One Day in September (1999) Movie Script
A morning like any other in Munich...
a city where tradition and modernity
exist happily side by side.
This summer our beautiful city
plays host...
to the 20th Olympic Games.
There, in the center of the future
Olympic site, is the Olympic tower.
Next to it,
the Olympic arena.
For many visitors,
Munich is a kind of German paradise.
We're sure that you'll agree.
Well, nobody could foresee
what later on happened.
From the wires
of the APand UPI.
Good afternoon.
This is Paul Mandel reporting.
Another deadline
has come and gone-
They had their hands tied in front of
them, their hands were tied like that.
Quite a frightening experience.
It wasn't any James Bond,;
it was the real thing.
- I just want to know what happened.
- The Games must go on.
The deadline appears, to us,
to be less than one minute away.
- Unbelievable.
- Spitz is a Jew, and it was feared...
an attempt might be made
to seize him.
Behind them was an Arab guerilla
with some kind of weapon in his hand.
All seems to be-
It was only a year and three months
that I was married to Andre Spitzer...
but it made such
an enormous impression on me...
sometimes it looks
like a lifetime.
I went fencing, and he happened
to be my fencing master.
I didn't know
he was from Israel at all.
He spoke Dutch,
but with a slight accent...
so I thought he maybe is from
Eastern Europe or something.
Ankie Spitzer
He had something about him
which really appealed to me.
He was very much
at peace with himself...
and also with
the people around him.
It was very attractive
to me because...
I was not so at peace
with everyone and everybody...
and certainly not with myself.
Being the person that he was, it was
hard not to fall in love with him.
I am a member
of a Palestinian family...
which fled our village in Galilee
from Zionist gangs in 1948.
As refugees, my family moved from
camp to camp...
before finally ending up
at the Chatila camp in Beirut.
When I was growing up, I thought
there was no future for us...
unless we returned to Palestine.
If we didn't return,
I would spend my whole life...
as a refugee deprived of
any kind of human rights.
So I joined
the liberation movement...
and was given a gun
and trained to use it.
For the first time in my life I felt
inspired, I felt truly Palestinian...
that I wasn't
just a wretched refugee...
but a revolutionary
fighting for a cause.
I joined the revolution
since 1967.
- Which revolution?
- The Palestinian revolution.
It has affected the course
of the rest of my life.
You have only to look at the way
I have to do this interview...
so many years later,
still in hiding.
We lived in the northern border
between Lebanon and Israel...
and it was way out in nowhere.
They decided to have
their fencing academy there.
He was going from town to town,
from village to village...
to try to teach the youngsters...
through the art of fencing,
to have respect for each other...
because fencing
is an aggressive sport.
You have a weapon in your hand.
You're going to attack somebody.
If you attack him right,
then you score a point.
But he tried
to teach the youngsters...
how to channel that aggression...
into respect for your opponent.
It was very tough living there, but I
remember that year we lived there...
as the most beautiful
and most wonderful year of my life.
I did a few tours of duty
in training camps in Lebanon...
and then the leadership sent us
to Libya for special training.
The training was hard and advanced.
We were there for about one month.
It seemed to me we were
getting special training.
We began to get a feeling that
something big was underway.
He dreamt always to be once
at the Olympics.
Years before,
before I knew him...
he said that he was thinking
about to get to the Olympics once...
because, I think, for every athlete,
that's the climax of your career.
For Andre and the rest
of the Israeli team...
the 1972 Olympics held
a particular significance...
because they were held in Munich,
Germany, the birthplace of Nazism.
There was a feeling that this was
a huge event for the Israeli team...
to be coming and attending...
and therefore their presence
in the Olympic village...
certainly their presence
in the opening ceremony...
when their team marched under the flag
of the Star of David...
were very emotional moments.
The Germans saw the games
as an opportunity to erase...
the negative memories many still had
of the 1936 Berlin Olympics...
which had been misused by the Nazis
for propaganda purposes.
Twenty-seven years
after the end of the war...
Munich was the ideal opportunity
to show the world...
the new democratic face
of Germany.
The friendliness was in overdrive.
It was a massive attempt,
and it hit you straightaway...
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Reporter
to appear open and modern
and shorn of their past.
To help promote this new
non-militaristic image of Germany...
security was kept deliberately lax.
Police were banned
from the Olympic sites...
and in their place were
clad in specially designed outfits.
Jacov Springer
Israeli Weightlifting Coach
Jacov Springer
Israeli Weightlifting Coach
But for some of the Israeli team,
it was not so easy to erase the past.
My father, he was five times
in the Olympic Games.
Five times is a special thing.
He was born in Poland in 1921.
His father was from Germany
originally...
and thought that because he's speaking
German, nothing would happen to them.
Alex Springer
So all the family stayed in Poland
during the war...
but my father ran to Russia.
He didn't want to stay because he was
afraid something will happen to them.
And all the family...
his brothers, sisters
and his parents...
were killed in Poland.
He was the only one who survived.
Thirty-six years
after the Nazi Olympics...
Dachau, the first of the concentration
camps, was chosen as the site...
for an Olympic memorial service.
The Israeli team
came to the service...
along with competitors
from most European countries.
Dachau is just six miles
from the Munich stadium.
I think it was very difficult
for him with the memories...
of his family
and what the Germans did to them.
I think he felt this.
But maybe it was also
for him to-
to show something to the Germans...
that " Here I am, coming back
to the Olympic Games...
and you-
you couldn't really destroy me. "
Spitz is still holding them off.
He's got a half a meter lead.
Down on the near side is- But Spitz is
gonna go in. Spitz wins the gold medal!
Mark Spitz, USA.
And that is the whistle anyway,
and the United States...
have kept their unbeaten record
unless-
The referee says there's
three more seconds to play.
The only way they're going to score
is by going for a long shot.
And they got it!
My goodness, I don't believe it.
I do not believe it.
The Russians have got the gold.
Victory for the USSR
for the first time ever.
Absolutely fantastic.
She loves every moment of it!
Myself and two others traveled
from Libya to Germany...
two days before the operation.
We went to a hotel which the
leadership had given us the address of.
There we met up with
the rest of the team-
another group of three and two leaders
who had been in Munich for some time.
The following day my friend and I...
went to a couple of volleyball games
at the Olympic Park.
We still had not been told what
the target of our operation was to be.
After one of the competitions he said,
"Hey, there is the Lebanese team.
I'm going over
to say hello to them. "
I, coming from Holland, said,
'Are you out of your mind?"
They are from Lebanon.
Israel was in a state of war
with Lebanon.
He said, 'Ankie, that's exactly what
the Olympics are all about.
Here I can go to them and talk to them.
That's what the Olympics are about. "
So he went over and he asked
how were your results...
and I'm from Israel,
and how did it go?
To my big amazement, I saw
that the people responded...
and they shook hands with him
and they talked to him...
Ankie Spitzer
and they asked him about his results.
I'll never forget when he turned
around and came back towards me...
with this huge smile
on his face and said...
"You see? This is what
I was dreaming about. "
After ten days, Andre's fencers
finished their competitions...
and he and Ankie traveled to Holland
to spend time with their baby Anouk...
whom they had left
in the care of Ankie's parents.
The next morning at 10:00,
he had to take the train to Munich.
He woke up a little bit late.
We got to the train station,
and the train had left.
I was desperate because I thought
he's going to get in trouble...
when he gets back to Munich because
they're waiting for him there.
He said,
"Well, another day with you. "
I said, " No, let's try the other
train station about 30 miles onwards. "
So we raced to the next station...
and in Eindhoven in Holland,
that's where he jumped on the train.
Without a ticket.
The train was already in the station.
I still remember me
running next to the train...
and he left.
And that was the last time
I saw him.
On the night of September 4,
as Andre arrived back at the village...
the Israeli delegation was enjoying
a night out at the theater...
watching Fiddler on the Roof.
They returned to the village
at midnight.
The night of the operation...
we went to the restaurant
in the railway station for dinner.
There we met with the chief
of the organization...
who for the first time told us
what the target of our operation was.
I felt very proud...
that for the first time I was able
to confront the Israelis.
Our passports and belongings
were taken from us...
so there wouldn't be any clue
as to who we were.
Then we all went to the village.
As we were climbing
over the fence...
we ran into a group
of American athletes...
who were sneaking in
after a night out.
I remember they were drunk.
The funny thing is that we actually
helped each other to climb over.
I held my hand out...
and we lifted one
of them into the village.
We said thank you and good-bye.
With the help of members
of the East German team...
the terrorist leaders had entered
and studied the Olympic village...
in the days prior
to the attack.
Now they headed straight
for the Israeli men's quarters.
We headed towards the building.
Each of us
was carrying a sports bag...
filled with weapons,
hidden under clothes.
Each of us was given
a specific task.
My job was to guard the outside of
the building while the others went in.
The Israelis were
in five apartments.
Apartment one
housed the team coaches.
The terrorists went there first.
As they broke in, wrestling coach Moshe
Weinberger attempted to stop them...
but he was shot and wounded.
The leader went
into the first room...
but didn't realize there was
an Israeli behind him.
He was attacked full force
and his weapon was taken.
Another member of our group panicked
and shot the Israeli.
The terrorists demanded that
Weinberger, already heavily wounded...
show them where the rest
of the Israelis were.
At gunpoint, he led them
past apartment two...
which housed
the field athletes...
to apartment three, which contained
the weight lifters and wrestlers.
Weinberger calculated that
they might stand some chance...
of overpowering the terrorists.
I got out of bed and went outside...
only to find myself
standing in front of a terrorist...
wearing a balaclava hood
and a yellow sweater.
