‘To Kill A Nazi’ Honors Unsung Hero Of Israel’s Famous Entebbe Rescue

BusinessHollywood & Entertainment‘To Kill A Nazi’ Honors Unsung Hero Of Israel’s Famous Entebbe RescueByJosh Weiss,Contributor.Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. Josh Weiss is a writer covering the nexus of pop culture and Judaism.Follow AuthorJun 15, 2026, 04:59pm EDTJun 15, 2026, 05:01pm EDTMichel CojotCourtesy of Dvir ProductionsIn July 1976, the Israeli military pulled off its daring rescue of over 100 Jewish hostages held captive in the Ugandan capital of Entebbe after a group of fterrorists hijacked an Air France flight from Tel Aviv to Paris.Similar to the Mossad’s capture of Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann a decade prior, the audacious operation (code-named “Thunderbolt”) captured the global imagination and took center stage in three different films: Raid on Entebbe, Operation Thunderbolt, and Seven Days in Entebbe. Parties lauded in the aftermath include the elite Sayeret Matkal commandoes who carried out the mission and Air France pilot Michel Bacos. The latter is said to have refused to leave his passengers when the hijackers offered to release him. He ended up receiving France’s highest, the Légion d’honneur, and even had a street named after him in the coastal Israeli city of Netanya.By Bacos’s own admission, however, the official story perpetuated for the last 50 years isn’t exactly true, as journalist-turned-documentarian Boaz Dvir learned while interviewing the retired pilot before his death in 2019.“He’s volunteering information,” recalled Dvir, who also teaches journalist at Penn State University. “And I come to the conclusion in the middle of this two-hour interview that he didn’t deserve to be [considered] a hero. The whole thing was made up. I grew up believing he was a hero because he refused to leave when he and his crew had a chance to leave, but they stayed with the Jewish hostages. Not the case. I’m not accusing him and I’m in shock, but I'm asking more questions that further revealed that this w...