Smoking passenger forces El Al flight to make unscheduled landing

An El Al flight taking off from Ben Gurion International Airport had to make an unscheduled landing on Sunday to offload an unruly passenger. Flight LY2323 to Berlin touched down in Athens, Greece, after the passenger in question was found smoking on board.

According to Ynet, the Polish passenger was smoking in the plane’s lavatory and began cursing and yelling when confronted by airline staff. One passenger on the flight told the Israeli news site that the unnamed passenger was apparently drunk during the incident. After the plane was diverted to Athens, local police took the man in for questioning.

In early October, three Israelis were detained in Moldova after being arrested while boarding a plane bound for Tel Aviv. While boarding a connecting flight in Chișinău, a flight attendant asked the youngest of the group, a 17-year-old, to stop smoking. The flight attendant said that another passenger interrupted the conversation and physically attacked her.

A partial video of the incident broadcast by Channel 13 showed passengers scuffling with security personnel on the aircraft and screaming, “Nazi, Nazi.”

Several weeks later, an Israeli man was removed from a plane after demanding to be seated near his son.

In 2015, a video of several Israeli airline passengers browbeating a flight attendant over a chocolate bar went viral.