C-130 on runway after Entebbe raid.
C-130 on runway after Entebbe raid.<a target="_blank" href="http://www.israelnationalnews.com">Israel News</a> photo

Collectors of Israeli military memorabilia – here's something you still can't find on E-Bay: the Department of Defense has put up for sale five Hercules C-130 transport planes. One of them, which carries the tail number 106, had the honor of participating in the IDF's legendary raid on the airport at Entebbe, Uganda, in 1976, which freed over 100 hostages from a hijacked Air France flight.

Hostages rescued after Entebbe operation.

Israel News photo.

On the night before July 4, 1976, four C-130 planes from Hercules Squadron 'Hatzipor Hatzehuba' ('The Yellow Bird') took the Matkal elite commando unit to Entebbe in a mission code named Operation Thunderbolt and later named Operation Yonatan, in memory of its commander, Yonatan Netanyahu, who was killed in the raid. One of the soldiers participating was a young Captain named Gabi Ashkenazi – now IDF Chief of Staff.

Their 4,000 km. route passed over Sharm al-Sheikh, and down the international flight path over the Red Sea flying at a height of no more than 100 feet (30 meters) to avoid radar detection. The Israeli ground task force on board numbered approximately 100 personnel. One Hercules carried a black Mercedes which the operation's planners intended to use as a ruse.

Lt. Col. Yoni Netanyahu

The daring rescue succeeded in freeing most of the hostages, but three were killed in the crossfire and one, the elderly Dora Bloch, was murdered in her hospital bed by Ugandan dictator Idi Amin's gunmen.

The first pair of Hercules transports arrived in Israel in October of 1971. The planes received the Hebrew nickname 'Karnaf' - 'rhinocerus'.

The Hercules also played a part in Operation Shlomo – in which Ethiopia's Jews were brought to Israel. Its different roles include midair refueling of planes and helicopters, evacuation, airdrop of personnel and materiel, observation, airborne command and control, intelligence, fire fighting, satellite location, weather observation and research.