00:00And again, I want to have Captain Smith and Prime Minister Modi, our great friends.
00:06I really would like them to bear a celebratory flame.
00:10It's our highest honor that we give in our Independence Day.
00:14It's usually reserved for Israeli citizens.
00:17But I think here, in this case, all the citizens of Israel will embrace you.
00:24They do now and they will then too, so we hope to see you very soon in Israel.
00:30But tell me, I wanted to ask you, how did it all begin? Can you tell me how it began?
00:36It was, it just was a normal flight and the co-pilot offered, I mean, he demanded, not demanded, but
00:49he wanted to pray,
00:50which a lot of locals, they do pray, and which is not out of the ordinary.
01:00But while he was praying, out of respect, I was just looking at the front and not at the back.
01:09And suddenly, after, I think I would say about four or five minutes, there was a big blow to the
01:17back of my head.
01:18My first thought was that there was a catastrophic damage to the aircraft and something is not right.
01:28Then, after that, the blow kept coming, one after the other.
01:34And that's when I realized that it's not the aircraft, it's the other guy who was in the cockpit with
01:40me.
01:41I did try to stop him, but because of his initial blows, my vision was almost like nothing.
01:51And I was completely blurred out.
01:55At this point, I remember I was lying down on the cockpit floor.
02:02And I felt the aircraft and the whooshing sound and people screaming.
02:08And as I was telling the ambassador here that I had that one last fight left in me that, you
02:19know, call it personal or call it for people.
02:23But let's say I did it that if I don't do it, I'm going to die.
02:28And that's when I pushed against everything.
02:31I gave everything that I had and just went for the door and opened the door.
02:35And thankfully, people were waiting to pound back, took over the control.
02:41And the rest is what you know, sir.
02:45Well, you know, frankly, I'm amazed at your courage, at your coolness of judgment under impossible conditions.
02:54And so, thank you.
Comments