BERN, June 8: Swiss justice authorities said on Thursday that they had thwarted a plot by a group of North Africans to attack a plane of the Israeli airline El Al, and had made seven arrests in the process.

The Federal Prosecutor’s Office said that the individuals had been seized in sweeps which began on May 12 in Zurich and Basel, following an investigation which had shown that their cell had ‘very seriously considered’ attacking the Israeli carrier in Switzerland.

The office did not reveal the individuals’ names or nationalities. It dismissed Swiss media reports that police had also seized a rocket-propelled grenade, surface-to-air missile or explosives.

Philippe Roy, spokesman for Geneva airport, told AFP that El Al had halted flights to the Swiss city for a week last December, officially for ‘commercial or technical’ reasons.

The carrier’s flights were instead routed to Zurich.

According to unconfirmed Swiss media reports, the El Al plot involved shooting down a plane at Geneva airport during landing or take-off, from outside the airport perimeter.

A similar attack on an Israeli plane, claimed by Osama Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network, took place in Mombasa, Kenya, in November 2002.

However, two shoulder-fired missiles launched at the Arkia plane missed the aircraft, which was carrying 261 people.

The Swiss prosecutor’s office said that investigators uncovered the plot here after police identified a gang of around a dozen members early in 2005.—AFP