The crocodiles in Lake Victoria were the least of their problems.

The Night Israel Rescued Its Hostages From Entebbe

When 100 Commandos Flew 2,500 Miles Into the Heart of Uganda

Israel approved an impossible rescue mission 2,500 miles away—and pulled it off with blueprints from a construction company.

The Air France Airbus had been sitting on the tarmac at Entebbe Airport for six days. Inside the old terminal building, 106 hostages—mostly Israeli and Jewish passengers—waited under the guns of Palestinian and German hijackers, protected by Idi Amin's Ugandan soldiers. Outside, crocodiles drifted in Lake Victoria. The deadline was approaching. Israel had until July 4th to release 53 imprisoned militants, or the executions would begin.

On the night of June 29th, 1976, Israeli Defense Minister Shimon Peres convened an emergency cabinet meeting. Intelligence had been trickling in from an unlikely source: the released non-Jewish hostages, debriefed in Paris, had sketched the terminal layout from memory. An Israeli construction firm that had built the old terminal in the 1960s still had the original blueprints. Mossad agents in Kenya had been watching Entebbe for days.

The plan was audacious to the point of madness. Four Hercules C-130 transport planes would fly 2,500 miles through hostile airspace, refueling in Kenya, and land undetected at night on a runway controlled by an enemy nation. The assault team would have exactly 53 minutes on the ground.

Lieutenant Colonel Yonatan Netan…

💡 The Israeli commandos used a black Mercedes sedan to impersonate Idi Amin's motorcade, but they painted it to match his new model—not realizing Amin had recently switched to a white Mercedes, nearly blowing their cover.