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Operation Yonatan was a hostage rescue mission performed by Israeli Sayeret Matkal special forces troops on the night of July 3 and early morning of July 4, 1976 to free hostages held on Air France Flight 139 at Entebbe Airport in Uganda. during the planning and execution stages, the mission had been codenamed Operation Thunderbolt or Operation Thunderball, but upon completion it was retroactively named Yonatan in memory of the raid's commander, Lieutenant Colonel Yonatan Netanyahu, the only Israeli soldier killed in the raid, and also the elder brother of Benjamin Netanyahu, who later became Israel's Prime Minister.
Background
The crisis began six days earlier, when two Palestinians and two Germans hijacked an Air France Airbus en route to Paris from Athens. The flight had originated in Lod, Israel, and nearly a third of its passengers were Israeli or non-Israeli Jews.
External links
- Yoni Lt. Col. Yonatan Netanyahu official memorial site