Is a new Kozo Okamoto expected soon? Is ISIS recruiting Japanese?

Is a new Kozo Okamoto expected soon? Is ISIS recruiting Japanese?

אילוסטרציה

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Illustration
Illustration

The Japanese police began investigating a 26 year old Japanese Muslim in suspicion he attempted to join ISIS in Syria. This, according to a local police report. The suspect, a student at Hokkaido University, reported his intention to fly to the Middle East in order to fight alongside ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

“I intend to go to Syria to join ISIS there and serve as a combatant,” the student told the police. The idea to join the murderous terrorist organization came to him after he had noticed a wanted add posted at a second hand bookstore in Tokyo.

In 1972, a terrorist group belonging to the ‘Japanese Red Army’ perpetrated a massacre at Ben Gurion Airport.

One of the culprits, Kozo Okamoto, was born to a middle class family. In February 1970, his two older brothers, in particular Takadia Okamoto – who was among the hijackers of a Japanese passenger aircraft to North Korea in 1970, recruited him to the terrorist organization who was made famous due to this hijacking. Upon his recruitment, Okamoto dropped out of University, severed all ties with the rest of his family, and espoused radical Trotskyist ideologies. In September 1971, Okamoto departed, as did dozens of other members, for Lebanon, where he received training in terrorist camps. There, he became a member of Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine headed by George Habash.

Many weeks ahead of to their terrorist attack, the members of the ‘Japanese Red Army’ boarded El Al flights between Europe and the US in order to examine Israeli security measures and study them, and raised the suspicion of security staff more than once. On May 16 1972, the members learned that contrary to their original plan, they were assigned to attack Ben Gurion Airport. As they were concerned they were being followed by Israeli security forces, they attempted to minimize the risk of penetrating deep into Israel by deciding to launch the attack on the international airport immediately upon their landing in Israel.

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On the day of the attack, May 30 1972, the terrorist unit board Air France flight 132 en route from Paris to Tel Aviv. They landed in Israel around ten o’clock in the evening. The three suit-clad Asians drew little attention from the local security guards. Upon landind, the three terrorists destroyed their passports and waited near the luggage ramp. When they collected their luggage, they produced their AK-47 rifles, magazines and hand grenades and began firing indiscriminately into the crowd in the passenger terminal. Between firing rounds, they threw the grenades at the people who fell onto the floor. When Yasuda Yasoko ran out of ammunition, his friend Okodiera shot him dead. He then went out to the tarmac and fired at disembarking passengers on other planes. When he too ran out of ammunition, he held a grenade to his chest and exploded. Okamoto too went out to the tarmac, fired his rifle and threw hand grenades at nearby aircraft. Severely injured, he tried to escape but was captured by El Al employee Claude Zaitoun, who was assisted by border patrol.

The attack claimed the lives of 24 people and injured 78.

I personally met Okamoto at the prison in Ramle. He sat on his bed surrounded by Palestinian terrorists and gazed on. He seemed completely detached from his environment.

Okamoto was released in the framework of the Jibril Agreement in 1985 and returned to Japan.

Arie Egozi iHLS editor-in-chief
Arie Egozi
iHLS editor-in-chief