Larnaca International Airport
Sibai was assassinated in Cyprus on February 18, 1978 while he was attending an Asian-African conference there. This murderous event had a negative effect on the Egyptian – Cypriot relations, and forced Egypt to cut ties with Cyprus, particularly after an Egyptian special military unit landed at Larnaca International Airport to arrest the assassins without informing the Cypriot authorities. After the assassination, the two murderers took about thirty hostages of the members of the delegations participating in the Solidarity Conference and imprisoned them in the hotel cafeteria. They threatened that they would kill the hostages by grenades unless the Cypriot authorities promised to fly them out of the country. The Cypriot authorities finally yielded to their request and it was resolved to take them on board of a DC8 Cypriot plane to escape outside Cyprus. The plane took off from Larnaca International Airport. The battle between the special Egyptian force and the Cypriot army had led to the deaths of several members of the Egyptian force while many were injured on both sides. The crime was later blamed on Abu Nidal Organization (ANO), a militant Palestinian splinter group.