Israel's Minister of Foreign Affairs, Gideon Saar, stated that the case of the attack on flight 901 in Panama in 1994, which resulted in the deaths of 20 passengers and crew members — most of them from the Jewish community, including four Israelis — remains an open wound. In a message posted on his X account, the minister affirmed that the decision to extradite Jalil from Venezuela, announced by Panama's Ministry of Foreign Affairs this Friday, represents a 'significant advance.' 'This measure is expected to advance the discovery of the truth and shed light on his ties with the terrorist organization Hezbollah, which also acts to spread terrorism in Latin America and represents a threat not only to Israel, Lebanon, and the Middle East, but to the peace of the entire world,' Saar concluded in his message. In 1994, flight 901 of the Panamanian airline Alas Chiricanas crashed minutes after taking off from Tocumen International Airport, located in Panama City. The case was reopened following a request from Panama's Attorney General's Office in August 2019, which was followed by the suspect's arrest in Venezuela in November 2025. In the attack, considered the most serious in the country's history and which remains unsolved, there were no survivors; among the victims were a dozen businessmen from Panama's Jewish community. The attack occurred one day after the terrorist attack suffered by the Argentine Israeli Mutual Association (AMIA) in Buenos Aires, in which 85 people died and which also remains unpunished.
