Raid on Entebbe (Uganda) July 3-4, 1976 - A Brief History

While the USA is celebrating the Fourth of July, Israel remembers the Raid on Entebbe, July 3-4, 1976. Hostages from a French jet airliner were hijacked en route from Israel to France. After stopping briefly in Athens, Greece, the airliner was hijacked on June 27th by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Red Army Faction (a West German radical leftist group) and flown to Entebbe, Uganda.

At Entebbe, the hijackers freed those of the 258 passengers who did not appear to be Israeli or Jewish and held the rest hostage. The hijackers bargained for the release of 53 militants imprisoned in Israel, Kenya, West Germany and elsewhere. In response. Israel dispatched four Hercules C-130H cargo planes carrying 100-200 soldiers and escorted by Phantom jet fighters. (on July 3rd). The Israeli force rescued the hostages within an hour after landing. All of the hijackers were killed and 45 Ugandan soldiers were killed. Eleven Soviet-built MiG-17s and MiG-21s of Uganda’s air force were destroyed. The Israelis lost one soldier and three hostages during the operation. That soldier was a unit commander. His name was Lt. Col. Yonatan Netanyahu, who was the older brother of the current Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu.

On the return trip, the Israeli planes met an awaiting hospital plane and refueled at Nairobi, Kenya. The success of the Entebbe raid substantially boosted Israeli morale.