Lee Heidhues 10.29.2023
The unbridled passions unleashed by the Hamas terror attack inside Israel and the relentless response by Israel has turned the world upside down.
The ferocious anger being displayed by people in the Arab world has now reached Russia’s Dagestan region. A predominantly Muslim region.
Excerpted from Arab News 10.29.2023
MOSCOW: Hundreds of people stormed into the main airport in Russia’s Dagestan region and onto the landing field Sunday, chanting antisemitic slogans and seeking passengers arriving on a flight from Tel Aviv, Israel, Russian news agencies and social media reported.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagestan
Russian news reports said the crowd surrounded the airliner, which belonged to Russian carrier Red Wings. The website Flightradar indicated that a Red Wings flight out of Tel Aviv had landed at Makhachkala at 7:00 p.m. (1600 GMT).
Red Wings Airlines is owned by Ilyushin Finance, itself a subsidiary of the Russian government’s UAC United Aircraft Corporation holdings. It is one of the 10 largest airlines in Russia.
The independent Russian media outlet Sota said it was a transiting flight that had been due to take off again for Moscow two hours later.
Authorities closed the airport in Makhachkala, the capital of the predominantly Muslim region, and police converged on the facility. Dagestan’s Ministry of Health said more than 20 people were injured, with two in critical condition. It said the injured included police officers and civilians.
Russia’s civilian aviation agency, Rosaviatsia, later reported that the airfield had been cleared, but that the airport would remain closed to incoming aircraft until Nov. 6.
Video on social media showed some in the crowd waving Palestinian flags and others trying to overturn a police car. Antisemitic slogans can be heard being shouted and some in the crowd examined the passports of arriving passengers, apparently in an attempt to identify those who were Israeli.
Other videos showed a crowd inside an airport terminal trying to break down doors as staff members tried to deter them.
Dagestan and Chechnya are both mainly Muslim areas — known in Russia as “republics” — in a region that has witnessed years of violent tension with the central Russian authorities.
Earlier on Sunday, the RIA Novosti news agency reported that a Jewish center in another North Caucasus republic — Kabardino-Balkaria — had been set on fire in the city of Nalchik.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, expressing concern at the “appalling” videos posted on social media, said on X, formerly Twitter, that it was not an isolated incident. It was, he said, “part of Russia’s widespread culture of hatred toward other nations, which is propagated by state television, pundits and authorities.”
In a statement released Sunday night, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Israel “expects the Russian law enforcement authorities to protect the safety of all Israeli citizens and Jews wherever they may be and to act resolutely against the rioters and against the wild incitement directed against Jews and Israelis.” Netanyahu’s office added that the Israeli ambassador to Russia was working with Russia to keep Israelis and Jews safe.
Dagestan is Russia’s southernmost territory and one of its poorest regions.
It has taken an active part in the Ukraine offensive — with independent reports showing it has sent proportionally more men to Ukraine than many more ethnically Russian regions.
Lee's Perspective 