Victims' names and their sports, Flickr
Top: Amitzur Shapira, David Berger, Eliezer Halfin, Josef Romano, Kehat Shorr.
Bottom: Moshe Weinberg, Mark Slavin, Jacob Springer, Josef Gutfreund, Andre Spitzer.
Absent Ze'ev Friedman.
Black September originated in the long 1948 Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Jordan-Palestinian Liberation Organisation/PLO conflict. The post-war UN partition plan of Palestine envisaged both an Arab and a Jewish state, but after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, only Israel existed with many Palestinians displaced. From 1964, P.L.0’s goal was self-determination for Palestine, especially after the 1967 war, in what the Palestinians called The Catastrophe.
Jordan’s King Hussein ruled more Palestinian refugees than Jordanians and he feared the PLO. His army killed thousands of Palestinians in Sept 1970. Black September, an affiliated extremist wing of the PLO, was formed in 1971 to avenge the slaughter, assassinating the Jordanian Prime Minister. Japanese terrorists recruited by a Palestinian group massacred 26 at Israel's Airport May 1972. But killing young, world athletes in a distant country would be a new obscenity.
The Munich Games in Sept continued for 10 days without incident, and security officials relaxed. But on Sept 4, while the Israelis enjoyed their Village flat, some Palestinians planned an operation under Palestinian Commander Issa. At 4am partying athletes helped the track-suited fedayeen over the Village fence, carrying Kalashnikovs and grenades in duffel bags. These Black Septemberniks were linked to the PLO.
Black September terrorists on the balcony
outside the Israeli athletes' flat
Olympic Village Munich
As West German authorities scrambled to respond, the Games continued normally; it was 7 hours into the situation before anyone saw the crisis. This became the first time terrorism had reached a live global audience. Despite the Israeli wrestling judge blocking them, the terrorists pushed in. Two men escaped out the back window, but 11 other teammates were shackled. Josef Romano and Moshe Weinberg were killed grabbing the terrorists’ guns.
When the Olympic Village woke, officials locked the gates and flats. At 7am, papers signed by Black September floated from a window detailing the terrorists’ demand: release of 234 terrorist prisoners in Israel and 2 in West Germany, or an Israeli hostage would be executed every hour. The freed terrorists would be taken to an Arab country.
As German officers negotiated, Israeli P.M Golda Meir trusted West German officials to protect her athletes on German soil. Alas their rescue attempts failed eg German police officers went onto nearby rooftops. But as the world watched on live TV, so did the terrorists inside the flat. As the Germans stalled, Issa grew impatient, threatening to kill all the athletes. A truce was reached: the terrorists and hostages would be flown to Fürstenfeldbruck military airfield Munich where a Boeing 727 would fly to Cairo.
That night the 8 terrorists and the surviving hostages arrived at the airport. Issa inspect the Boeing and found an empty plane waiting. 13 German police officers dressed as flight crew for a planned ambush i.e to kill the hostage-takers as they emerged from the helicopters to board the plane. But the police had no trained snipers, little equipment and no data on how many Black September members were there.
As Issa and his mate returned from the deserted plane, police sharp shooters fired from a rooftop. The scene descended into chaotic crossfire and the airfield plunged into blackness. The West Germans shot 5 of the 8 terrorists, but not before the terrorists massacred all of the remaining Israeli hostages, and a West German policeman. Three of the Black September members escaped and were soon captured. Only at 3am did the ABC announce to world audiences that the athletes had all been killed. The well-intended German rescue attempt was a tragic failure.
When the Olympic Village woke, officials locked the gates and flats. At 7am, papers signed by Black September floated from a window detailing the terrorists’ demand: release of 234 terrorist prisoners in Israel and 2 in West Germany, or an Israeli hostage would be executed every hour. The freed terrorists would be taken to an Arab country.
As German officers negotiated, Israeli P.M Golda Meir trusted West German officials to protect her athletes on German soil. Alas their rescue attempts failed eg German police officers went onto nearby rooftops. But as the world watched on live TV, so did the terrorists inside the flat. As the Germans stalled, Issa grew impatient, threatening to kill all the athletes. A truce was reached: the terrorists and hostages would be flown to Fürstenfeldbruck military airfield Munich where a Boeing 727 would fly to Cairo.
That night the 8 terrorists and the surviving hostages arrived at the airport. Issa inspect the Boeing and found an empty plane waiting. 13 German police officers dressed as flight crew for a planned ambush i.e to kill the hostage-takers as they emerged from the helicopters to board the plane. But the police had no trained snipers, little equipment and no data on how many Black September members were there.
As Issa and his mate returned from the deserted plane, police sharp shooters fired from a rooftop. The scene descended into chaotic crossfire and the airfield plunged into blackness. The West Germans shot 5 of the 8 terrorists, but not before the terrorists massacred all of the remaining Israeli hostages, and a West German policeman. Three of the Black September members escaped and were soon captured. Only at 3am did the ABC announce to world audiences that the athletes had all been killed. The well-intended German rescue attempt was a tragic failure.
The flag was flown at half mast
to honour the murdered athletes
at Munich's main stadium, NPR
The Olympic Games had been suspended for 34 hours, with a memorial for the Israelis held in the main stadium the next morning. But Pres. Avery Brundage (International Olympic Committee) declared that the Games must go on. Only Israeli survivors and coffins flew home.
The nation stood in silence
when the Israeli athletes' coffins arrived at Lod Airport,
Sept 7, 1972. Origins
Global coverage shocked the world, affecting public opinion on non-state violence as a political tool. Germans had tried to save the athletes, but were seen as unprepared because security was in the hands of State (not Federal) authorities i.e people without expertise in hostage situations. And West Germany's post-war constitution limited the domestic use of the army in peacetime. Meanwhile some Germans blamed the Israelis for ignoring the terrorists’ demands.
