Deputy Foreign Minister Binyamin Netanyahu this weekend visited the airport in Entebbe, Uganda, where his legendary brother, Yonatan, was killed during the rescue operation of July 4, 1976.
The deputy minister, now back in Israel, has declined so far to give details of his emotional return to the site of his brother’s death. He was accompanied there by his other brother, Ido, a doctor, and by his 12-year-old daughter.
Yoni, Bibi and Ido all served, at different periods, in the elite unit of the Israel Defense Force that carried out the famed Entebbe rescue under Yoni’s command.
Bibi Netanyahu’s brief visit to Entebbe was part of a trip to Kenya and Uganda, two countries with which Israel is seeking to re-establish the diplomatic ties sundered by most of black Africa during the 1970s.
Recently another high-level Israeli, roving Ambassador David Kimche, had talks in Nairobi, and observers here expect the formal resumption of ties with Kenya imminently.
But Netanyahu would not answer reporters’ questions about the content of his talks in either country or give his assessment of the prospects of an early resumption of ties.
Netanyahu will accompany Foreign Minister Moshe Arens on his visit next week to Washington.
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