Makhachkala airport employees testified to the court about the rioters' behavior.

Participants in the October 2023 mass riots accused Makhachkala airport staff of "hiding" passengers from Israel; workers were forced to barricade themselves indoors.

As reported by the "Caucasian Knot," three alleged organizers of the pogrom—Ilya Ponomarev*, Abakar Abakarov, and Israil Akhmednabiyev (Abu Umar Sasitlinsky)—were placed on the wanted list in connection with the riots at Makhachkala's Uytash Airport. According to the Investigative Committee, they published posts on Telegram that encouraged residents of Dagestan to participate in mass riots motivated by hatred toward Israel. In July 2025, the cases of all three were submitted to the Supreme Court of Dagestan for trial in absentia. Participants in the 2023 riots at Makhachkala's Uytash Airport attempted to disarm security forces and threw stones at them, according to testimony read out in court in November 2025. Abakarov was killed in Turkey in October 2025, after which the court sent a request to Turkey to confirm his death.

At the latest hearing in the case of the mass riots at Makhachkala Airport, new witness testimony was read out. One of the airport customs officers testified.

According to the witness, during the riots, about 50 people broke into the customs office, violating the rules for staying in the customs zone. They accused the officers of hiding passengers from Israel in their offices, but made no threats against the airport employees themselves.

“They opened every office, shouting and cursing, and asked, ‘Why are you hiding them?’ My colleagues were with me, and I decided to barricade myself in one of the rooms,” TASS quotes a witness from the January 21 hearing.

At the January 14 hearing, former airport general director Said Ramazanov testified in the Supreme Court of Dagestan. He stated, in particular, that 17 days before the mass riots that occurred on October 29, 2023, three people protested at the airport against the arrival of passengers from Israel, but this protest passed without conflict.

At the same meeting, Ramazanov recounted that on the day of the riots, when a flight from Tel Aviv landed at Uytash Airport, a crowd of rioters broke into the checkpoint and checked passengers' passports "in search of Jews."

The protesters surrounded the bus and checked passengers' passports, dragging them out into the street against their will.

According to Ramazanov, he personally, along with other airport employees and State Duma deputy Khizri Abakarov, escorted passengers arriving from Israel onto a pre-arranged bus. At this point, "protesters broke through to the platform and ran after the bus," while airport employees and Abakarov attempted to "protect passengers from the crowd."

"Protesters surrounded the bus and checked passengers' passports, dragging them out into the street against their will. Since both doors of the bus were open, three protesters were inside, along with the passengers, checking their documents... The protesters said they needed to find Jews," RIA Novosti quoted Ramazanov as saying.

Three passengers—a married couple with a disabled child—were unable to board the bus. According to Ramazanov, he and several of his subordinates personally shielded them from the crowd, and they were later taken by minibus to the administrative building and evacuated from the area by helicopter. Other passengers arriving from Israel were also evacuated by two helicopters.

The next hearing in the Uytash Airport riots case is scheduled for January 28, according to the case file on the court's website.

The "Caucasian Knot" also reported that in mid-January, a court in Georgievsk found Anvarbek Atayev and Rabadan Radzhabov guilty of violating transport safety regulations during the riots at Makhachkala Airport and sentenced them to prison terms ranging from 8.5 to 10 years. They had previously been convicted of mass riots and violence against a security officer.

More than 130 people have already been convicted of participating in the mass riots at Makhachkala Airport and received prison terms ranging from 6.5 to 15 years. Dagestani resident Bakhtiyar Radzhabov, whom the Georgievsk city court sentenced in October to seven years in prison, became at least the 136th person convicted for participating in the pogrom; Investigators previously stated that the cases of 139 defendants (excluding three who are wanted) had been transferred to the courts.

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