Amid the tense international situation over the Gaza war, a mob stormed the terminal and runway of Makhachkala airport on Sunday, where a Russian airline Red Wing plane from Tel Aviv had landed on its way to Moscow.
Some rioters carried Palestinian flags or shouted “Allahu Akbar,” while others apparently checked passengers’ IDs in search of Israeli citizens. It was initially unclear what became of the occupants of the Red Wing plane.
Dagestan Governor Sergei Melikov said those responsible for the riots would be punished. According to his Interior Ministry, 150 participants had been identified and 60 of them arrested as of Monday. The search for others involved is ongoing.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the incident was “largely the result of outside influence.” This also included “information from outside”. In view of the television images of the “horrors in the Gaza Strip,” it is easy for “malicious people” to stir up people and incite them to take action.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova described the riots as the “result of a planned and externally controlled provocation.” Kiev played a “direct and decisive role” in this.
According to his spokesman Peskov, President Vladimir Putin will speak in the evening with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, his spy chiefs and other advisers about the “attempts of the West” to “use the events in the Middle East to divide Russian society.” Russia often blames foreign influence for unrest at home.
Dagestan’s governor Melkov, for his part, blamed “enemies” of his government for the storming of the airport. The riot was incited by posts from the Telegram channel Utro Dagestan, which operates from Ukrainian territory, Melkov said. The channel had on Sunday forwarded a call for a mass gathering at the airport to prevent the arrival of “unwanted passengers”.
Similar to Chechnya, the population in Dagestan is predominantly Muslim. In Chechnya, Information Minister Akhmed Dudayev called for calm on Sunday in view of increasing anti-Israeli tensions. The Russian news agency Ria-Novosti simultaneously reported another attack on a Jewish center in the Caucasus republic of Kabardino-Balkaria.
After the incident in Dagestan, Israel called on Russia to protect its citizens and all people of Jewish faith. Washington condemned the “anti-Semitic protests” in Dagestan.
The Central Council of Jews in Germany pointed to Israeli media reports that “paradoxically” there were mostly Russian citizens on the plane from Tel Aviv who were returning from medical treatment. “Nothing can better unmask the Islamists’ hatred of Jews than through reality,” declared the Central Council.
According to the President of the Central Council Josef Schuster, the incident shows at the same time “that we are dealing with an ideology that knows no boundaries.” “The Islamists are not concerned with Israel, they are concerned with Jews.”
In Dagestan, too, there is “a network of fanatical Islamists who have incited people,” Schuster continued. He demanded that “everything be done to ensure that these radicals in Germany have no opportunity to spread their hatred.”