Many Palestinians saw the terrorist attack as bringing welcome, worldwide attention to their struggle, despite denunciations for the terrorists’ methods. But the Munich massacre in Sept 1972 had lasting repercussions on an international scale, waking up Western governments to the threat of terrorism, showing the power of live broadcast and setting the stage for future violence.
Later tensions worsened when Black September sympathisers hijacked a Lufthansa flight in Oct 1972, demanding that the 3 Black September members in West German detention be freed. The West Germans complied! The 3 surviving Munich killers arrived as heroes in Libya, saved by Moammar Gaddafi. Golda Meir and all the Jews were devastated. Spouse and I had already left Central Europe and were safely in London, but we never fully recovered.
The development of counterterrorism forces grew so that new special forces could respond to hostage situations and terrorism eg in Entebbe (1976) and Somalia (1977). Now read One Day in September by Simon Reeve (2005) and Munich 1972: Tragedy, Terror and Triumph by David Large (2012) .
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18 comments:
Following the Munich massacre, Israeli prime minister Golda Meir ordered the intelligence agency Mossad to track down and assassinate those responsible. Known as Operation Wrath of God, the mission spanned Europe, North Africa and the Middle East for years. Agents eliminated more than a dozen militants connected to Black September and the PLO, plus at least one innocent man, a Moroccan waiter in Norway. Of the eight gunmen who took part in the Munich massacre, five were killed at the airport the same night, and two were either assassinated or died later. One was thought to be alive.
After the eleven Israeli team members were murdered by Palestinian terrorists, the Munich massacre felt even worse. At the memorial service, Brundage condemned the politicisation of sports and he refused to cancel the remainder of the 1972 Olympics, stating that the Games must go on. What was he thinking?
Many thanks for the 2012 Guardian newspaper article.
Although I remembered the entire catastrophe at the Munich Olympic Games, what happened in the years after 1972 was never publicised. I assume my readers won't even have heard of the Operation Wrath of God.
Deb
If an Australian footballer died in the middle of a game here, can you imagine just removing the body off the field and going on with the rest of the game? I imagine the 60,000 people in the stands would remain silent and in tears.
Apparently Brundage was infamous for his racism, sexism and anti-Semitism. Pre-WW2, he fought to send a U.S. team to the 1936 Olympics. He wrote in the AOC's pamphlet that American athletes should not become involved in "the present Jew-Nazi altercation." As the Olympics controversy heated up in 1935, Brundage alleged the existence of a "Jewish-Communist conspiracy" to keep the U.S out of the Games.
https://www.ushmm.org/exhibition/olympics/?content=favor_participation&lang=en
My first thought as I read this was, I don't remember it, my second thought was of course you don't you were only 10, moving on from that this was horrible thank you for posting about it so I could learn about it.
Jo-Anne
I would love to have gone to the Munich Olympics but I was pregnant and wanted to settle in London before the baby was born in September. My father had had a close relationship with the Olympics in Australia, so it would have been a special fortnight.
Your powerful account of the Munich tragedy reminds us how the hopeful spirit of the 1972 Munich Olympic Games was shattered by violence, forever changing how the world understands terrorism and the need for preparedness.
I didn't know any detail about the massacre, so thank you for improving my knowledge.
roentare
I totally agree that the 1972 Games were very important for Germany and the world, intending to prove that the horrors of WW2 were past and would never return.
But I am not sure how clearly terrorism was understood and handled. Following the Black September terrorists into Israeli Olympic quarters 4:30 a.m, the response was delayed, disorganised and chaotic. Avery Brundage, President of the International Olympic Committee, refused to postpose the Games and called the massacre "suspected Israeli communist conspiracies".
Andrew
you may choose to see "September 5", the film about the Munich Olympics released in 2025 in Australia. If you want to understand the terror of Munich, the film is worth watching, even though you won't sleep at night.
I do remember this massacre. So sad and so poorly handled. I saw the film about it recently, but you explained the details better. A real tragedy.
I can't recall this dreadful tragedy at all, Hels. Thanks for enlightening me, and how awful it must have been, so sad.
gluten Free
athletes sent to the Olympic Games by their own nations are the proudest and most skilled citizens those nations have. More important I think than prime ministers, university professors and film stars. However I believe the athletes trusted the German police and army to look after them, and were delighted to travel to Munich. How wrong they were :(
Margaret
Back then, I believed that every Australian was so sports mad, we would have not moved from the tv for the fortnight of the Olympics. Teachers discussed the tragedy with their pupils and ministers with their congregations.
I remember this sad event, but not a lot of the details. It was sad to read about this again, but interesting to get the details. Maybe some day we will have peace in the world, but it doesn't seem to be coming soon.
Erika
I don't think of the 1972 murders of those beautiful athletes very often these days, thank goodness. But when the Bondi Beach massacre happened in mid Dec 2025, my response was the same - anxiety, fear of strangers, sleeplessness :(
I was a baby when this happened and if I've heard of it before, there was no detail.
Our collective skills around counter-terrorism and hostage situations hs improved to be unrecognisable, which is good but sad.
kylie
my father was the engineer in charge of all water sports in 1956, when the Games were in Melbourne. I loved going to the swimming, diving and water polo events :)
By 1972, I definitely would have gone to the Munich Games but the timing wasn't good because spouse and I had continued our trip from Tel Aviv on to London. Nonetheless it was a terrible, terrible time.
Would we have handled the massacres better now? After Bondi Beach, I am not certain.
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