'Hero' Pilot Successfully Lands Routine Flight From Abu Dhabi to Qatar

What a contrast to Indian captain Smit Machchhar, who two days earlier was flying a Flydubai Boeing 737 from Dubai to Tel Aviv when his islamist co-pilot stabbed him in the cockpit and tried to bring down the aircraft carrying 174 people.

The co-pilot has not been named. He is an Omani national. He is rumored to have been through Islamist radical indoctrination. His social media talked about killing Jews. A colleague called him a religious extremist who prayed through the day and would not shake hands with women.

Machchhar, seriously wounded, fought back and managed to open the cockpit door, allowing passengers and crew to intervene before other pilots eventually brought the aircraft down safely. He is now recovering in a hospital in Saudi Arabia.

Naturally, this made him a “hero.”

Narendra Modi, Benjamin Netanyahu, Donald Trump and actually every human being with a brain skipped the quotation marks and is hoping for his quick recovery.

Some European media like the German Tagesschau or the British BBC, of course, could not quite bring themselves to do that. A man gets stabbed in a cockpit, fights back, helps save 174 people and still receives the full journalistic hazmat treatment.

The plane was full of Israelis, flying to Israel, so naturally the Indian pilot’s story could not remain the Indian pilot’s story for very long. The internet needs it to be a "false flag" about Benjamin Netanyahu and the upcoming Israeli elections.

Which brings us back to Captain Lars Hoffmann.

On Thursday, Lufthansa flight LH 1234 from Abu Dhabi to Doha landed in light rain, eight minutes late. Captain Hoffmann, 44, blond, from Hanover, reported no injuries and no diversions. He is being hailed as a hero.

"I just did my job," Hoffmann told Tagesschau. Colleagues described him as calm, professional, and the sort of man you want up front when the weather turns. A childhood photo from his gliding club in Lower Saxony has already been published. His mother said she was proud. Congratulations!