The terrorists were already holding
all five of Gad Zabari's roommates.
Now, weight lifter David Berger,
suggests they attack the terrorists...
saying,
"We have nothing to lose. "
But a gunman understands and jabs
a machine gun into Zabari's waist...
ordering him towards the exit
and back to apartment number one.
And that's how
I came to be the first in line.
My friends are behind me
with their heads bowed.
I feel in a bit of a daze
when suddenly I see...
another terrorist ahead of me,
wearing a balaclava hood.
Suddenly the reality
of what's happening hits me.
As I get closer,
he orders me in this direction.
But as he's giving me the order...
I push his Kalashnikov aside
and run.
He shoots two or three rounds at me.
But I don't think
about the shots, I just run.
I run for about 70 meters...
and then jump over the village fence
and into the first building I see.
As Gad Zabari ran away...
the already wounded Moshe Weinberger
heroically jumped on the terrorists.
He was shot and killed.
We had no orders to kill.
We were forced to
only when things went wrong.
I heard some shots,
so I walked up to the window...
and then I realized
Moshe Weinberger...
has been thrown out
of the door...
to the pavement.
He was naked,
without anything on him.
Shmuel Lalkin
Head Israeli
And I saw that he was dead
because blood was pooling around him.
This was when I thought
that we were attacked by somebody.
This is ABC.
I'm Jim McKay speaking to you live,
at this moment...
from ABC headquarters,
Munich, West Germany.
The Olympics of serenity
have become the one thing...
the Germans didn't want them to be:
the Olympics of terror.
I had the first telephone call
from the head of the team...
Dan Shilon
Israeli Television
this morning at 6:00,
and he told me that the Arabs are there...
and one of the Israelis
was killed.
His name is Moshe Weinberger...
Israeli Journalist
and I saw his body carried out
after one hour into an ambulance.
That body was smashed...
which means he was killed
by a machine gun...
not by a regular gun.
I was sleeping.
My parents came to wake me up,
and they said...
"We just heard on the radio
that there was an attack...
at the Israeli quarters
of the Olympic village.
They killed one of the Israelis,
and they say it was the boxing coach. "
I know there was no boxing coach,
so I jumped out of my bed.
I thought, if it is not the
boxing coach, then what coach is it?
Maybe it's Andre.
How many Israelis are they
holding as hostage in the block?
Around 16, 17.
Thirteen members of the Israeli team
as hostages.
There are nine hostages.
Nobody could tell me
if Andre was a part of this...
if he was one of the hostages,
if he escaped.
Nobody could tell me.
When I arrived on the scene,
I met a young female police officer...
who was talking to a man
dressed in a white suit.
He was Issa,
the terrorists' spokesman.
Issa expressed his demands
in a staccato manner.
He was very cool
and very determined...
clearly fanatical
in his convictions.
The terrorists handed
a communique to the police.
In it they demanded the release of
more than 200 revolutionary prisoners...
from jails in Israel,
Germany and elsewhere.
If this was not done
by 12:00 noon...
the hostages would be executed.
And you have until 12:00?
They said that at 12:00
they will shoot.
I certainly took it seriously because
I was standing there on gunpoint...
where always two or three
machine guns pointed on me...
and the leader of the terrorists
had a hand grenade in his hands.
Walther Trger
Mayor of Olympic Village
So I had to take it seriously.
When he was discussing with me,
he always had that hand grenade.
Somebody's going inside.
The negotiators knew nothing
about the terrorists...
except what they saw.
Three were visible
at any one time.
Issa, the leader, his face blackened
with shoe polish.
Tony, second in command, usually at the
first floor window wearing a cowboy hat.
And another man
guarding the balcony door.
Issa told the negotiators...
that a second Israeli
had been shot and killed...
while trying to overpower
his captors.
The terrorist leader refused
to identify the dead man...
or allow his body
to be removed...
until all the political prisoners
on the communique had been released.
My camera crew and I ended up,
for all of that long day...
looking down
into this little walkway...
very quiet.
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Reporter
And in a sense, you were looking down
into the cockpit of world events.
We opened up all the radios
and television stations...
to get some information.
Then at 9:00 in the morning, I found out
that Andre is one of the hostages.
The men in the room:
Josef Romano is 31 years old...
The men in the room:
Josef Romano is 31 years old...
an Israeli weight lifter
in the middleweight class...
David Berger, 26 years old,
in the light heavyweight class...
Ziev Friedman, another 26-year-old
weight lifter in the bantamweight class.
These strong men sitting helpless
there at the point of submachine guns.
Eliezer Halfin, 24 years old,
a freestyle wrestler, is in that room.
Mark Slavin is 18 years old,
a Greco-Roman wrestler.
The others are officials,
Joseph Gotfriend, Jacob Springer...
Andre Spitzer, Kehat Shorr
and Amitzur Shapiro.
We have a situation.
In Israel, the population awoke
to the shocking news.
Demand the release of some 200 Arabs
now being held in Israel.
The Israeli government
immediately made it clear...
that in line with their policy, no deals
would be struck with the terrorists.
Golda Meir
Prime Minister of Israel 1969-1974
If we should give in,
then no Israeli anywhere in the world...
can feel that his life is safe.
It's blackmail of the worst kind.
At this time I was the aide-de-camp
of Minister Genscher.
And the minister
was shocked, of course.
General Ulrich K. Wegener
He wanted to see the Minister
of Interior of Bavaria...
because he was responsible.
We are a federal state.
So they talked to each other and they
decided to go to the Olympic village.
In terms of the politicians
and the VIPs who came...
they looked to me as if
they held none of the cards...
as if they basically did not understand,
one, how to respond...
and two, the mind-set of the people
they were dealing with.
The Palestinians that one saw,
there was that feeling...
that they were in charge
and that they were dictating.
When it became clear to me
that negotiation was fruitless...
I said to the leader:
"You know our recent history...
what was done to the Jews
by the Germans.
You must understand, this makes the
situation here particularly difficult. "
I said "Why don't you let them go
and take me instead?"
But he refused.
Acting on behalf of both the Federal
and Bavarian governments...
I offered the terrorists
an unlimited sum of money...
in exchange for the hostages.
This offer was rejected.
They said, "It is not a question of
either money or substitute hostages...
but only of the 200 prisoners. "
Peter Jennings is inside
the village...
and is observing this
with the naked eye.
Jim, I am almost directly...
over the Israeli building.
It will be a famous number before long.
It's building 31.
It's on Connollystrasse.
It does appear to be confirmed-
though anything confirmed today
is difficult-
that these guerrillas are from one
of the very extreme left-wing groups...
a group called Black September.
Continuous delegations go forward.
People here are waiting,
but unquestionably...
the mood becoming more tense.
They had set a deadline of noon...
which is just an hour
and 15 minutes away...
saying that they were going to kill
all of their hostages at that time.
There were other people involved.
A friend of mine was a member
of the Arab Council...
and he also came to negotiate.
My overall impression was that
they really believed...
in the possibility
of their demands being met.
In my opinion, from a political
point of view, this was 99.9% unlikely.
I thought and still think that
the Israelis would rather have let...
their whole athletic team be killed
than let this happen.
I tried to explain these things
to Issa...
but he was very skeptical
and dismissive of me.
Israel remained adamant that no deal
could be struck with the terrorists...
but to buy time,
the negotiators lied to Issa...
saying they were still awaiting
a definitive answer from Jerusalem.
They begged the terrorist leader
to postpone his noon deadline.
Issa responded only
with a new threat-
one Israeli would be shot
publicly every hour...
that their demands remained unmet.
We were, I think, a little bit naive.
Also the minister.
The German government
at this time thought...
they could negotiate with terrorists.
They were thinking
that they could talk to them...
and convince them
to let the Israelis go.
But there was no way.
So the time to get close
to noon and to think that...
"It's almost noon.
Are they going to kill him now?"
It was like dying
a little bit.
A matter of seconds before
the deadly ultimatum was reached...
the negotiators persuaded Issa
to agree to an extension.
The deadline now is 5:00
Munich time, noon in New York.
It is now 1:25 here in Munich.
It's about three and a half hours
to the next deadline.
Israeli Olympic Committee in Jerusalem
has now named the second dead man...
as being Josef Romano, a 31-year-old
middleweight weight lifter.
I can't believe it for one second
that my husband has gone.
Yesterday I received a cassette...
where he said, " Happy Jewish
New Year" to everyone...
his brothers, the children-
A lot of people I meet
in the street or at work...
Schlomit Romano
when they hear about me
being the daughter...
of Josef Romano from Mnchen...
they say, "Oh, you know,
when I was little...
I admired your father,
and he was like this and that. "
All the time I hear new stories
and new things...
about my father.
That's how I know him.
Of course, not enough.
Like, I can't imagine his voice.
I can't imagine him
calling my name.
They let Josef Romano die, bleeding to
death, lying between all his friends...
as a warning if anybody tried to grab
a weapon from one of the Palestinians...
this would be their lot.
Nobody has the right to do that.
In a way, I didn't like Issa
because of what he was doing...
but I could have liked him
when I met him elsewhere.
He was not violent. I would have
even trusted him in his word.
Not his compatriots and partners.
Walther Trger
Mayor of Olympic Village
They were like-
What do we say in German?
Galgenvogel.
Gallow birds.
But Issa was different from them.
We were not only negotiating
on how to handle this.
We also were-
I wouldn't call it philosophical...
but we were also going into the grounds
of the whole thing.
I said,
"Why are you doing it?"
He said, "We are sorry for you.
You made good Olympic Games.
