Among Israel’s fallen heroes, Jonathan “Yoni” Netanyahu is revered to extent probably
second only to the tragically gallant Hannah Senesh. However, Netanyahu’s ultimate sacrifice came
leading one of the most successful military operations in the history of the
state of Israel. The life of the
commander of the Raid on Entebbe is celebrated in Jonathan Gruber & Ari
Daniel Pinchot’s Follow Me: The YoniNetanyahu Story (trailer
here), which
opens this Friday in New York.
Yoni
Netanyahu was born to lead. An ardent
Israeli patriot, he always had the look of a man of action. Netanyahu was the oldest of three brothers,
indeed including Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, the Israeli current Israeli Prime
Minister (whom Obama and Sarkozy consider so gauche for being, you know, so
Israeli). The family was always quite
close, frequently writing back and forth while the eldest brother of destiny
studied in America.
Thanks
to a wealth of surviving letters, Netanyahu’s voice comes through loud and
clear in Follow. In fact, the film is most successful
conveying a sense of what it was like to come of age and start a new life as a
young man at a time when Israel was under constant threat of attack from her
belligerent neighbors. Somewhat surprisingly, the film steadily builds towards
the moment of truth in Uganda, but the actual boots-on-the-ground military
operation is handled rather perfunctorily.
(Perhaps the filmmakers assumed most interested audiences would already
be well versed in the details of the operation that was memorably dramatized
several times in the 1970’s, including Menahem Golan’s Operation Thunderbolt and Irvin Kershner’s Raid on Entebbe).
In
addition to Netanyahu’s brother Benjamin, two former Prime Ministers—Shimon
Peres and Ehud Barak—also sat for on-camera interviews, which speaks volumes
about Netanyahu’s significance to his countrymen. Yet without question, some of the most
insightful and moving reminiscences come from his comrades-in-arms.
Unless
viewers truly have hatred in their hearts, there are episodes in Follow that will absolutely choke them
up. Years later, Netanyahu’s family and
loved ones still clearly feel his loss acutely.
Some moments are quite beautiful, including Benjamin Netanyahu’s
memories of his brother’s desert wedding, which he explains perfectly
represented him as a rugged son of Israel.
Others of remembrances are deeply tragic. Altogether, they add up to an eventful but
all too short life.
