At least a dozen Israelis were among the passengers on a flight Wednesday morning that was forced to make an emergency landing in Malaysia.
The flight, Emirates 354, was en route to Singapore from Dubai when severe weather conditions forced the pilot to make an unscheduled stop in the Muslim-majority nation.
The passengers were not required to disembark while on Malaysian soil. The airliner resumed its flight to Singapore five hours later.
A Brief Dilemma
Israel does not have diplomatic relations with Malaysia, which complicated Israel’s ability to monitor the situation.
Israel’s Foreign Ministry kept tabs on what was happening by staying in contact with one of the Israelis aboard the flight.
“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs continues to act for the benefit of Israeli citizens in exceptional cases like this,” Foreign Minister Eli Cohen said in a statement. “From the moment we received word of the incident, I instructed the director-general of the ministry, Ronan Levy, to act to resolve the incident and make sure that all Israelis were safe.”
Levy conducted situation assessments with the ministry’s department for Israelis abroad and with the Israeli diplomatic missions in Dubai and Singapore.
