New Delhi: The Omani co-pilot of the Flydubai flight had previously been removed from flying duties at Oman’s national airline after concerns were raised about his ideological views, a Wall Street Journal report Saturday revealed.
Despite that, the pilot, identified as Hamam al-Hammami, was employed by Flydubai. Hammami had previously worked for Oman Air and had been removed from flight training last year after concerns about what the airline described as radical ideological views, according to the report.
A LinkedIn profile in Hammami’s name said he had worked at Oman Air for seven years, leaving in February 2025. It listed a subsequent position at Royal Air Maroc, where he worked from June 2025 until January 2026. The profile did not mention Flydubai, CNN reported. The profile has since been deleted. Omani authorities are yet to release a report.
According to CNN’s investigation, the LinkedIn profile contained only two posts, both uploaded in quick succession Wednesday, around nine hours after the incident. One post contained a series of cockpit videos filmed aboard a Boeing 737 Max aircraft. The aircraft involved in Wednesday’s incident was a 737 Max 8.
One clip, which investigators were able to locate as shot at Dubai International Airport, showed an aircraft operated by El Al, Israel’s national airline.
The video ended with images of Ayman al-Zawahiri, the former leader of Al Qaeda, and Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, who carried out a 2009 suicide bombing in Afghanistan that killed nine people, including seven American intelligence personnel.
A second post showed an AI image of Islam’s three holiest sites—Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem—connected by a glowing trail. A poem accompanying the image spoke of rejecting humiliation, refusing to fear death and defending personal dignity.
The same videos were also posted around the same time to an Instagram account bearing Hammami’s name and photographs. That account was later deleted.
CNN said it analysed nearly 3,000 deleted posts using an AI semantic search system. Hammami’s deleted Twitter account, in posts published between 2021 and 2022, described him as deeply religious and expressed strongly conservative views about women, marriage and workplaces, the investigation further found.
The case has also raised other questions about the Omani pilot. Flydubai, according to a Jerusalem Post report, has an explicit clause stating that all its pilots must be from countries that have normalised relations with Israel. Oman does not have diplomatic relations with Israel.
Israeli authorities have asked internal security and counterintelligence service Shin Bet to look into how an Omani was co-piloting the aircraft.
The Israeli government has described the episode as a suspected terrorist attack and is investigating whether the pilot acted alone or was connected to a broader network.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Wednesday said the suspect was believed to have undergone “Islamist radical indoctrination”. An Israeli official Thursday added that the initial assessment was that the co-pilot had intended to crash the aircraft with its passengers aboard.
The UAE attorney general has also opened an investigation into whether the attack was connected to terrorist activity and whether it involved advance planning or outside direction, according to the state news agency WAM.
The UAE has jurisdiction because the aircraft is registered there, and Emirati law applies to crimes committed aboard its aircraft even when they occur outside the country, the report added.
Netanyahu said the suspect had been interrogated in Saudi Arabia, where the plane landed after the attack, and that Israel was participating in the investigation.
Flydubai flights between Dubai and Tel Aviv remain suspended.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)
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