Surface to Air Missiles in Canada?
by John Thompson
11/03/03
On October 23rd, a regular El Al flight from Israel to Toronto had to divert, first to Montreal and finally to Hamilton, because of what our tight-lipped police called a "specific threat" against the aircraft and its passengers.
With an absence of facts about the incident, the media has turned to speculation about what the threat might have been, and how credible was it. There wasn’t much to go on, but…
For a start El Al has been a popular target for terrorist attacks for many years. One of the first aircraft hijackings where the passengers were used for hostages in a lengthy propaganda stunt by the terrorists was in July 1968, when Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine gunmen took over an El Al 707 and diverted it to Algeria. That was the last time an Israeli passenger liner was hijacked.
Terrorists have continued to view the Israeli national carrier as a prime target. An assorted group of Arab terrorists were arrested in Rome in 1973; as police raided their apartment close to Rome’s airport, they found a pair of SAM-7 launchers and missiles. In 1978, another Palestinian group shot up an El Al aircrew bus in London, killing one flight attendant. El Al aircrews are now closely guarded everywhere they go.
In December 1985, the Abu Nidal group simultaneously shot-up the passenger line-ups at El Al ticket counters in Rome and Vienna — killing 17 people and wounding 100; but four of the terrorists were subsequently killed by airport security and three more were captured. On July 4th 2002, a lone Muslim gunman pulled a pistol out at the El Al ticket line-up in Los Angeles International, and killed one passenger before being killed himself by security officers while simultaneously being tackled by other would-be victims.
On November 28th, 2002 two SAM-7 shoulder launched anti-aircraft missiles were fired at another El Al flight in Kenya (while a simultaneous truck bombing detonated outside a local hotel favored by Western and Israeli tourists). El Al has reportedly fitted some of its aircraft with a very expensive system that detected the missiles in the Kenya incident — which use a passive infrared seeker and betray no electronic signature as they fire. Other factors that prevented tragedy might have been the heat of the sun radiating off the hot runways (which can confuse older infrared warheads), and the age of the missiles themselves, as one was reported to have actually hit the plane and then bounced off without detonating.
After having received repeated threats to its aircraft across the world, any threat against El Al must be taken seriously — even in Canada.
Are there those in Canada who would attack an airliner? Yes there are, remember the Air India Bombing in 1985? 329 people on the Air India flight and two Japanese baggage handlers in Narita Airport died that day because of bombs placed aboard the flight in Toronto. Al Qaeda has a strong presence in Canada; Hamas, Hizbollah and Palestinian Islamic Jihad are also here. These groups would be delighted to down an El Al flight here. For that matter, al Qaeda and Hizbollah would be just as delighted to down an American flight, or an Australian, British or Canadian one if they could.
In an environment where baggage and passengers are screened for explosives and weapons, it seems unlikely that an El Al flight (nor any others) would be hijacked or bombed here. Attacks on emplaning or debarking passengers are always possible, but the attacking terrorists might find it difficult to survive their attack or escape afterwards. This leaves an attack on an aircraft on the tarmac with explosive weapons — such as an improvised mortar like the IRA used to fire into Heathrow — or with an anti-aircraft weapon used against an aircraft as it takes off or lands.
It would be no great trick for Hizbollah or al Qaeda terrorists to acquire heavy .50 calibre machineguns on the black market inside North America — Outlaw Motorcycle Bike gangs and the Mohawk Warrior’s Society have acquired these weapons too. However, these are not ideal for attacking aircraft, especially as they are fast targets even when landing, the range from the edge of an airport to the runway is a long one for small arms, and the damage — while potentially lethal — would probably be slight. This leaves man portable missiles such as the SAM-7 as the more likely agents of attack.
A missile attack in Canada? One may well have been planned for last week. We can ignore this recent threat, but we may found out how valid this threat is someday… let’s just hope we don’t find out the hard way.
John Thompson is President of the Mackenzie Institute which studies political instability and terrorism. He can be reached at: mackenzieinstitute@bellnet.ca
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