But you offered us a showcase...
and we have to use this showcase
in order to show our possibility...
to so many millions or even billions
of people in the world...
who are watching
your Olympic Games. "
Mark Spitz,
the American swimming star...
who won seven gold medals
at this Olympiad...
was placed under heavy guard
shortly after the drama unfurled.
Within hours, Spitz was hustled out
of Germany on a plane bound for home.
Spitz is a Jew, and it was feared
an attempt might be made to seize him.
Spontaneous demonstrations condemning
the attack sprung up around the world.
There was outrage that the Olympic ideal
of peace and brotherhood...
had been so shamelessly destroyed.
But as the day progressed, there was
also a growing sense of anger...
directed at the International
Olympic Committee...
for refusing to halt the Games
in the light of what had happened.
The Olympic Committee
at that time was very arrogant.
Very arrogant.
They felt something terrible happened,
but they have nothing to do with it.
Willi Daume, head of
the Olympic Organizing Committee...
has announced that the Olympics
will go on.
As of this hour, the Olympics, the Games
of the 20th Olympiad, will continue.
This is a live shot
you're looking at right now.
And we're moving in now
on the windows...
behind which, at this moment, eight or
nine terrified living human beings...
are being held prisoner.
The demands have been many.
There's someone right now.
And this has happened
time and time and time again.
The door opening, the head coming out
to see what is going on.
Within 200 yards of where that
building is, there's a manmade pond.
Not a formal swimming pool, but
a very lovely pond with a little dock...
where the athletes lie out
and take sun.
That's what they're doing
right now, sunning themselves.
They're swimming, talking of technique
with athletes of other countries.
And yet this grim, terrible thing
is taking place inside the village.
There were people running
around the training track.
I thought, yeah, you've trained
for this for four years...
but it seemed wrong.
There was something selfish,
slightly obscene...
about the atmosphere
in the rest of the village.
I didn't hear much
of the negotiations.
I spent my time
standing guard outside.
But after some time I was relieved
and I went into the room...
where the Israelis
were being held.
I found one of our guys sitting with
the Israelis, his gun by his side.
We began to chat
with the Israelis...
and told each other
stories and jokes.
But then our leader suddenly came in
and ordered us to stop messing about.
He didn't want us
to talk to them too much...
in case they tried
to emotionally exploit us...
and tried to escape.
The Germans decided
that the time had come...
for them to take the initiative.
Food was brought in...
not only with the hope
that the hostages would be fed...
but in such large quantities
that no one man could carry it alone.
The police hoped more than one guerrilla
would come out for the five boxes...
could be rushed and overpowered.
A second hope was the chefs could gain
access and count the Arabs inside.
There were no chefs.
It was the police commissioner...
Mr. Schreiber, and myself...
with two policemen
clad as chefs, as cooks.
The idea was not
to poison the food.
The idea was that someone of us...
could enter the room...
because at that time nobody knew
about the number of the terrorists.
The deception had no effect.
The negotiators reported
to the waiting Israeli ambassador...
that their plan had failed.
The ambassador repeated again
that no deal would be made.
The Israeli ambassador
was watching, together with me...
what was going on, and he
was not very happy about this.
He got out
and asked for a phone...
and he called
the prime minister in Israel.
General Ulrich K. Wegener
The Israelis, they wanted
to send a team...
which was rejected
by the German government, of course.
The prime minister had a long talk
with Chancellor Brandt.
And I remember her report saying...
that he refused
that any Israeli team...
will come to Germany
to do the action.
Zvi Zamir, Chief of Mossad
(Israel Secret Service) 1968-74
And the general feeling was that
if the German defense- army, whoever-
will take it upon itself...
they are capable
of doing it well in Germany...
and there is no necessity
to send an Israeli team.
At the time,
I was the head of the Mossad.
And Moshe Dayan spoke
with the prime minister...
and they insisted that I
should go to be present...
to see how the Germans
do this operation.
Zvi Zamir immediately
flew to Munich...
arriving early that same evening.
Almost 11 hours
after the start of the crisis...
the Olympic Committee finally bowed
to intense international pressure...
and suspended the Games.
Some competitions are continuing.
They will be allowed to finish.
But at that time
the Games will be suspended.
At 10:00 tomorrow morning,
in the huge Olympic stadium...
there will be a memorial service
for the two men dead.
The Olympic Games are reduced
to utter silence...
and one tantalizing head
poking out a door.
Something has to happen.
It was a kind of...
Dan Shilon
Israeli Television
a bizarre,
surrealistic situation...
in which we journalists
surrounded the event...
with every possible camera.
Endless cameras
around the Olympic village.
It was a great story to many television
stations and media around the world.
I mean, the climax
of the Olympic Games, such an event.
And perhaps even some
of the stations...
took a very cynical approach to it...
saying, "Wow!
What an audience we'll get now. "
On a lovely late summer afternoon,
the tense vigil continues.
In just a half an hour,
the deadline will have expired.
He definitely had
his hands tied. I saw it.
Late in the afternoon,
I saw that the window was opened...
of the apartment
where they were kept hostage...
and I saw Andre
in front of the window.
They asked him,
"Is everybody okay there...
and what is the situation
with all the other hostages?"
Andre said,
"Everybody is okay except for one. "
When the Germans asked, "Who is
the one and what happened to him?"
I saw that he was not allowed
to say that.
So he got hit with the butt of the rifle
of one of the Palestinians...
and pushed away,
and they closed the curtains.
That was the last time, really,
that I saw him.
After that, Mr. Genscher said...
he wished to have a direct discussion
with the Israeli hostages.
Then Mr. Schreiber said
he wished to accompany him.
They said, "No,you are policemen.
You are not allowed to enter. "
I said, 'All right. Then it's me. "
So we went up there...
and it was a terrible impression,
I must say.
One was bound to one chair...
and the others were on
the two sides tied together.
And then the one
who was killed...
was lying there.
The wall was full of blood.
I will never be able
to forget those faces...
full of fear, but also hope.
Then we had a discussion...
and the discussion was...
absolutely covered by the...
very depressed mood
of the hostages.
They wished...
to come to a conclusion
which might save their lives...
but they were not very hopeful
in that respect.
There's been one report attributed to
Wilf Brimsley of the Associated Press...
There's been one report attributed to
Wilf Brimsley of the Associated Press...
who said a police lieutenant
told him that at 5:00...
about 29 minutes from now,
Munich time...
a volunteer squad of policemen
dressed as athletes...
would storm the Israeli
Olympic team headquarters...
and would come in shooting.
These are the volunteer squad of
Because of very complicated laws...
the German army would not
be allowed to participate.
There you see an athlete
holding a canvas bag...
in which is obviously
a machine gun.
The commissioner of the police,
Mr. Schreiber...
selected some policemen,
you know...
and asked them...
have you ever shot a gun
or whatever?
That was it.
They had no training, nothing.
Jim, there are now a great many
of those security men...
in athletic uniforms...
moving off
in various directions.
I don't want to instigate
any false drama here...
but it looks, at this point, like the
beginnings of some kind of deployment.
The plan was for us
to climb up on the roof...
of the Connollystrasse building...
and go down the ventilation shafts.
Once in position we were to
await the code word 'sunshine'...
from the Chief Inspector
before attacking.
That's how we would
free the hostages.
Walking cautiously on the roof...
hopefully not being heard
in the rooms below.
You see how close these two men are.
Couldn't be 20 feet.
You see he comes out and
gets down on his hands and knees.
That's for him
to get a better look up.
Outside our studio here
and around the Olympic village...
a crowd estimated
at 75,000 to 80,000 people...
has gathered,
awaiting the outcome of this.
This building now swarming
with Germans...
trying to rescue the Israelis.
The deadline appears, to us,
to be less than one minute away.
Anything to report at all, Peter?
The commando looks very much
more nervous than he did a while ago...
and he certainly has an apprehensive
darting-about look from here...
almost as if they do sense
that something is very imminent.
Once again there is a delegation
directly under the building...
and the Arab guard,
not on the balcony...
but in the window slightly down
below him, is negotiating with him.
Now we've gotten
an official time check.
It is 5:00.
This is the deadline.
The storming, if it is going to happen,
could happen at any moment.
We waited and waited, but the
code word "sunshine"never came...
because there was a film crew...
on the East German building
opposite us...
which broadcast live everything
that was happening on the roof.
Later we discovered that there
was a TV in every athlete's room...
and the terrorists had been able...
to watch us preparing
live on screen.
Thank God we called it off.
It surely would have been
a suicide mission if we had attacked.
If you had told me then that the Germans
did not have available in Munich...
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Service
a trained storm squad,
I think I would have disbelieved you...
because everybody in 1972
was totally transfixed...
by a myth of utter
German ruthless efficiency.
Fourteen minutes to 6:00,
Munich time, in the evening.
We were told not to let the situation
go on for more than 24 hours...
because psychologically that was
the most we could take.
If the Israeli government still
refused to release the prisoners...
we had been told
to demand an airplane...
to take us, with the hostages,
to any Arab country we could.
At 6:00 p. m., the Palestinians
issued a new demand.
They wanted a long-distance jet...
to fly them and their hostages
to an unspecified Arab country.
But the German government
and the organizing committee...
decided that we were not
allowed at all...
to let foreigners bring out
guests of our country...
who came as guests
to the Olympic Games.
That led to the final conclusion that we
give the impression to the terrorists...
that we'll let them fly out...
but try everything
to then kill them...
or bring them into prison...
before they could leave the country.
Our aim was to
drag out the proceedings...
to wear down the terrorists...
and try to establish the best time
for freeing the hostages.
That was our objective.
The organizers of the Games
naturally wanted the Games...
to resume as soon as possible.
We had to find a resolution
one way or another.
