• Source: Munir Redfa

Captain Munir Redfa (Arabic: منير ردفا, Syriac: ܡܘܢܝܪ ܪܕܦܐ), born Munir Habib Jamil Rufa (Arabic: منير حبيب جميل روفا, Syriac: ܡܘܢܝܪ ܚܒܝܒ ܓܡܝܠ ܪܘܦܐ‎) (1934 – c. 1998) was an Iraqi fighter pilot.
After Qasim's coup, Redfa was one of only five pilots the new regime trusted to continue serving with the sole Iraqi unit operating the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21, 11th Squadron.
Redfa defected in 1966 in "Operation Diamond", flying a MiG-21 of the Iraqi Air Force to Israel. In what is considered one of the Mossad's most successful operations, Redfa's entire extended family was smuggled safely out of Iraq to Israel. The MiG-21 fighter was evaluated by the Israeli Air Force and was later loaned to the United States for testing and intelligence analysis, as part of "Have Doughnut". Knowledge obtained from analysis of the aircraft was instrumental to the successes achieved by the Israeli Air Force in its future encounters with Arab MiG-21s. Redfa's defection was the subject of the movie Steal the Sky (1988).
Redfa was an Assyrian, adherent of the Chaldean Catholic Church.
Redfa died of a heart attack around 1998.




See also


Viktor Belenko
List of Cold War pilot defections




References






External links


Stealing a Soviet MiG, Jewish Virtual Library.

Kata Kunci Pencarian:

• Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21
• Munir Redfa
• Steal the Sky
• Operation Diamond
• Ben Cross
• Have Doughnut
• Area 51
• List of Cold War pilot defections
• Mossad
• Iraqi Air Force
• List of Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21 operators