Netanyahu at 50-Year Entebbe Commemoration: "We Pushed Back an Existential Threat From Iran"

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke Sunday at a ceremony at the President's Residence marking 50 years since Operation Yonatan — the legendary mission to rescue hijacked hostages at Entebbe Airport. Netanyahu drew a direct line between the operation and Israel's current security reality: "'Entebbe' is synonymous with an operation of extraordinary audacity that made the impossible possible. That is precisely what we are doing in the current war: systematically dismantling the Iranian axis of evil. Since the horrific massacre of October 7, we have turned the tables. We have struck our tormentors from Gaza to Yemen, from Lebanon to Iran — and we have pushed back an immediate existential threat posed by Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons."

The prime minister paid tribute to his brother, Lieutenant Colonel Yoni Netanyahu of blessed memory, who was killed leading the operation at Entebbe, as well as to the other fallen: Jean-Jacques Maimoni, Ida Borochovitch, Pesach Cohen, and Dora Bloch, who was murdered in her hospital bed on the orders of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin.

Netanyahu also addressed the weight of command and the burden of bereavement, stating that as prime minister he regards it as a supreme duty to be as sparing as possible with human life when sending fighters into battle.

President Isaac Herzog addressed the ceremony with these words: "There are events that transcend any one person, place, or moment. They do not merely enter history — they enter our DNA as a people, as a state, as a nation. That is what Operation Yonatan was — the Entebbe operation.

"As President of the State of Israel, I personally insisted that this ceremony take place, together with the IDF. I insisted that we gather here, fifty years on, to declare something very simple: Operation Yonatan does not belong to any one person or political camp. It stands above all disputes. It is a legacy of heroism and daring that echoes — and will continue to echo — for generations to come. Hundreds of years from now, when all of us are long gone, the legacy of Operation Yonatan will endure. It is a legacy that belongs to the entire Jewish people."

Herzog continued: "Operation Yonatan was one of the most extraordinary missions in Israel's history — and it was also a moral declaration. On that night, the State of Israel established a principle that continues to resonate in our own generation: A state may have borders, but responsibility and mutual obligation among us know no border. When a Jew or an Israeli is in danger — even when the path seems impossible — we will come. The State of Israel will come. And it does."