Nearly five decades after Entebbe, Yonatan Netanyahu still stands in my mind as the embodiment of courage, moral clarity, Jewish resilience, and the spirit that keeps innovating the future of Israel

He was my hero before I knew enough history to explain why.

My fascination with Israel’s defense and security services did not begin with a book, a documentary, or even a newspaper. It began in a Bible Knowledge class many years ago. The teacher had just finished teaching us about brave men and women who faced overwhelming odds with skill, faith, and conviction: Joshua, David, Gideon, Samson, Joab, Deborah, Jael. As he packed up his materials and prepared to leave, he added one more thought, almost casually: the same courage, he said, was still being displayed in our own time, as the Israeli military had shown at Entebbe after the hijacking of an Air France flight. All Jewish hostages were freed. Only one soldier was killed. His name was Yoni Netanyahu.

That little snippet was enough. It lit a fire in me.

From that day, I found myself drawn to what I later came to call the 3Ms: the man, the mission, and the military. The man was Yonatan “Yoni” Netanyahu. The mission was Entebbe, one of the most daring rescue operations in modern history. The military, of course, was the Israel Defense Forces, whose story of courage, improvisation, sacrifice, and moral seriousness has fascinated me ever since.

Now, as Yoni would have turned 80 on March 13, 2026, I find myself reflecting on him again with deep gratitude, admiration, and emotion. Some heroes are admired because they were successful. Others are remembered because they died young. But Yoni occupies a rarer place. He is remembered because his life and death fused into one unforgettable testimony: leadership is not about rank, reputation, or rhetoric. It is about character under pressure. It is about going first when the risk is greatest. It is about duty, even when duty demands everything.

Yoni was, in every sense, a hero absolute.

Much has rightly been said about Operation Entebbe, later known as Operation Yonatan. The facts remain astonishing. A hijacked Air France flight. Jewish and Israeli passengers singled out. Hostages held at Entebbe Airport in Uganda. Demands made by terrorists who believed distance would protect them and fear would paralyze Israel. And then the extraordinary response: Israeli commandos flying some 4,000 kilometers to rescue their people in a raid that lasted less than 90 minutes and changed the world’s understanding of what a nation could do for its citizens.

But for me, Yoni’s greatness is not only in the spectacle of Entebbe. It is in the moral weight behind it.

Entebbe was more than a rescue mission. It was a declaration. It said that Jewish lives were not expendable. It said that terrorism would not have the final word. It said that the reborn Jewish state would not simply mourn its people; it would move mountains, cross continents, and confront evil to bring them home. That message mattered in 1976, and it still matters today.

And Yoni stood at the center of that message.

He was not merely a soldier who happened to be there. He was the commander who led from the front, the kind of officer whose courage inspired confidence in others. The accounts of his life before Entebbe only deepen one’s respect. He served in the Paratroopers Brigade, fought in the Six-Day War, studied at Harvard, returned to Israel because he felt he belonged with his people in their time of danger, studied mathematics and philosophy at Hebrew University, and served again with distinction in the Yom Kippur War. He was brave, yes, but he was also thoughtful. Hard, but not hollow. A warrior, but also a man of letters.

I have always found that combination especially moving.

There is something deeply beautiful about a fighter who thinks, a commander who writes, a tough man with a poet’s inner life. We sometimes speak as though courage belongs only to the physically strong. But Yoni reminds us that the finest courage is moral as much as martial. It comes from conviction. From love. From responsibility. From an unshakeable sense that some things must be defended because they are sacred.

That is why his memory has endured so powerfully. Nearly fifty years later, his name still stirs hearts not only in Israel but far beyond it. Ceremonies are held in his honor. Tributes continue to be paid. His role in reshaping the world’s response to terrorism is still acknowledged. Even Uganda, the very soil on which he fell, now speaks of honoring him with a statue at Entebbe. There is something profound in that. History has a way of clarifying moral truth. In time, even the place of tragedy can become a place of tribute.

I find that deeply fitting.

Because Yoni’s legacy is not trapped in 1976. It lives on wherever Jews and friends of Israel remember that courage is not abstract. It has a face. A cost. A name.

For me, Yoni also symbolizes something essential about Israel itself. Israel is often discussed in geopolitical terms: security doctrines, deterrence, intelligence superiority, military readiness. All of that matters. But beneath the hardware and the headlines lies a human story. Israel survives because generation after generation has produced men and women cut from the same cloth as Yoni Netanyahu: people of tenacity, bravery, discipline, sacrifice, and astonishing inner steel.

That is why, when I think of Yoni, I do not think only of one man. I think of the long line of gallant Israeli service men and women who have defended their people under impossible conditions. I think of pilots, commandos, reservists, medics, intelligence officers, tank crews, border police, and quiet heroes whose names never make the papers. Yoni belongs to that noble company, and at the same time he shines within it with singular brightness.

He still sets a standard.

And perhaps that is what makes his story so emotionally powerful. He did not merely die bravely. He lived purposefully. He chose service again and again. He could have remained abroad. He could have pursued the life of the mind in safer surroundings. He had the talent for it. Yet he returned, because he understood that ideas, however noble, must sometimes be defended by those willing to stand in harm’s way.

That is not militarism. That is moral seriousness.

In an age so often clouded by cynicism, Yoni’s life feels refreshingly clear. He reminds us that heroism is not outdated. Patriotism is not embarrassing. Sacrifice is not foolish. Love of one’s people is not a moral defect. On the contrary, in the right hands, these are among the highest virtues.

And this is why his memory still nourishes what I often call resilience and renewal. Israel’s renewal has never come cheaply. It has been built by dreamers, builders, scholars, entrepreneurs, and yes, warriors. The same nation that produces daring rescue missions also produces breakthroughs in science, medicine, agriculture, and technology. The link is not accidental. Both spring from the same source: a refusal to surrender. A determination to build, protect, and renew life against the odds. In that sense, Yoni’s legacy belongs not only to Israel’s military history, but to the larger story of innovating the future of Israel.

He helped defend the possibility of that future.

And so, at 80, though he did not live to see this birthday, Yoni Netanyahu still speaks. He speaks through memory. Through example. Through the pride he awakened in Jews after Entebbe. Through the admiration he still inspires in those of us who never met him, yet feel we know something of his spirit. He speaks through the enduring conviction that Jewish dignity is worth defending, that courage still matters, and that leadership begins with the willingness to say, in word and deed, “Follow me.”

That is how I remember him: not as a distant figure sealed in marble, but as a living moral force.

Thank you, Yoni. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for your tenacity. Thank you for your example. Thank you for embodying the very best of Israel at its most tested and most noble. You were a hero absolute. You remain one still.

May your memory continue to be a blessing.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)