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Dawson's Field Hijackings
In September 1970, members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) hijacked four airliners bound for New York City and one for London. Three aircraft were forced to land at Dawson's Field, a remote desert airstrip near Zarqa, Jordan, formerly Royal Air Force Station Zarqa, which then became PFLP's "Revolutionary Airport". By the end of the incident, one hijacker had been killed and one injury reported. This was the second instance of mass aircraft hijacking, after an escape from communist Czechoslovakia in 1950. On 6 September, TWA Flight 741 from Frankfurt (a Boeing 707) and Swissair Flight 100 from Zürich (a Douglas DC-8) were forced to land at Dawson's Field.BBC News, "On This Day: 12 September". On the same day, the hijacking of El Al Flight 219 from Amsterdam (another 707) was foiled: hijacker Patrick Argüello was shot and killed, and his partner Leila Khaled was subdued and handed over to British authorities in London. Two PFLP hijackers, wh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black September In Jordan
Black September (), also known as the Jordanian Civil War, was an armed conflict between Jordan, led by King Hussein, and the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), led by chairman Yasser Arafat. The main phase of the fighting took place between 16 and 27 September 1970, though certain aspects of the conflict continued until 17 July 1971. After the 1967 Six-Day War, Palestinian fedayeen guerrillas relocated to Jordan and stepped up their attacks against Israel and what had become the Israeli-occupied West Bank. They were headquartered at the Jordanian border town of Karameh, which Israel targeted during the Battle of Karameh in 1968, leading to a surge of Arab support for the fedayeen. The PLO's strength grew, and by early 1970, leftist groups within the PLO began calling for the overthrow of Jordan's Hashemite monarchy, leading to violent clashes in June 1970. Hussein hesitated to oust them from the country, but continued PLO activities in Jordan culminated in the Dawson ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frankfurt
Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the foreland of the Taunus on its namesake Main (river), Main, it forms a continuous conurbation with Offenbach am Main; Frankfurt Rhein-Main Regional Authority, its urban area has a population of over 2.7 million. The city is the heart of the larger Rhine-Main metropolitan region, which has a population of more than 5.8 million and is Germany's Metropolitan regions in Germany, second-largest metropolitan region after the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region, Rhine-Ruhr region and the List of EU metropolitan regions by GDP#2021 ranking of top four German metropolitan regions, fourth largest metropolitan region by GDP in the European Union (EU). Frankfurt is one of the ''de facto'' four main capitals of the European Union (alongside Brussels, Luxembourg Cit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kingdom Of Jordan
Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories to the west. The Jordan River, flowing into the Dead Sea, is located along the country's western border within the Jordan Rift Valley. Jordan has a small coastline along the Red Sea in its southwest, separated by the Gulf of Aqaba from Egypt. Amman is the country's capital and largest city, as well as the most populous city in the Levant. Inhabited by humans since the Paleolithic period, three kingdoms developed in Transjordan during the Iron Age: Ammon, Moab and Edom. In the third century BC, the Arab Nabataeans established their kingdom centered in Petra. The Greco-Roman period saw the establishment of several cities in Transjordan that comprised the Decapolis. Later, after the end of Byzantine rule, the region became p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amman
Amman ( , ; , ) is the capital and the largest city of Jordan, and the country's economic, political, and cultural center. With a population of four million as of 2021, Amman is Jordan's primate city and is the largest city in the Levant region, the fifth-largest city in the Arab world, and the tenth-largest metropolitan area in the Middle East. The earliest evidence of settlement in Amman dates to the 8th millennium BC in 'Ain Ghazal, home to the world's oldest statues of the human form. During the Iron Age, the city was known as ''Rabat Aman'', the capital of the Ammonite Kingdom. In the 3rd century BC, the city was renamed ''Philadelphia'' and became one of the ten Greco-Roman cities of the Decapolis. Later, in the 7th century AD, the Rashidun Caliphate renamed the city Amman. Throughout most of the Islamic era, the city alternated between periods of devastation and periods of relative prosperity. Amman was largely abandoned during the Ottoman period from the 15 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vickers VC10
The Vickers VC10 is a retired mid-sized, narrow-body long-range British jet airliner designed and built by Vickers-Armstrongs (Aircraft) Ltd and first flown at Brooklands, Surrey, in 1962. The VC10 is often compared to the larger Soviet Ilyushin Il-62, the two types being the only airliners to use a rear-engined quad layout, while the smaller Lockheed JetStar business jet also has this engine arrangement. The VC10 was designed to operate on long-distance routes from the shorter runways of the era and commanded excellent hot and high performance for operations from African airports. The performance of the VC10 was such that it achieved the fastest crossing of the Atlantic by a subsonic jet airliner of 5 hours and 1 minute, a record that was held for 41 years, until February 2020 when a British Airways Boeing 747 broke the record at 4 hours 56 minutes due to Storm Ciara. Only the supersonic Concorde was faster at 2 hours, 52 minutes, 59 seconds. Although only a relatively sm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cairo