To move the thing
from the Olympic compound...
Zvi Zamir, Chief of Mossad
(Israel Secret Service) 1968-74
in order to let
the Olympic Games to carry on...
this was their main objective.
The Israeli team...
and its rescue
were secondary to that.
The staff group decided
to bring them...
to the public airport of Munich
in order to try something.
I said, "Listen, that's crazy.
We have another airport...
which is not a public airport. "
So I proposed to make
Furstenfeldbruck the target.
The police plan revolved around
a decoy Boeing 727...
which was to be left on the runway
with its engine idling.
On board would be a voluntary squad
of policemen...
disguised as flight crew.
The Palestinians and Israelis
would be flown in by helicopter.
When Issa and his deputy
went to inspect the plane...
the fake crew would overcome them.
Meanwhile, five snipers positioned
on the tower and around the airfield...
would open fire
on the remaining terrorists...
and assault vehicles would rush in
to rescue the hostages.
There were only five snipers
because the police still believed...
there would be a total
of four to five terrorists.
This is Peter Jennings
in the Olympic village.
The Olympic village
is built on various levels...
and underneath building 31, and
underneath all of the buildings here...
there is a network of roads.
Those alleyways
now have been used to bring in...
a fairly massive security force,
including armored cars...
and just a short while ago,
Howard Cosell...
noticed that there was
considerable activity there.
Over the recent 25 to 30 minutes...
there was a flurry of activity,
cars were speeding off...
and we now have a corridor
or avenue of departure...
available to the Arabs...
should a deal have been made
and should they be coming out...
as now seems likely.
So there is a quiet now
and an expectancy.
I didn't feel fear as such.
I felt apprehensive,
as any person would.
I was afraid of failing.
The Palestinians and Israelis
were to be flown by helicopter...
to Furstenfeldbruck Airport.
But how would they get themselves
and their hostages...
to the helicopters,
which were on the edge of the village.
They decided to walk
via the underground car park.
The police saw
another ambush opportunity...
and placed marksmen here...
but Issa insisted
on checking the route first.
So we walked there with one of...
the terrorists behind me
with a machine gun in my back...
and at that time, some of the gunmen
of the German police...
were lying in the side streets...
and when we approached,
they were crawling away.
So the terrorists immediately
found out that there was danger...
and they decided to use a bus
and not to walk.
The terrorists brought the Israelis
down a passage...
into an underground car park
and to a bus.
Robert Thompson, a 24-year-old
Canadian water polo player...
saw them leave.
So then they brought
seven of them out...
and they put seven of the Israelis
on the bus...
and then he went back inside,
and then they brought out more.
During this, there was one fellow
standing in front of the bus...
with a machine gun,
watching all of it.
The terrorists had all the guns.
What were the Israelis doing?
They were tied.
They had their hands
tied in front of them...
and plus their hands
were tied like that.
Then around the back they had ropes,
and they were tied together like that.
The first man that got out was
the man with the white pith helmet.
He got out, went over
to the first helicopter...
and made a complete check
with a flashlight.
He checked in and out, both back,
front and middle of the helicopter...
and when he saw that everything
looked like it was all right...
he signaled, and four hostages
started to march out...
with their hands
tied in front of them...
and behind them
was an Arab guerilla...
with some kind of weapon
in his hand.
It was quite
a frightening experience.
It wasn't any James Bond.
It was the real thing.
It has taken less than five minutes
to reach the waiting helicopters...
but in that five minutes
a critical piece of information...
has suddenly been revealed.
There are not four guerillas
nor even five, as the police believed.
There are eight, and there are
only five police marksmen...
waiting at Furstenfeldbruck Airport.
We were standing
at a window directly above...
as our friends were led handcuffed
from the bus to the helicopters.
The terrorists stood there
with rifles.
They looked as if they felt like heroes
dominating the world.
All around,
flashbulbs were going off.
I felt bitter.
It's not a movie.
It's our people we're talking about!
Two were already murdered, and
they were making a show out of it.
One of the helicopters now proceeds
out over the Olympic site...
out over the main stadium
where half the lights are on.
The second helicopter
is now following it...
and moving out around
this tremendously high...
major Olympic tower
as they depart...
to a destination we, of course,
as yet do not know.
And we, with the German team...
we moved to the third helicopter.
The third helicopter
now moving right by us...
right over the Olympic village...
passing now
over the main stadium.
All the lights on
in this Olympic site-
an Olympic site
which for more than a week now...
has been a place of serenity
and comradeship-
an Olympic village which, in spite of
some political crisis, has been happy...
and now today has been
absolutely shattered...
by this tragedy.
As we were flying...
we began to get the feeling
that a trap was waiting for us...
so we began to prepare ourselves.
In the event of an ambush,
we had been told to fight...
with all our strength,
as though in battle.
We were to do
everything necessary...
to defend ourselves
and our operation.
The marksmen,
who had no radio links...
were still only expecting
a total of five terrorists.
Nobody from the village
thought to inform them...
that there were now known
to be eight.
We rushed quickly
into the main building...
we moved to the second floor.
It was dark-
dark in the place.
There were very many people in
the corridors and around the building-
behind the building.
From the window we could watch
and see the two helicopters...
landing in front of us.
Just as the helicopters...
bearing the Palestinians
and Israelis were landing...
the police squad
assigned to the decoy plane...
fearing that
they were under-trained...
took a vote
to abandon their mission.
It was quite simply
a suicide mission...
and we unanimously voted
to abandon it.
And this was seconds before-
not even minutes-
seconds before
the helicopters landed.
I told the minister,
I said, "I'm sure...
this will blow the whole affair. "
The Germans had marksmen
on the roof of the control tower...
and marksmen at ground level...
but they had no communications
between each other.
They were just briefed to shoot.
When the first marksmen opened fire,
they would all open fire...
but there was
no coordination of targets.
Some of us got out of
the helicopters...
but others waited inside it with
the hostages, who were now very scared.
We told them that it was in everybody's
interests for them to remain quiet.
Now, the leader of the team,
he and another one...
went to check the aircraft.
The Palestinians
were obviously missing...
the whole crew,
because they came back...
and were yelling.
They were, of course, excited.
As the leader returned
from the airplane...
the whole area suddenly lit up...
and an enormous
amount of firing started.
So we all opened fire in the direction
the shooting was coming from.
And a key marksman was moving
from one position...
to another, blocked by a pillar...
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Reporter
to get into another shooting position
when the shooting started...
and therefore missed the crucial shot
against the Black September commander.
Issa managed to get back to the cover
of the helicopters unscathed.
Sniper Two was more successful,
seriously wounding Issa's deputy.
Snipers Three and Four opened fire
on the six terrorists...
guarding the helicopters...
but inexplicably
managed to kill only one.
Sniper Five did not fire
a single shot.
Because the helicopters had been
landed in the wrong place...
he found himself
in the direct line of fire...
of his fellow marksmen
on the tower.
Like the others, he had not been
supplied with a bulletproof vest...
or steel helmet and found himself
hopelessly exposed.
Meanwhile, a policeman standing
by a window inside the tower...
was killed when a stray bullet
struck him in the head.
They weren't capable.
I can tell you that I doubt
whether the snipers...
were really snipers
according to what I listened to.
One was lying on the roof...
not far away from us.
He wasn't firing
with a sniper's rifle.
But they didn't see it.
They didn't see the targets.
Unbelievable.
The latest word
we get from the airport...
is that, quote, "All hell
has broken loose out there"...
that there is still shooting going on-
but all seems to be confusion.
Nothing is nailed down.
We have no idea what has happened
to the hostages.
The leader was now
on his feet again and shooting...
but his deputy
was seriously wounded.
I crawled over to him
and was hit in the hand.
My gun flew from my hand.
I tried to grab his gun
so I could head for cover...
but I just couldn't do it.
And I only hope that our people...
and the Israelis, that they could
get out of the helicopter...
but they had tied them together
or whatever...
and so they couldn't leave
the helicopters.
The entire area
is ringed off by troops-
heavily armed troops with dogs,
keeping everybody away.
We tried to approach, were stopped by
one of the guards with a machine gun...
and he said, " Do not come closer.
They're heavily armed.
You're going to get hurt. "
But it's total confusion out there.
Just about everybody
and his brother and his sister...
got into their cars
and they've driven to the area.
They've clogged the roads.
Police reinforcements
had a bad time getting there...
because all of these people
are curious, flocking to the area...
clogging up the roads.
Just absolute confusion.
Then I decided to try and find
the commander of the police...
and then we said...
Zvi Zamir, Chief of Mossad
(Israel Secret Service) 1968-74
"What else?
What are you doing?"
Then he said
that he is waiting...
for armored cars to arrive...
from somewhere near Munich.
The police had forgotten
to order the armored cars...
to come to the airport earlier...
and it was only now,
that they radioed to Munich
for them to be sent.
But because the roads
were congested with onlookers...
they did not arrive at the scene
for another hour...
by which time
most of the fighting was over.
Still no word...
the word we really want,
from the hostages.
We asked them to let us
go on top of the roof...
and try to negotiate
with the terrorists.
They refused at the beginning...
but then they said,
'All right, on certain conditions. "
We went up on top of the roof...
and we started to speak Arabic
to the terrorists.
Their reply was clear,
very clear.
They opened fire on the building.
General Ulrich K. Wegener
They fired at the tower,
and I told the minister he should lie down...
and he touched down
under the desk of the commander.
Very funny,
from our view today.
One of the surviving terrorists
now made a dash for it...
heading straight for Sniper Five.
As the terrorist ran towards him,
Sniper Number Five...
fired his only shots of the night...
point-blank
into the fleeing man's face.
