitan coast, two of the hijackers burst into the cockpit and one clubbed a pilot with his pistol and took command, while the other two threatened the passengers with guns and grenades.
The plane was diverted to Algiers as the hijackers had been instructed. The Algerian authorities immediately impounded the aircraft and the passengers and crew were taken off the jet and held, though for the 23 non-Israeli passengers their captivity was short as they were able to return to Rome on July 24 aboard an Algerian plane.
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It is important to note that Israel and Algeria were formally still at war following the Six Day War and the crew technically became prisoners of war. On July 27, the 10 remaining female passengers and crew were freed, leaving a dozen men, five passengers and seven crew as hostages.
There then ensued a long and fraught negotiation between Israel and Algeria.
HOW DID IT END?
PEACEFULLY. Though the Israeli government planned a raid to free the prisoners, a diplomatic end came after 39 days with all international airlines boycotting Algeria. In Israel, 16 Palestinian prisoners were released ‘on humanitarian grounds’ while the crew and passengers were able to return via Rome and the El Al jet was handed back to its owners.
WHAT EFFECT DID IT HAVE?
THE hijacking sparked a long spate of similar incidents and though the PFLP denied it was a terrorist group, hijacking of aircraft became associated with many terrorist atrocities. El Al introduced the world’s first baggage security checks and none of its aircraft have ever been successfully hijacked in the 50 years since.
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