Cairo ( ; , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Egypt and the Cairo Governorate, being home to more than 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, List of largest cities in the Arab world, the Arab world, and List of largest metropolitan areas of the Middle East, the Middle East. The Greater Cairo metropolitan area is List of largest cities, one of the largest in the world by population with over 22.1 million people. The area that would become Cairo was part of ancient Egypt, as the Giza pyramid complex and the ancient cities of Memphis, Egypt, Memphis and Heliopolis (ancient Egypt), Heliopolis are near-by. Located near the Nile Delta, the predecessor settlement was Fustat following the Muslim conquest of Egypt in 641 next to an existing ancient Roman empire, Roman fortress, Babylon Fortress, Babylon. Subsequently, Cairo was founded by the Fatimid Caliphate, Fatimid dynasty in 969. It ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Beirut
Beirut ( ; ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Lebanon. , Greater Beirut has a population of 2.5 million, just under half of Lebanon's population, which makes it the List of largest cities in the Levant region by population, fourth-largest city in the Levant region and the List of largest cities in the Arab world, sixteenth-largest in the Arab world. The city is situated on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean coast. Beirut has been inhabited for more than 5,000 years, making it one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world. Beirut is Lebanon's seat of government and plays a central role in the Economy of Lebanon, Lebanese economy, with many banks and corporations based in the city. Beirut is an important Port of Beirut, seaport for the country and region, and rated a Global City, Beta- World City by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network. Beirut was severely damaged by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Boeing 747
The Boeing 747 is a long-range wide-body aircraft, wide-body airliner designed and manufactured by Boeing Commercial Airplanes in the United States between 1968 and 2023. After the introduction of the Boeing 707, 707 in October 1958, Pan Am wanted a jet times its size, to reduce its seat cost by 30%. In 1965, Joe Sutter left the Boeing 737, 737 development program to design the 747. In April 1966, Pan Am ordered 25 Boeing 747-100 aircraft, and in late 1966, Pratt & Whitney agreed to develop the JT9D engine, a high-bypass turbofan. On September 30, 1968, the first 747 was rolled out of the custom-built Everett Plant, the world's List of largest buildings#Largest usable volume, largest building by volume. The 747's first flight took place on February 9, 1969, and the 747 was certified in December of that year. It entered service with Pan Am on January 22, 1970. The 747 was the first airplane called a "Jumbo Jet" as the first wide-body airliner. The 747 is a four-engined jet ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leila Khaled
Leila Khaled ( ; born April 9, 1944) is a Palestinian former militant and activist who was a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). She is famous as being the first woman to hijack an airplane. Khaled gained her prominence for her role in the TWA Flight 840 hijacking in 1969 and one of the four simultaneous Dawson's Field hijackings the following year as part of the campaign of Black September in Jordan. After being imprisoned, she was released in a prisoner exchange for civilian hostages kidnapped by other PFLP members. Early life Khaled was born on April 9, 1944, in Haifa, Mandatory Palestine, to Arab parents. Her family fled to Lebanon on April 13, 1948, as part of the 1948 Palestinian expulsion and flight, leaving her father behind. At the age of 15, following in the footsteps of her brother, she joined the pan-Arab Arab Nationalist Movement, originally established in the late-1940s by George Habash, then a medical student at the American U ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Region of Amsterdam, urban area and 2,480,394 in the Amsterdam metropolitan area, metropolitan area. Located in the Provinces of the Netherlands, Dutch province of North Holland, Amsterdam is colloquially referred to as the "Venice of the North", for its canals of Amsterdam, large number of canals, now a World Heritage Site, UNESCO World Heritage Site. Amsterdam was founded at the mouth of the Amstel River, which was dammed to control flooding. Originally a small fishing village in the 12th century, Amsterdam became a major world port during the Dutch Golden Age of the 17th century, when the Netherlands was an economic powerhouse. Amsterdam was the leading centre for finance and trade, as well as a hub of secular art production. In the 19th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Walter Dawson (RAF Officer)
Air chief marshal Sir Walter Lloyd Dawson, (6 May 1902 – 10 June 1994) was a senior commander in the Royal Air Force in the 1950s. He was the last RAF commander in Palestine, before the creation of the State of Israel. RAF career Dawson joined the Royal Air Force as a boy mechanic in 1919. He served in the Second World War on the air staff at RAF Middle East and then in the Directorate of Plans at the Air Ministry. He continued his war service as Station Commander at RAF St Eval from 1942, Director of Operations (Naval Co-operation) from 1943 and Director of Plans from 1944. After the war he was made Air Officer Commanding AHQ Levant at a difficult time when the State of Israel was being established. He was appointed Commandant of the School of Land/Air Warfare in 1948 and then served as Senior RAF Instructor at the Imperial Defence College from 1950 before becoming Assistant Chief of the Air Staff (Policy) in 1952. He went on to be Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans & Policy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
BBC News
BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadcast news organisation and generates about 120 hours of radio and television output each day, as well as online news coverage. The service has over 5,500 journalists working across its output including in 50 foreign news bureaus where more than 250 foreign correspondents are stationed. Deborah Turness has been the CEO of news and current affairs since September 2022. In 2019, it was reported in an Ofcom report that the BBC spent £136m on news during the period April 2018 to March 2019. BBC News' domestic, global and online news divisions are housed within the largest live newsroom in Europe, in Broadcasting House in central London. Parliamentary coverage is produced and broadcast from studios in London. Through BBC English Regions, th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