Seeing these shots...
police reinforcements
arriving at the scene...
with no knowledge of the precise
location of their own snipers...
mistakenly identified Sniper Five
and the helicopter pilot...
who had fled for cover beside him
as terrorists...
and opened fire on them.
Both were seriously wounded.
At midnight
came the official announcement...
of the spokesman
of the German government...
who said all the Israelis are saved...
and all the terrorists are dead.
Conrad Ahlers
German Government Spokesman
I'm very glad that, as far as we can see now,
this police action was successful.
Of course,
it's an unfortunate interruption...
of the Olympic Games...
but, I mean, if all that comes out...
as we hope it will come out
or has come out...
I think it will be forgotten
after a few weeks.
Ankie Spitzer
People all over Holland were calling me-
all my friends, my family.
A neighbor came to us
with this bottle of champagne...
Alex Springer
and we all...
was very glad and happy...
and I think that I went to sleep.
Then the Israeli ambassador
in The Hague, he called me and said...
"Ankie, I just heard the news.
Congratulations,
and everybody is saved...
and everything is okay. "
Originally they said
that the hostages were safe.
Now that has been changed...
and an Olympic spokesman said...
"We are afraid the information
given so far is too optimistic. "
That's where we seem to stand.
So I called the Olympic village.
I called every half-hour, and every
time the news got worse and worse...
and at 3:00 in the morning I said...
"If you know that something happened,
then you tell me now...
because I'm not Hercules.
I have been waiting
from 7:00 in the morning...
and now it's 3:00 the next morning.
I just want to know
what happened to Andre. "
We keep hearing
that the indications are not good...
that Johnny Klein
may have very bad news.
After almost two hours of fighting...
one of the surviving Palestinians
threw a hand grenade...
into the eastern helicopter.
The helicopter was refueled...
and within minutes...
the helicopter
and the area around it...
was in fire.
Simultaneously,
one of his comrades...
sprayed a full clip of bullets
into the other helicopter.
Then there was silence.
And I told the minister...
"I think I have to go to look
for what the police is doing. "
And then I went to the captain
of the police company there...
and said,
"Are you going to do something?
You have to move your people there.
You pull out the hostages
or whatever, you know...
and do something. "
They didn't do anything.
"I have no orders," he said.
It was-
It was a really tragic story...
and so we could only look,
you know.
And when after-
You could hear them yelling,
you know.
We've just gotten the final word.
When I was a kid,
my father used to say...
"Our greatest hopes and our
worst fears are seldom realized. "
Our worst fears
have been realized tonight.
They have now said
that there were 11 hostages.
Two were killed in their rooms...
yesterday morning.
Nine were killed
at the airport tonight.
They're all gone.
That afternoon,
the Games continued.
The surviving members
of the Israeli team...
flew home with their dead.
The bodies of the five
dead Palestinians...
were handed over to Libya,
where they received a hero's funeral.
Mohammed Safady, Aged 19
The three surviving terrorists
were never to stand trial.
Adnan Al Gashey, Aged 27
Jamal Al Gashey, Aged 18
Seven weeks later,
a Lufthansa jet...
en route from Beirut to Frankfurt
was hijacked.
The hijackers demanded the release
of the three Munich terrorists.
Acting with indecent haste and without
consulting the Israeli government...
the Germans
handed over the three prisoners.
The circumstances
surrounding the hijacking...
have long been thought suspicious.
Why were only 12 passengers
on board such a large plane?
Why no women or children?
Why such haste in agreeing
to the hijackers' demands?
For the first time, one of
the Palestinians involved...
has revealed
that the entire affair was a setup...
organized by the German government
in collusion with the terrorists.
The Germans thought
that in this way...
they would prevent future
terror attacks on their country...
and dispose the embarrassing evidence
of their failure that day in September.
I think-
I think it's probably true, yes.
At this time,
the mentality was so, you know.
Really.
Hans Jochen Vogel
Mayor of Munich 1960-1972
On such questions, Willy Brandt,
as I remember very well...
always made this gesture.
I can't say and do more.
Terrorists arrive in Libya
Did you shoot
any of the Israeli hostages?
It's not important to say
if I killed Israeli or not.
What do you think you achieved?
One would have-
We have made our voice heard...
by the world-
Are those your words?
- Of course.
- The same thing.
They have made their voice heard
by the universe or the world...
who has not been hearing before.
I'm proud of what I did at Munich...
because it helped
the Palestinian cause enormously.
Before Munich the world had no idea
about our struggle...
but on that day the name of" Palestine"
was repeated all over the world.
It was only a year and three months
that I was married to Andre Spitzer.
But I remember that year
as the most beautiful...
and most wonderful year of my life.
This is the grave
of Amitzur Shapiro.
He was the athletics coach.
He had four little children,
one my age.
And here is Kehat Shorr.
He was the shooting coach.
Eliezer Halfin was a wrestler...
and so was Mark Slavin,
who I think was only 18 years old.
And here's my father's grave.
Anouk Spitzer
And it says on it his name: Andre Spitzer.
It says, "Son of Tibor,
fencing coach...
murdered by- killed by murderers...
in the Olympic Games in Munich...
as a representative
of the Israeli sport. "
Then it says his date of birth
and the date that he was murdered.
And I always bring him sunflowers
because that's his favorite flower.
a city where tradition and modernity
exist happily side by side.
This summer our beautiful city
plays host...
to the 20th Olympic Games.
There, in the center of the future
Olympic site, is the Olympic tower.
Next to it,
the Olympic arena.
For many visitors,
Munich is a kind of German paradise.
We're sure that you'll agree.
Well, nobody could foresee
what later on happened.
From the wires
of the APand UPI.
Good afternoon.
This is Paul Mandel reporting.
Another deadline
has come and gone-
They had their hands tied in front of
them, their hands were tied like that.
Quite a frightening experience.
It wasn't any James Bond,;
it was the real thing.
- I just want to know what happened.
- The Games must go on.
The deadline appears, to us,
to be less than one minute away.
- Unbelievable.
- Spitz is a Jew, and it was feared...
an attempt might be made
to seize him.
Behind them was an Arab guerilla
with some kind of weapon in his hand.
All seems to be-
It was only a year and three months
that I was married to Andre Spitzer...
but it made such
an enormous impression on me...
sometimes it looks
like a lifetime.
I went fencing, and he happened
to be my fencing master.
I didn't know
he was from Israel at all.
He spoke Dutch,
but with a slight accent...
so I thought he maybe is from
Eastern Europe or something.
Ankie Spitzer
He had something about him
which really appealed to me.
He was very much
at peace with himself...
and also with
the people around him.
It was very attractive
to me because...
I was not so at peace
with everyone and everybody...
and certainly not with myself.
Being the person that he was, it was
hard not to fall in love with him.
I am a member
of a Palestinian family...
which fled our village in Galilee
from Zionist gangs in 1948.
As refugees, my family moved from
camp to camp...
before finally ending up
at the Chatila camp in Beirut.
When I was growing up, I thought
there was no future for us...
unless we returned to Palestine.
If we didn't return,
I would spend my whole life...
as a refugee deprived of
any kind of human rights.
So I joined
the liberation movement...
and was given a gun
and trained to use it.
For the first time in my life I felt
inspired, I felt truly Palestinian...
that I wasn't
just a wretched refugee...
but a revolutionary
fighting for a cause.
I joined the revolution
since 1967.
- Which revolution?
- The Palestinian revolution.
It has affected the course
of the rest of my life.
You have only to look at the way
I have to do this interview...
so many years later,
still in hiding.
We lived in the northern border
between Lebanon and Israel...
and it was way out in nowhere.
They decided to have
their fencing academy there.
He was going from town to town,
from village to village...
to try to teach the youngsters...
through the art of fencing,
to have respect for each other...
because fencing
is an aggressive sport.
You have a weapon in your hand.
You're going to attack somebody.
If you attack him right,
then you score a point.
But he tried
to teach the youngsters...
how to channel that aggression...
into respect for your opponent.
It was very tough living there, but I
remember that year we lived there...
as the most beautiful
and most wonderful year of my life.
I did a few tours of duty
in training camps in Lebanon...
and then the leadership sent us
to Libya for special training.
The training was hard and advanced.
We were there for about one month.
It seemed to me we were
getting special training.
We began to get a feeling that
something big was underway.
He dreamt always to be once
at the Olympics.
Years before,
before I knew him...
he said that he was thinking
about to get to the Olympics once...
because, I think, for every athlete,
that's the climax of your career.
For Andre and the rest
of the Israeli team...
the 1972 Olympics held
a particular significance...
because they were held in Munich,
Germany, the birthplace of Nazism.
There was a feeling that this was
a huge event for the Israeli team...
to be coming and attending...
and therefore their presence
in the Olympic village...
certainly their presence
in the opening ceremony...
when their team marched under the flag
of the Star of David...
were very emotional moments.
The Germans saw the games
as an opportunity to erase...
the negative memories many still had
of the 1936 Berlin Olympics...
which had been misused by the Nazis
for propaganda purposes.
Twenty-seven years
after the end of the war...
Munich was the ideal opportunity
to show the world...
the new democratic face
of Germany.
The friendliness was in overdrive.
It was a massive attempt,
and it hit you straightaway...
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Reporter
to appear open and modern
and shorn of their past.
To help promote this new
non-militaristic image of Germany...
security was kept deliberately lax.
Police were banned
from the Olympic sites...
and in their place were
clad in specially designed outfits.
Jacov Springer
Israeli Weightlifting Coach
Jacov Springer
Israeli Weightlifting Coach
But for some of the Israeli team,
it was not so easy to erase the past.
