The plane was on a scheduled flight from Cairo to Athens. Hijackers forced it to Beirut and twice went to Algiers before returning to Beirut releasing most of the (non-American) 152 passengers along the way, and murdering U.S. Navy diver Robert Stethem, one of the passengers—beating him, shooting him in the temple and dumping his body on the tarmac of Beirut International Airport.
Hijackers had demanded the release of 735 Lebanese Shiites and Lebanese held by Israel either in Israeli prisons or in an Israeli detention camp in occupied South Lebanon.
The hijackers get away—and their operation succeeds: On July 3, Israel released 300 prisoners, and 100 more on July 24. None of the prisoners had been charged. They were held in Israeli custody under suspicion of participating in attacks on Israel or on the Israeli-allied South Lebanon Army.
It is possible that Hezbollah terrorist Imad Mugniyah was one of the hijacking’s masterminds. German authorities arrested Mohammed Ali Hammadi and convicted him of Stethem’s murder in 1987. Hammadi was paroled in 2005 and returned to Beirut, where he is believed to be living today.
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