Overview
- The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said on Thursday that Kozo Okamoto died in Beirut’s Dahiya district after a prolonged illness and that he had been protected by Palestinian factions in Lebanon.
- Okamoto took part in the May 30, 1972 attack at Lod (now Ben Gurion) Airport when he and two JRA colleagues pulled guns and grenades from luggage and opened fire, an assault that killed between 24 and 26 people and wounded dozens.
- Wounded and captured at the scene, Okamoto was tried by an Israeli military court, given life sentences, and was freed in 1985 in the Jibril prisoner exchange after roughly 12 to 13 years behind bars.
- After his release he lived in several Middle Eastern countries before settling in Lebanon, where authorities granted him political asylum and repeatedly rejected Japanese extradition requests backed by Interpol notices.
- His death ends a long-running, cross-border legal and diplomatic dispute and leaves a contested legacy that resonates with victims’ families, Japanese authorities seeking accountability, and Palestinian groups that hailed him as a symbol of international solidarity.