The commemorations of the 50th anniversary of the attack carried out by a Palestinian commando that cost the lives of eleven athletes brought together Israelis and Germans on Monday to try to heal the still open wounds of the tragedy.
On behalf of Germany, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier asked the relatives of the victims for “forgiveness” and took responsibility for the mistakes made by Germany.
“As head of state of this country and on behalf of the Federal Republic of Germany, I apologize for the lack of protection of Israeli athletes during the Olympic Games in Munich and for the lack of explanations afterwards; by the fact that what happened could have happened“, he said in the presence of his counterpart from Israel, isaac herzog.
The ceremony took place at the military base of Fürstenfeldbrucksome 30 kilometers west of Munich, where an ill-prepared police assault to free the hostages ended in a “bloodbath”, in the words of the German president.
“We are talking about a great tragedy and a triple flop. The first failure concerns the preparation of the Games and the concept of security. The second is the events of September 5 and 6, 1972. The third failure begins the day after the attack: silence, repression, oblivion,” Steinmeier added.
What happened at the Munich Olympics
The attack, on the eleventh day of the Munich Games, left an indelible mark on the history of Olympism. Eight members of the Palestinian organization Black September they attacked the Israeli delegation at dawn in their accommodation in the Olympic Village.
They killed two Israeli athletes and took nine others hostage, hoping to exchange them for more than 200 Palestinian prisoners. After long hours of negotiations, the intervention of the German security services in the military base failed “catastrophically”, said the German president.
All nine hostages were killed in the operation, along with a West German policeman. Five of the eight hijackers were killed and the other three captured.
A total of 18 people died in the hostage taking and many media around the world described the events as “munich massacre“.
The “Joy Games“, which should make us forget those held in Berlin in 1936 under the Nazi regime, became a failure. “We were not prepared for such an attack and yet we should have been,” admitted Steinmeier.
The police assault was poorly organized. German police “did not make the slightest attempt to save lives,” he said. Zvi Zamirthen head of Israel’s foreign intelligence service (Mossad), in a declassified report in 2012.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) decided not to interrupt the Games.
The painful journey of the families of the victims
Relatives of the deceased “hit a wall” every time they tried to get answers from Germany or the IOC, according to Israeli President Isaac Herzog.
“They don’t know what we’ve been through for the last 50 years,” he told AFP. ankie spitzerwhose husband Andrei was one of the coaches killed in Munich.
The commemorations were on the verge of becoming a fiasco with the threat of boycott by the families who have been fighting for decades to get Germany to pay adequate compensation.
Last week a last minute agreement was reached and the government of Olaf Scholz agreed to pay a sum of 28 million euros (a similar figure in dollars), which will be assumed in part by the federated state of bavaria and the city of Munich.
The German government had previously offered 10 million euros, including some 4.5 million already paid in 1972 and 2002.
Source: Ambito
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