The Shadow Negotiator: Michel Cojot and the Entebbe Rescue

The cinematic exploration of the 1976 Entebbe hostage crisis has long centered on military precision, yet a new documentary titled To Kill a Nazi shifts the focus toward the singular, overlooked contributions of Michel Cojot. Filmmaker Boaz Dvir, a journalism professor at Penn State, spent nearly a decade reconstructing the life of the French Jewish banker whose presence on the hijacked Air France flight proved instrumental to the eventual success of the Israeli rescue mission.

Michel Cojot was born in Paris in 1938, the son of a man later murdered at Auschwitz. After surviving the Nazi occupation of France, he pursued a career in finance while maintaining a clandestine commitment to tracking down those responsible for his father’s death. This pursuit led him to South America in 1975, where he confronted Klaus Barbie, the Gestapo commander known as the Butcher of Lyon. Despite being armed and positioned to execute his own form of justice, Cojot ultimately chose to spare Barbie, concluding that extrajudicial killing would mirror the very ideology he sought to dismantle.

The trajectory of Cojot’s life intersected with global history once more in 1976 when he and his son were taken hostage by Palestinian and West German radicals. During the week-long standoff at Entebbe International Airport in Uganda, Cojot leveraged his linguistic skills to act as a crucial intermediary between the captors and the terrified passengers. He served as a translator for the Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, a role that allowed him to observe the hijackers’ movements and the physical layout of the terminal from the inside.

Upon his release, Cojot provided the Mossad with critical intelligence regarding the hostage site, data that reportedly informed the tactical planning for Operation Thunderbolt. His contributions remained largely absent from mainstream accounts of the rescue, including the 2018 feature film 7 Days in Entebbe. Dvir’s documentary seeks to rectify this historical omission by incorporating interviews with all four of Cojot’s children and utilizing archival footage of the man himself.

The production process itself became a multi-year endeavor that required Dvir to navigate complex historical narratives and personal testimonies. While initially intending to focus on the pilot Michel Bacos, Dvir shifted his investigative lens after repeated mentions of Cojot from former hostages. The resulting film, narrated by actor Jason Alexander, serves as both a biography and a corrective to the established record of the Entebbe affair.

The release of To Kill a Nazi arrives during a period of heightened sensitivity regarding the representation of Jewish and Israeli narratives in the arts. Dvir noted that while the film has secured screenings at various international festivals, including the Chelsea Film Festival, the process of finding distribution has required significant effort. He remains focused on the film’s reception, viewing the project as a necessary act of historical reclamation that transcends the typical boundaries of documentary filmmaking.

The resonance of Cojot’s story was underscored in late September when a separate, thwarted hijacking attempt on a flight bound for Israel occurred just as Dvir arrived in the country. This event served as a stark reminder of the enduring nature of the threats that defined Cojot’s life. The parallels were not lost on audiences, who viewed the historical account through the lens of contemporary security concerns.

Cojot’s legacy is defined by his transition from a victim of state-sponsored terror to a man who refused to succumb to the cycle of violence. His decision to testify against Klaus Barbie in the late 1980s, rather than acting as his executioner, solidified his commitment to legal accountability. By documenting these actions, Dvir ensures that the tactical and moral dimensions of the Entebbe rescue are finally attributed to their rightful participant.

The film’s upcoming schedule includes screenings in Austin and Harrisburg, with the director actively seeking a broader streaming platform to house the narrative. As the documentary reaches wider audiences, the story of the man who helped save 102 hostages from the tarmac at Entebbe continues to challenge the conventional, simplified accounts of the crisis. The work serves as a testament to the importance of individual agency within the machinery of geopolitical conflict.