Meaningful Minute · Oct 6, 2026
Meaningful Minute — photo status
Those were the words Tzvika Manes heard from his daughters as Flydubai Flight FZ1073 plunged thousands of feet from the sky. And according to Tzvika, hearing those words is what gave him the strength to get up and fight. His daughters were screaming. Passengers believed they were about to die. A terrorist had attacked Captain Smit Machchhar inside the cockpit and was trying to take control of the plane. Then Tzvika heard his girls calling for their father. “Dad, we don’t want to die.” He knew he couldn’t sit there. Tzvika got out of his seat and ran toward the cockpit, joining the passengers who confronted the terrorist. Together, they fought him, dragged him away from the controls and restrained him as others rushed to save the badly wounded captain. It would be easy to look at what Tzvika did and call it extraordinary courage. But when Tzvika later spoke about what gave him that courage, he pointed to his daughters. In the most terrifying moment of their lives, three girls looked to their father to p