My father, he was five times
in the Olympic Games.
Five times is a special thing.
He was born in Poland in 1921.
His father was from Germany
originally...
and thought that because he's speaking
German, nothing would happen to them.
Alex Springer
So all the family stayed in Poland
during the war...
but my father ran to Russia.
He didn't want to stay because he was
afraid something will happen to them.
And all the family...
his brothers, sisters
and his parents...
were killed in Poland.
He was the only one who survived.
Thirty-six years
after the Nazi Olympics...
Dachau, the first of the concentration
camps, was chosen as the site...
for an Olympic memorial service.
The Israeli team
came to the service...
along with competitors
from most European countries.
Dachau is just six miles
from the Munich stadium.
I think it was very difficult
for him with the memories...
of his family
and what the Germans did to them.
I think he felt this.
But maybe it was also
for him to-
to show something to the Germans...
that " Here I am, coming back
to the Olympic Games...
and you-
you couldn't really destroy me. "
Spitz is still holding them off.
He's got a half a meter lead.
Down on the near side is- But Spitz is
gonna go in. Spitz wins the gold medal!
Mark Spitz, USA.
And that is the whistle anyway,
and the United States...
have kept their unbeaten record
unless-
The referee says there's
three more seconds to play.
The only way they're going to score
is by going for a long shot.
And they got it!
My goodness, I don't believe it.
I do not believe it.
The Russians have got the gold.
Victory for the USSR
for the first time ever.
Absolutely fantastic.
She loves every moment of it!
Myself and two others traveled
from Libya to Germany...
two days before the operation.
We went to a hotel which the
leadership had given us the address of.
There we met up with
the rest of the team-
another group of three and two leaders
who had been in Munich for some time.
The following day my friend and I...
went to a couple of volleyball games
at the Olympic Park.
We still had not been told what
the target of our operation was to be.
After one of the competitions he said,
"Hey, there is the Lebanese team.
I'm going over
to say hello to them. "
I, coming from Holland, said,
'Are you out of your mind?"
They are from Lebanon.
Israel was in a state of war
with Lebanon.
He said, 'Ankie, that's exactly what
the Olympics are all about.
Here I can go to them and talk to them.
That's what the Olympics are about. "
So he went over and he asked
how were your results...
and I'm from Israel,
and how did it go?
To my big amazement, I saw
that the people responded...
and they shook hands with him
and they talked to him...
Ankie Spitzer
and they asked him about his results.
I'll never forget when he turned
around and came back towards me...
with this huge smile
on his face and said...
"You see? This is what
I was dreaming about. "
After ten days, Andre's fencers
finished their competitions...
and he and Ankie traveled to Holland
to spend time with their baby Anouk...
whom they had left
in the care of Ankie's parents.
The next morning at 10:00,
he had to take the train to Munich.
He woke up a little bit late.
We got to the train station,
and the train had left.
I was desperate because I thought
he's going to get in trouble...
when he gets back to Munich because
they're waiting for him there.
He said,
"Well, another day with you. "
I said, " No, let's try the other
train station about 30 miles onwards. "
So we raced to the next station...
and in Eindhoven in Holland,
that's where he jumped on the train.
Without a ticket.
The train was already in the station.
I still remember me
running next to the train...
and he left.
And that was the last time
I saw him.
On the night of September 4,
as Andre arrived back at the village...
the Israeli delegation was enjoying
a night out at the theater...
watching Fiddler on the Roof.
They returned to the village
at midnight.
The night of the operation...
we went to the restaurant
in the railway station for dinner.
There we met with the chief
of the organization...
who for the first time told us
what the target of our operation was.
I felt very proud...
that for the first time I was able
to confront the Israelis.
Our passports and belongings
were taken from us...
so there wouldn't be any clue
as to who we were.
Then we all went to the village.
As we were climbing
over the fence...
we ran into a group
of American athletes...
who were sneaking in
after a night out.
I remember they were drunk.
The funny thing is that we actually
helped each other to climb over.
I held my hand out...
and we lifted one
of them into the village.
We said thank you and good-bye.
With the help of members
of the East German team...
the terrorist leaders had entered
and studied the Olympic village...
in the days prior
to the attack.
Now they headed straight
for the Israeli men's quarters.
We headed towards the building.
Each of us
was carrying a sports bag...
filled with weapons,
hidden under clothes.
Each of us was given
a specific task.
My job was to guard the outside of
the building while the others went in.
The Israelis were
in five apartments.
Apartment one
housed the team coaches.
The terrorists went there first.
As they broke in, wrestling coach Moshe
Weinberger attempted to stop them...
but he was shot and wounded.
The leader went
into the first room...
but didn't realize there was
an Israeli behind him.
He was attacked full force
and his weapon was taken.
Another member of our group panicked
and shot the Israeli.
The terrorists demanded that
Weinberger, already heavily wounded...
show them where the rest
of the Israelis were.
At gunpoint, he led them
past apartment two...
which housed
the field athletes...
to apartment three, which contained
the weight lifters and wrestlers.
Weinberger calculated that
they might stand some chance...
of overpowering the terrorists.
I got out of bed and went outside...
only to find myself
standing in front of a terrorist...
wearing a balaclava hood
and a yellow sweater.
The terrorists were already holding
all five of Gad Zabari's roommates.
Now, weight lifter David Berger,
suggests they attack the terrorists...
saying,
"We have nothing to lose. "
But a gunman understands and jabs
a machine gun into Zabari's waist...
ordering him towards the exit
and back to apartment number one.
And that's how
I came to be the first in line.
My friends are behind me
with their heads bowed.
I feel in a bit of a daze
when suddenly I see...
another terrorist ahead of me,
wearing a balaclava hood.
Suddenly the reality
of what's happening hits me.
As I get closer,
he orders me in this direction.
But as he's giving me the order...
I push his Kalashnikov aside
and run.
He shoots two or three rounds at me.
But I don't think
about the shots, I just run.
I run for about 70 meters...
and then jump over the village fence
and into the first building I see.
As Gad Zabari ran away...
the already wounded Moshe Weinberger
heroically jumped on the terrorists.
He was shot and killed.
We had no orders to kill.
We were forced to
only when things went wrong.
I heard some shots,
so I walked up to the window...
and then I realized
Moshe Weinberger...
has been thrown out
of the door...
to the pavement.
He was naked,
without anything on him.
Shmuel Lalkin
Head Israeli
And I saw that he was dead
because blood was pooling around him.
This was when I thought
that we were attacked by somebody.
This is ABC.
I'm Jim McKay speaking to you live,
at this moment...
from ABC headquarters,
Munich, West Germany.
The Olympics of serenity
have become the one thing...
the Germans didn't want them to be:
the Olympics of terror.
I had the first telephone call
from the head of the team...
Dan Shilon
Israeli Television
this morning at 6:00,
and he told me that the Arabs are there...
and one of the Israelis
was killed.
His name is Moshe Weinberger...
Israeli Journalist
and I saw his body carried out
after one hour into an ambulance.
That body was smashed...
which means he was killed
by a machine gun...
not by a regular gun.
I was sleeping.
My parents came to wake me up,
and they said...
"We just heard on the radio
that there was an attack...
at the Israeli quarters
of the Olympic village.
They killed one of the Israelis,
and they say it was the boxing coach. "
I know there was no boxing coach,
so I jumped out of my bed.
I thought, if it is not the
boxing coach, then what coach is it?
Maybe it's Andre.
How many Israelis are they
holding as hostage in the block?
Around 16, 17.
Thirteen members of the Israeli team
as hostages.
There are nine hostages.
Nobody could tell me
if Andre was a part of this...
if he was one of the hostages,
if he escaped.
Nobody could tell me.
When I arrived on the scene,
I met a young female police officer...
who was talking to a man
dressed in a white suit.
He was Issa,
the terrorists' spokesman.
Issa expressed his demands
in a staccato manner.
He was very cool
and very determined...
clearly fanatical
in his convictions.
The terrorists handed
a communique to the police.
In it they demanded the release of
more than 200 revolutionary prisoners...
from jails in Israel,
Germany and elsewhere.
If this was not done
by 12:00 noon...
the hostages would be executed.
And you have until 12:00?
They said that at 12:00
they will shoot.
I certainly took it seriously because
I was standing there on gunpoint...
where always two or three
machine guns pointed on me...
and the leader of the terrorists
had a hand grenade in his hands.
Walther Trger
Mayor of Olympic Village
So I had to take it seriously.
When he was discussing with me,
he always had that hand grenade.
Somebody's going inside.
The negotiators knew nothing
about the terrorists...
except what they saw.
Three were visible
at any one time.
Issa, the leader, his face blackened
with shoe polish.
Tony, second in command, usually at the
first floor window wearing a cowboy hat.
And another man
guarding the balcony door.
Issa told the negotiators...
that a second Israeli
had been shot and killed...
while trying to overpower
his captors.
The terrorist leader refused
to identify the dead man...
or allow his body
to be removed...
until all the political prisoners
on the communique had been released.
My camera crew and I ended up,
for all of that long day...
looking down
into this little walkway...
very quiet.
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Reporter
And in a sense, you were looking down
into the cockpit of world events.
We opened up all the radios
and television stations...
to get some information.
Then at 9:00 in the morning, I found out
that Andre is one of the hostages.
The men in the room:
Josef Romano is 31 years old...
The men in the room:
Josef Romano is 31 years old...
an Israeli weight lifter
in the middleweight class...
David Berger, 26 years old,
in the light heavyweight class...
Ziev Friedman, another 26-year-old
weight lifter in the bantamweight class.
