picture 184766

This Douglas C-47 Skytrain operated by the United Nations was provided to Folke Bernadotte, Count of Wisborg (1895–1948), while he was serving as the United Nations Mediator in Palestine. Bernadotte had become famous for organising exchanges of over 11,000 prisoners from Germany during the Second World War, and for rescuing 15,000 people from German concentration camps. On 20 May 1948, he was tasked by the United Nations with negotiating a truce between unilaterally declared Israel and its Arab enemies. However, Count Bernadotte would be assassinated by the Jewish terrorist group Lehi, commonly known in the West as the Stern Gang, on 17 September 1948. (Artwork by Luca Canossa)