101 Squadron "The First Fighter Squadron"
Hatzor Air Base, 1967
flown by Giora Epstein ”Even" during the "Six Days War"
Model: Mirage IIICJ "Shahak"
Serial 56
Col. Giora Epstein “Even”, born in 1938, is Israel Air Force’s leading ace with 17 victories. After the 1956 “Suez War”, Giora “Even” (Stone in hebrew) attended at flight school and in 1963 flew french made fighters: Dassault “Ouragons”, “Super Mysteres”, and Mirage IIIs. Late the 1973 flew Israeli Aircraft Industries “Neshers” and “Kfirs” and General Dynamics F-16 “Fighting Falcons”. In over 5.000 hours of fighting time, Giora scored 17 victories. 5 egyptian MiGs were shot down in the “Six Days War” in 1967 while in the 1973 “Yom Kippur War”, Even shot down 12 egyptian aircraft, eight of them in only 26 hours: two Sukhoi SU-7s, two Sukhoi SU-20s, and four Mikoyan Gurevich MiG-21s. After the ‘73 war, Giora was awarded the “Medal of Ideal”, one of Israel’s highest military honors. After commanding IAF squadrons for years is now a retired IAF Reserve colonel and a Captain for EL-AL airlines.
