A day after a flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv was thrown into chaos, US President Donald Trump has hinted that Iran may have a link to the flydubai incident, saying the answer is “yes” based on what he is hearing, though checks are still under way.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was asked about the same issue in an interview with Fox News on Thursday. Trump was asked by a reporter whether anyone had briefed him on a possible link between the flydubai attacker and Iran. “We’re working on that right now. We’ll be very open with it. There has been no official evidence of Iranian involvement yet. Netanyahu did say the co-pilot had gone through Islamist radicalisation. He added that this appeared to come from the man’s personal information. So far, no motive has been determined. International investigators are trying to understand why he allegedly attacked the captain and tried to take control of the plane.
He said his team was looking into it. Uh, I would say the answer based on what I’m hearing is yes, but we’re working on it right now,” Trump said. He said it was not yet possible to link the co-pilot to Iran or anyone else. “I think it’s too early to say whether he had any connections with Iran or with anyone else,” he said. He told “Fox & Friends” that he would be able to say within a matter of days whether there were any such links. “We know that he underwent Islamist radical indoctrination,” he said. “That appears to be something we’re gathering from his personal information,” he said. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar told NDTV that the co-pilot was an Omani national, but he has not yet been publicly identified. The UAE said it is looking into whether the violence was linked to “terrorist activity.”
