Omar Rezaq

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Omar Rezaq is the only surviving hijacker of EgyptAir Flight 648. He was a member of Abu Nidal. The plane was hijacked by a group of three people. The remaining two hijackers were killed, either in in-flight shooting with a sky-marshal or after Egyptian commandos stormed the hijacked plane.

Omar Rezaq had given his name as Omar Marzouki and used a Tunisian passport when boarding that plane at Athens airport, but later he admitted that he is of Palestinian origin and that he was born in Lebanon in 1963.

During hours of negotiations at Luqa airport in Malta, Rezaq deliberately shot five passengers - three of them miraculously survived - and used a hand grenade when Egyptian commandos stormed the plane on November 24, 1985 at about 8 p.m. He was severely wounded in this shootout (his left lung was pierced by a bullet), but recovered and was arraigned in court on December 12, 1986. Preliminary inquiry lasted until April 3, 1987 and on November 2, 1988 Rezaq was arraigned in court and he pleaded guilty to seven of nine charges against him. These were the illegal arrest of crew and passengers, the death of Nitzan Mendelson and of Scarlett Marie Rogenkamp, the attempted killing of Methad Mustafa Kamal, Patrick Scott Baker, Jacqueline Nink Pflug and Tamar Artzi, and with the illegal possession of arms and explosives. Nevertheless, the former two charges were later withdrawn. Rezaq was sentenced to the full 25 years less the years and months he had already spent in prison. On appeal, the same sentence was confirmed on April 20, 1989.

Rezaq however served only seven years in Malta and was released. As a free man under assumed name, he went to Accra, Ghana and remained there until July 1993. Then he flew to Lagos, Nigeria and was arrested there and the Nigerian authorities turned him over to waiting FBI agents, who flew him to the United States.

On July 19, 1996 after a month-long trial Rezaq was sentenced to life in prison on a single count of air piracy. U.S. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth, who sentenced him, recommended that any request for parole made after the 10-year period should be rejected.