Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated to CBS News that the motive of the co-pilot accused of stabbing his fellow pilot on a passenger jet bound from Dubai to Tel Aviv is still unknown.
Page A4From§Eachthe milkman edition — 1 October 2026
Netanyahu says motive unknown, not too early to blame Iran or credit a hero.
As it ran on the front
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told CBS News he didn't think the FlyDubai cockpit stabbing was a hijacking. The co-pilot had allegedly stabbed the pilot; the plane dropped 13,000 feet in a minute; the reason was not yet known.
By Thursday the uncertainty had split into two certainties, told to two outlets the same day. To CBS, Netanyahu said it was still too early to determine the co-pilot's motive. To the New York Post, the same day, he vowed to find out if Iran was behind the attack. The black box had not been read. The not-knowing and the suspect arrived from the same mouth within hours of each other.…
…(cont) The passenger got his credit before investigators got their answer. Fox News ran that Netanyahu praised the "heroic bystander" who stormed the cockpit and stopped "another 9/11." The Post ran the same day that the hero was a heroic Israeli plumber, the same phrase attached — "another 9/11," the one hijacking that already comes with a motive built in. Neither outlet named him. A nationality got kept; a name got withheld; a reference point got supplied.
This is not the first week Netanyahu has had an answer ready before the facts arrived. On Sept.
And this is not the first week Netanyahu's timeline — what he knew, and when — has been the actual news. On Sept. 9 he sent Haaretz a libel warning over its reporting that he had been explicitly warned, before the Oct. 7, 2023, attack, that one was coming. Haaretz said it stands by the story. That dispute isn't about a cockpit. It's the same question, asked of the same man, twice in one month: what did you know, and when did you decide to say so.
By Thursday afternoon the position had a shape: ignorance about the co-pilot, certainty about Iran, credit handed to the passenger, and a lawsuit pending over who gets to ask what Netanyahu knew about the last disaster before anyone asks him about this one. The motive is still listed as unknown. Everything else about it has already been decided.
“He tells CBS it's too early to know, then tells the New York Post the same day he already knows it's Iran — that's not an investigation, that's a press release with a delay switch on it. Notice who gets named and who doesn't: the hero's nationality gets kept, his name gets dropped, and the suspect's whole country gets named before the black box is even open. Call it what it is — a verdict with a connecting flight.”
“Look, the Prime Minister is simply being careful here — he told CBS himself it's too early to determine a motive, that's exactly the restraint you want from a leader in a crisis. And yes, he also told the Post the same day he'd find out if Iran was behind it, but that's not prejudging the investigation, that's just — okay, that is prejudging the investigation. He's entitled to praise a hero while the facts are still pending, heroes don't wait on black boxes, nobody has to wait for — wait, isn't waiting for the black box sort of the whole point of an investigation?”
The receipts
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised the heroic passenger who stormed the cockpit as the FlyDubai plane plunged 13,000 feet in one minute.
A FlyDubai flight headed for Israel made an emergency landing on Wednesday after one of the pilots allegedly stabbed the other. Tony Dokoupil spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday to discuss the incident.
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This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.