Operation Wooden Leg (Hebrew: מבצע רגל עץ, Mivtza Regel Etz) was an Israeli airstrike on the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) headquarters in Hammam Chott, near Tunis, Tunisia, on 1 October 1985.

With a target 1,280 miles (2,060 km) from the operation's starting point, this was the most distant publicly known action undertaken by the Israel Defense Forces since the Entebbe raid in 1976.

Under the plan, PLO fighters would travel to the Israeli coast in a freighter and land in rubber dinghies, then hijack a bus or two and force the drivers to transport them to the Kirya, the Israeli military headquarters in Tel Aviv, where they would kill the sentries and storm the compound, killing as many people as they could and trying to target the Minister of Defense and Chief of Staff.

On 20 April, the Atavarius, a ship carrying the PLO raiding force, was intercepted and sunk by two Israeli missile boats.

In a subsequent raid on 24 April, four Israeli missile boats and Shayetet 13 commandos sank the Moonlight, another ship leased for the operation, at its dock in Algeria.

[4] In the aftermath of the incident, Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin ordered plans drawn up for a retaliatory operation against the PLO's base in Tunisia.

The victims were Reuven Paltsur, 53, his wife Esther 50, both of Haifa, and their friend Avraham Avneri, 53, of Arad who had taken a vacation cruise to nearby Cyprus marina, a popular spot for Israelis.

[7] Paltsur, who owned the yacht, was described as a dedicated sailor, active in the Sea Scouts and other movements promoting seafaring among Israelis.

The latter was identified as British citizen lan Michael Davison who had joined the PLO cause and fought alongside Yasser Arafat two years prior.

[12][4] Gordon Thomas claimed in his controversial book Gideon's Spies that many of the subsequent stories in the Arab press warning of Israeli retaliation were planted by LAP [fr], the Mossad's department of psychological warfare.

The route was designed to avoid detection by Egyptian and Libyan radars and United States Navy vessels patrolling the Mediterranean.

Shortly before the arrival there was another refueling and then the remaining eight F-15 fighter bombers flew in two groups low over the shore and each dropped one GBU-15 precision-guided munition on the PLO headquarters, a cluster of sand-colored buildings along the seaside.

Each bomb was then guided to the target using a TV guidance head by the Weapon systems officer (WSO) sitting in the back.

[20] In Pollard's court defense memorandum, he stated that his Israeli handlers "stressed the fact that the mission could not have been undertaken without the information I made available".

Following Operation Wooden Leg, the PLO searched for an alternative location to hold its next congress, as it was assumed that Israel would launch a similar attack against it.

As it was assumed that Israel would launch a similar raid, the Algerian military established a twenty-kilometer no-fly zone around the Club Des Pins, stationed an anti-aircraft missile battery nearby, and kept four fighter jets flying a combat air patrol over the area and additional fighter jets on standing alert at their bases every time PLO representatives were meeting.

Two more fighter jets were scrambled to reinforce the combat air patrol over the Club des Pins, which was ordered to turn and take a position in front of the incoming aircraft.

[23][24] While the two incoming formations were never spotted or identified by other means, it was presumed that they were Israeli aircraft en route to bomb the Club des Pins.

[26] This was followed by Britain's Prime Minister Thatcher, on a visit to Jordan in early September, announcing the invitation of a Jordanian delegation including two members of the PLO for talks with the British Foreign Secretary, Geoffrey Howe.

[27][28] On 27 September, King Hussein announced in a speech to the United Nations that Jordan was willing to start direct negotiations with Israel.

[29] Prior to the King's arrival in New York, the US administration had announced it was submitting to Congress the purposed sale of weapons to Jordan worth $1.5 billion.

The motion put forward by Tunisia was passed unanimously 14–0, though the call for sanctions and the description of Israel as a "terrorist state" had been dropped.

The UK listening post on Mount Olympus, Cyprus, and the US 6th Fleet based around Crete would have detected the aircraft as soon as they were in the air.