Australia has launched an investigation after reports claimed that the flydubai co-pilot — who tried to hijack an Israel-bound flight — spent two years in the country as a student.
The co-pilot, identified as Hamam al-Hammami from Oman, attacked the captain of the flydubai flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv on Wednesday.
The second post featured an AI-generated image depicting Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem, which are Islam’s three holiest sites. al-Hammami attacked the pilot, Captain Smit Machchhar from India, with an axe during the flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv on Wednesday morning. Hamam al-Hammami was reportedly born in the UAE to an Omani father and Syrian mother. He was later hired by UAE-based airline flydubai. There was no immediate comment Saturday from Israel’s government. No other details were immediately known about his background. His Instagram account was active until the day of the flight and then deleted.
He left Australia in 2017, and his visa was cancelled in 2019 after authorities confirmed he was no longer enrolled in the course, the source said. As per reports, he worked at Oman Air for seven years before leaving in February 2025. He then reportedly joined Morocco’s national carrier Royal Air Maroc in June 2025 and left in January this year. He also reportedly completed a three-year distance-learning course and graduated with a degree in aviation management from the Buckinghamshire New University in UK in 2023. The first made was a video which ended with a photo of Ayman al-Zawahiri, who led al Qaeda after the death of Osama Bin Laden, and a photo of Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, who killed nine people, including seven American CIA officers and contractors, in a 2009 suicide bombing in Afghanistan. Captain Machchhar said he somehow managed to open the cockpit door, following which passengers overpowered the co-pilot as the Boeing 737 plunged nearly 14,000 feet in less than 30 seconds. A second pair of flydubai pilots aboard the flight — which was carrying over 170 passengers and crew — then landed the jet safely in Saudi Arabia’s Tabuk.
The co-pilot, identified as 29-year-old Hamam al-Hammami from Oman, attacked the captain of the flydubai flight from Dubai to Tel Aviv on Wednesday, with the United Arab Emirates, which is leading the investigation, calling it a “terrorist attack”. al-Hammami was granted an Australian student visa in 2014, before arriving in the country to commence a university course the following year, British newspaper The Guardian reported, citing a source familiar with the case. Royal Air Maroc said he “completed a three-month theoretical training period with the airline in 2025, as part of the pre-employment process”. “At the end of this training period, his application was not selected for employment,” it said in a statement to the news agency The Associated Press. A spokesperson for Buckinghamshire New University told the news agency The Associated Press that al-Hammami completed a distance-learning course in aviation management there but “did not undertake any pilot training”. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday said he had undergone “Islamist radicalization”.
Hamam al-Hammami was earlier barred from flying by Oman over concerns that he had adopted extremist views, and moved to an administrative job at Oman Air.
