Report: Terrorist who commanded notorious attack killed in Israeli bombing

A senior commander of a Palestinian terrorist group who carried out a deadly hang glider attack in 1987 was reportedly killed in an Israeli air strike in Syria. Was Israel settling an old score?

Abdelrahim Ahmed Atik, a senior commander in the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) terror group was killed over the weekend in Syria, reportedly in an Israeli air strike on the base where he was staying.

It is unclear if he was actually killed by Israel’s Air Force (IAF), and if so, if he was the target of the attack or if he was killed while warplanes were targeting something else.

The PFLP’s General Command confirmed Atik’s death in a pamphlet it published on Monday that confirmed the event happened on Saturday, but did not specify a location.

Israel reportedly carried out several strikes inside Syria over the weekend, although Israel has not officially commented on the attacks.

According to the PFLP-GC pamphlets, Atik took part in a number of attacks on the “Zionist enemy” and was the leader of the terror cell that carried out the infamous “Night of the Gliders” attack on November 25, 1987, in which an armed terrorist flew into northern Israel from Lebanon on a hang glider. The terrorist stormed an IDF military base near Kiryat Shmona. He murdered six IDF soldiers before he was shot dead.

Another terrorist on a hang glider landed inside Israel’s security zone, just north of the country, and was killed by IDF forces.

The PFLP fights along Basher al-Assad’s forces in the Syrian civil war.

By: World Israel News Staff