These strong men sitting helpless
there at the point of submachine guns.
Eliezer Halfin, 24 years old,
a freestyle wrestler, is in that room.
Mark Slavin is 18 years old,
a Greco-Roman wrestler.
The others are officials,
Joseph Gotfriend, Jacob Springer...
Andre Spitzer, Kehat Shorr
and Amitzur Shapiro.
We have a situation.
In Israel, the population awoke
to the shocking news.
Demand the release of some 200 Arabs
now being held in Israel.
The Israeli government
immediately made it clear...
that in line with their policy, no deals
would be struck with the terrorists.
Golda Meir
Prime Minister of Israel 1969-1974
If we should give in,
then no Israeli anywhere in the world...
can feel that his life is safe.
It's blackmail of the worst kind.
At this time I was the aide-de-camp
of Minister Genscher.
And the minister
was shocked, of course.
General Ulrich K. Wegener
He wanted to see the Minister
of Interior of Bavaria...
because he was responsible.
We are a federal state.
So they talked to each other and they
decided to go to the Olympic village.
In terms of the politicians
and the VIPs who came...
they looked to me as if
they held none of the cards...
as if they basically did not understand,
one, how to respond...
and two, the mind-set of the people
they were dealing with.
The Palestinians that one saw,
there was that feeling...
that they were in charge
and that they were dictating.
When it became clear to me
that negotiation was fruitless...
I said to the leader:
"You know our recent history...
what was done to the Jews
by the Germans.
You must understand, this makes the
situation here particularly difficult. "
I said "Why don't you let them go
and take me instead?"
But he refused.
Acting on behalf of both the Federal
and Bavarian governments...
I offered the terrorists
an unlimited sum of money...
in exchange for the hostages.
This offer was rejected.
They said, "It is not a question of
either money or substitute hostages...
but only of the 200 prisoners. "
Peter Jennings is inside
the village...
and is observing this
with the naked eye.
Jim, I am almost directly...
over the Israeli building.
It will be a famous number before long.
It's building 31.
It's on Connollystrasse.
It does appear to be confirmed-
though anything confirmed today
is difficult-
that these guerrillas are from one
of the very extreme left-wing groups...
a group called Black September.
Continuous delegations go forward.
People here are waiting,
but unquestionably...
the mood becoming more tense.
They had set a deadline of noon...
which is just an hour
and 15 minutes away...
saying that they were going to kill
all of their hostages at that time.
There were other people involved.
A friend of mine was a member
of the Arab Council...
and he also came to negotiate.
My overall impression was that
they really believed...
in the possibility
of their demands being met.
In my opinion, from a political
point of view, this was 99.9% unlikely.
I thought and still think that
the Israelis would rather have let...
their whole athletic team be killed
than let this happen.
I tried to explain these things
to Issa...
but he was very skeptical
and dismissive of me.
Israel remained adamant that no deal
could be struck with the terrorists...
but to buy time,
the negotiators lied to Issa...
saying they were still awaiting
a definitive answer from Jerusalem.
They begged the terrorist leader
to postpone his noon deadline.
Issa responded only
with a new threat-
one Israeli would be shot
publicly every hour...
that their demands remained unmet.
We were, I think, a little bit naive.
Also the minister.
The German government
at this time thought...
they could negotiate with terrorists.
They were thinking
that they could talk to them...
and convince them
to let the Israelis go.
But there was no way.
So the time to get close
to noon and to think that...
"It's almost noon.
Are they going to kill him now?"
It was like dying
a little bit.
A matter of seconds before
the deadly ultimatum was reached...
the negotiators persuaded Issa
to agree to an extension.
The deadline now is 5:00
Munich time, noon in New York.
It is now 1:25 here in Munich.
It's about three and a half hours
to the next deadline.
Israeli Olympic Committee in Jerusalem
has now named the second dead man...
as being Josef Romano, a 31-year-old
middleweight weight lifter.
I can't believe it for one second
that my husband has gone.
Yesterday I received a cassette...
where he said, " Happy Jewish
New Year" to everyone...
his brothers, the children-
A lot of people I meet
in the street or at work...
Schlomit Romano
when they hear about me
being the daughter...
of Josef Romano from Mnchen...
they say, "Oh, you know,
when I was little...
I admired your father,
and he was like this and that. "
All the time I hear new stories
and new things...
about my father.
That's how I know him.
Of course, not enough.
Like, I can't imagine his voice.
I can't imagine him
calling my name.
They let Josef Romano die, bleeding to
death, lying between all his friends...
as a warning if anybody tried to grab
a weapon from one of the Palestinians...
this would be their lot.
Nobody has the right to do that.
In a way, I didn't like Issa
because of what he was doing...
but I could have liked him
when I met him elsewhere.
He was not violent. I would have
even trusted him in his word.
Not his compatriots and partners.
Walther Trger
Mayor of Olympic Village
They were like-
What do we say in German?
Galgenvogel.
Gallow birds.
But Issa was different from them.
We were not only negotiating
on how to handle this.
We also were-
I wouldn't call it philosophical...
but we were also going into the grounds
of the whole thing.
I said,
"Why are you doing it?"
He said, "We are sorry for you.
You made good Olympic Games.
But you offered us a showcase...
and we have to use this showcase
in order to show our possibility...
to so many millions or even billions
of people in the world...
who are watching
your Olympic Games. "
Mark Spitz,
the American swimming star...
who won seven gold medals
at this Olympiad...
was placed under heavy guard
shortly after the drama unfurled.
Within hours, Spitz was hustled out
of Germany on a plane bound for home.
Spitz is a Jew, and it was feared
an attempt might be made to seize him.
Spontaneous demonstrations condemning
the attack sprung up around the world.
There was outrage that the Olympic ideal
of peace and brotherhood...
had been so shamelessly destroyed.
But as the day progressed, there was
also a growing sense of anger...
directed at the International
Olympic Committee...
for refusing to halt the Games
in the light of what had happened.
The Olympic Committee
at that time was very arrogant.
Very arrogant.
They felt something terrible happened,
but they have nothing to do with it.
Willi Daume, head of
the Olympic Organizing Committee...
has announced that the Olympics
will go on.
As of this hour, the Olympics, the Games
of the 20th Olympiad, will continue.
This is a live shot
you're looking at right now.
And we're moving in now
on the windows...
behind which, at this moment, eight or
nine terrified living human beings...
are being held prisoner.
The demands have been many.
There's someone right now.
And this has happened
time and time and time again.
The door opening, the head coming out
to see what is going on.
Within 200 yards of where that
building is, there's a manmade pond.
Not a formal swimming pool, but
a very lovely pond with a little dock...
where the athletes lie out
and take sun.
That's what they're doing
right now, sunning themselves.
They're swimming, talking of technique
with athletes of other countries.
And yet this grim, terrible thing
is taking place inside the village.
There were people running
around the training track.
I thought, yeah, you've trained
for this for four years...
but it seemed wrong.
There was something selfish,
slightly obscene...
about the atmosphere
in the rest of the village.
I didn't hear much
of the negotiations.
I spent my time
standing guard outside.
But after some time I was relieved
and I went into the room...
where the Israelis
were being held.
I found one of our guys sitting with
the Israelis, his gun by his side.
We began to chat
with the Israelis...
and told each other
stories and jokes.
But then our leader suddenly came in
and ordered us to stop messing about.
He didn't want us
to talk to them too much...
in case they tried
to emotionally exploit us...
and tried to escape.
The Germans decided
that the time had come...
for them to take the initiative.
Food was brought in...
not only with the hope
that the hostages would be fed...
but in such large quantities
that no one man could carry it alone.
The police hoped more than one guerrilla
would come out for the five boxes...
could be rushed and overpowered.
A second hope was the chefs could gain
access and count the Arabs inside.
There were no chefs.
It was the police commissioner...
Mr. Schreiber, and myself...
with two policemen
clad as chefs, as cooks.
The idea was not
to poison the food.
The idea was that someone of us...
could enter the room...
because at that time nobody knew
about the number of the terrorists.
The deception had no effect.
The negotiators reported
to the waiting Israeli ambassador...
that their plan had failed.
The ambassador repeated again
that no deal would be made.
The Israeli ambassador
was watching, together with me...
what was going on, and he
was not very happy about this.
He got out
and asked for a phone...
and he called
the prime minister in Israel.
General Ulrich K. Wegener
The Israelis, they wanted
to send a team...
which was rejected
by the German government, of course.
The prime minister had a long talk
with Chancellor Brandt.
And I remember her report saying...
that he refused
that any Israeli team...
will come to Germany
to do the action.
Zvi Zamir, Chief of Mossad
(Israel Secret Service) 1968-74
And the general feeling was that
if the German defense- army, whoever-
will take it upon itself...
they are capable
of doing it well in Germany...
and there is no necessity
to send an Israeli team.
At the time,
I was the head of the Mossad.
And Moshe Dayan spoke
with the prime minister...
and they insisted that I
should go to be present...
to see how the Germans
do this operation.
Zvi Zamir immediately
flew to Munich...
arriving early that same evening.
Almost 11 hours
after the start of the crisis...
the Olympic Committee finally bowed
to intense international pressure...
and suspended the Games.
Some competitions are continuing.
They will be allowed to finish.
But at that time
the Games will be suspended.
At 10:00 tomorrow morning,
in the huge Olympic stadium...
there will be a memorial service
for the two men dead.
The Olympic Games are reduced
to utter silence...
and one tantalizing head
poking out a door.
Something has to happen.
It was a kind of...
Dan Shilon
Israeli Television
a bizarre,
surrealistic situation...
in which we journalists
surrounded the event...
with every possible camera.
