Airliner with 58 aboard landed at military base in southern Israel.

A Chechen gunman who seized a Russian airliner surrendered to Israeli authorities Sunday and all 58 people on board were safe, a military official said. Army Col. Ofer Ophir said the lone hijacker was in Israeli custody and all the passengers had been removed from the plane. Israel, Russia and Azerbaijan had said initially that up to four hijackers were on board and were threatening to blow up the plane. But there was only one gunman, who turned over his weapon and surrendered, Israeli authorities said. The aircraft was directed to a remote landing strip. Initially officials said the hijackers acted in support of the Palestinian uprising, a six-week-old conflict that has claimed nearly 200 lives. But later army spokesman Brig. Gen. Ron Kitrey said that information was incorrect, and that the hijacking was part of the ongoing conflict between Russia and Chechnya, which is predominantly Muslim. Israel initially refused the plane permission to land, and was intent on preventing the plane from landing at Ben-Gurion international airport near Tel Aviv, the country's main airport. While the plane circled over the Mediterranean Sea, an Israeli Air Force jet flew nearby. Eventually, the plane was allowed to land after the Russian pilot said he was running low on fuel. The gunman seized the plane Saturday night shortly after takeoff from Makhachkala, the capital of the southern Russian region of Dagestan in the Caucasus Mountains. The jet, with 48 passengers, including two children, and five stewardesses and five cockpit crew, was flying to Moscow from Makhachkala, the Dagestan capital.