Giora Romm

Giora Romm was born in 1945 in Tel Aviv

Giora Romm was born in Tel Aviv in 1945 to parents who came from Poland. He attended the military boarding school next to the Reali School in Haifa and was active in the Scouts.

He earned a bachelor's degree in economics and political science from Bar-Ilan University. He later earned an MBA from UCLA in Los Angeles.

Romm joined the IDF in 1962 and flew the Mirage with the Bat Squadron. In the Six-Day War he shot down 5 enemy aircraft and became the air force's first jet ace. In the War of Attrition in 1969 he was shot down over Egypt, held and tortured in prison near Cairo, and released in a prisoner exchange.

He took command of the Skyhawk squadron at Tel Nof just before the Yom Kippur War and led attack sorties in Egypt. He later commanded the Ramon and Tel Nof air bases and flew an F-15 in Operation Wooden Leg in Tunisia. He served as deputy air force commander and as military attaché in the United States as a major general, and left the IDF in 1996.

After the army he headed the Ministry of National Infrastructure, then the Jewish Agency from 2001 and the Civil Aviation Authority from 2008 to 2014. His book Tulip Four, about his captivity, won the Yitzhak Sadeh Prize. He was married to Miriam, had 2 sons and a daughter, and died of cancer in 2023.