El Al cancelled its regular flight from Tel Aviv to Copenhagen today apparently on information that Arab terrorists planned to attack the airliner when it landed at Kastrup Airport here. Airport officials gave no official reason for the cancellation which was announced on short notice but at least 30 armed police officers took up positions at the airfield before the scheduled arrival time of the El Al jet and two police boats patroled the sea off the airport.
Sources here said Israeli intelligence agents had tipped off Danish authorities to the planned attack and that Danish police were watching a man identified as the head of the Scandinavian branch of El Fatah, the Palestinian guerrilla organization. El Al airliners have been attacked, with fatal results, at Athens and Zurich airports in recent months. In each case the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a terrorist organization, claimed credit. The Copenhagen flight which would have carried 90 passengers and crew-members was scheduled to land here at 3:20 p.m. local time but never took off from Tel Aviv, airport officials said.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