Endless cameras
around the Olympic village.
It was a great story to many television
stations and media around the world.
I mean, the climax
of the Olympic Games, such an event.
And perhaps even some
of the stations...
took a very cynical approach to it...
saying, "Wow!
What an audience we'll get now. "
On a lovely late summer afternoon,
the tense vigil continues.
In just a half an hour,
the deadline will have expired.
He definitely had
his hands tied. I saw it.
Late in the afternoon,
I saw that the window was opened...
of the apartment
where they were kept hostage...
and I saw Andre
in front of the window.
They asked him,
"Is everybody okay there...
and what is the situation
with all the other hostages?"
Andre said,
"Everybody is okay except for one. "
When the Germans asked, "Who is
the one and what happened to him?"
I saw that he was not allowed
to say that.
So he got hit with the butt of the rifle
of one of the Palestinians...
and pushed away,
and they closed the curtains.
That was the last time, really,
that I saw him.
After that, Mr. Genscher said...
he wished to have a direct discussion
with the Israeli hostages.
Then Mr. Schreiber said
he wished to accompany him.
They said, "No,you are policemen.
You are not allowed to enter. "
I said, 'All right. Then it's me. "
So we went up there...
and it was a terrible impression,
I must say.
One was bound to one chair...
and the others were on
the two sides tied together.
And then the one
who was killed...
was lying there.
The wall was full of blood.
I will never be able
to forget those faces...
full of fear, but also hope.
Then we had a discussion...
and the discussion was...
absolutely covered by the...
very depressed mood
of the hostages.
They wished...
to come to a conclusion
which might save their lives...
but they were not very hopeful
in that respect.
There's been one report attributed to
Wilf Brimsley of the Associated Press...
There's been one report attributed to
Wilf Brimsley of the Associated Press...
who said a police lieutenant
told him that at 5:00...
about 29 minutes from now,
Munich time...
a volunteer squad of policemen
dressed as athletes...
would storm the Israeli
Olympic team headquarters...
and would come in shooting.
These are the volunteer squad of
Because of very complicated laws...
the German army would not
be allowed to participate.
There you see an athlete
holding a canvas bag...
in which is obviously
a machine gun.
The commissioner of the police,
Mr. Schreiber...
selected some policemen,
you know...
and asked them...
have you ever shot a gun
or whatever?
That was it.
They had no training, nothing.
Jim, there are now a great many
of those security men...
in athletic uniforms...
moving off
in various directions.
I don't want to instigate
any false drama here...
but it looks, at this point, like the
beginnings of some kind of deployment.
The plan was for us
to climb up on the roof...
of the Connollystrasse building...
and go down the ventilation shafts.
Once in position we were to
await the code word 'sunshine'...
from the Chief Inspector
before attacking.
That's how we would
free the hostages.
Walking cautiously on the roof...
hopefully not being heard
in the rooms below.
You see how close these two men are.
Couldn't be 20 feet.
You see he comes out and
gets down on his hands and knees.
That's for him
to get a better look up.
Outside our studio here
and around the Olympic village...
a crowd estimated
at 75,000 to 80,000 people...
has gathered,
awaiting the outcome of this.
This building now swarming
with Germans...
trying to rescue the Israelis.
The deadline appears, to us,
to be less than one minute away.
Anything to report at all, Peter?
The commando looks very much
more nervous than he did a while ago...
and he certainly has an apprehensive
darting-about look from here...
almost as if they do sense
that something is very imminent.
Once again there is a delegation
directly under the building...
and the Arab guard,
not on the balcony...
but in the window slightly down
below him, is negotiating with him.
Now we've gotten
an official time check.
It is 5:00.
This is the deadline.
The storming, if it is going to happen,
could happen at any moment.
We waited and waited, but the
code word "sunshine"never came...
because there was a film crew...
on the East German building
opposite us...
which broadcast live everything
that was happening on the roof.
Later we discovered that there
was a TV in every athlete's room...
and the terrorists had been able...
to watch us preparing
live on screen.
Thank God we called it off.
It surely would have been
a suicide mission if we had attacked.
If you had told me then that the Germans
did not have available in Munich...
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Service
a trained storm squad,
I think I would have disbelieved you...
because everybody in 1972
was totally transfixed...
by a myth of utter
German ruthless efficiency.
Fourteen minutes to 6:00,
Munich time, in the evening.
We were told not to let the situation
go on for more than 24 hours...
because psychologically that was
the most we could take.
If the Israeli government still
refused to release the prisoners...
we had been told
to demand an airplane...
to take us, with the hostages,
to any Arab country we could.
At 6:00 p. m., the Palestinians
issued a new demand.
They wanted a long-distance jet...
to fly them and their hostages
to an unspecified Arab country.
But the German government
and the organizing committee...
decided that we were not
allowed at all...
to let foreigners bring out
guests of our country...
who came as guests
to the Olympic Games.
That led to the final conclusion that we
give the impression to the terrorists...
that we'll let them fly out...
but try everything
to then kill them...
or bring them into prison...
before they could leave the country.
Our aim was to
drag out the proceedings...
to wear down the terrorists...
and try to establish the best time
for freeing the hostages.
That was our objective.
The organizers of the Games
naturally wanted the Games...
to resume as soon as possible.
We had to find a resolution
one way or another.
To move the thing
from the Olympic compound...
Zvi Zamir, Chief of Mossad
(Israel Secret Service) 1968-74
in order to let
the Olympic Games to carry on...
this was their main objective.
The Israeli team...
and its rescue
were secondary to that.
The staff group decided
to bring them...
to the public airport of Munich
in order to try something.
I said, "Listen, that's crazy.
We have another airport...
which is not a public airport. "
So I proposed to make
Furstenfeldbruck the target.
The police plan revolved around
a decoy Boeing 727...
which was to be left on the runway
with its engine idling.
On board would be a voluntary squad
of policemen...
disguised as flight crew.
The Palestinians and Israelis
would be flown in by helicopter.
When Issa and his deputy
went to inspect the plane...
the fake crew would overcome them.
Meanwhile, five snipers positioned
on the tower and around the airfield...
would open fire
on the remaining terrorists...
and assault vehicles would rush in
to rescue the hostages.
There were only five snipers
because the police still believed...
there would be a total
of four to five terrorists.
This is Peter Jennings
in the Olympic village.
The Olympic village
is built on various levels...
and underneath building 31, and
underneath all of the buildings here...
there is a network of roads.
Those alleyways
now have been used to bring in...
a fairly massive security force,
including armored cars...
and just a short while ago,
Howard Cosell...
noticed that there was
considerable activity there.
Over the recent 25 to 30 minutes...
there was a flurry of activity,
cars were speeding off...
and we now have a corridor
or avenue of departure...
available to the Arabs...
should a deal have been made
and should they be coming out...
as now seems likely.
So there is a quiet now
and an expectancy.
I didn't feel fear as such.
I felt apprehensive,
as any person would.
I was afraid of failing.
The Palestinians and Israelis
were to be flown by helicopter...
to Furstenfeldbruck Airport.
But how would they get themselves
and their hostages...
to the helicopters,
which were on the edge of the village.
They decided to walk
via the underground car park.
The police saw
another ambush opportunity...
and placed marksmen here...
but Issa insisted
on checking the route first.
So we walked there with one of...
the terrorists behind me
with a machine gun in my back...
and at that time, some of the gunmen
of the German police...
were lying in the side streets...
and when we approached,
they were crawling away.
So the terrorists immediately
found out that there was danger...
and they decided to use a bus
and not to walk.
The terrorists brought the Israelis
down a passage...
into an underground car park
and to a bus.
Robert Thompson, a 24-year-old
Canadian water polo player...
saw them leave.
So then they brought
seven of them out...
and they put seven of the Israelis
on the bus...
and then he went back inside,
and then they brought out more.
During this, there was one fellow
standing in front of the bus...
with a machine gun,
watching all of it.
The terrorists had all the guns.
What were the Israelis doing?
They were tied.
They had their hands
tied in front of them...
and plus their hands
were tied like that.
Then around the back they had ropes,
and they were tied together like that.
The first man that got out was
the man with the white pith helmet.
He got out, went over
to the first helicopter...
and made a complete check
with a flashlight.
He checked in and out, both back,
front and middle of the helicopter...
and when he saw that everything
looked like it was all right...
he signaled, and four hostages
started to march out...
with their hands
tied in front of them...
and behind them
was an Arab guerilla...
with some kind of weapon
in his hand.
It was quite
a frightening experience.
It wasn't any James Bond.
It was the real thing.
It has taken less than five minutes
to reach the waiting helicopters...
but in that five minutes
a critical piece of information...
has suddenly been revealed.
There are not four guerillas
nor even five, as the police believed.
There are eight, and there are
only five police marksmen...
waiting at Furstenfeldbruck Airport.
We were standing
at a window directly above...
as our friends were led handcuffed
from the bus to the helicopters.
The terrorists stood there
with rifles.
They looked as if they felt like heroes
dominating the world.
All around,
flashbulbs were going off.
I felt bitter.
It's not a movie.
It's our people we're talking about!
Two were already murdered, and
they were making a show out of it.
One of the helicopters now proceeds
out over the Olympic site...
out over the main stadium
where half the lights are on.
The second helicopter
is now following it...
and moving out around
this tremendously high...
major Olympic tower
as they depart...
to a destination we, of course,
as yet do not know.
And we, with the German team...
we moved to the third helicopter.
The third helicopter
now moving right by us...
right over the Olympic village...
passing now
over the main stadium.
All the lights on
in this Olympic site-
an Olympic site
which for more than a week now...
has been a place of serenity
and comradeship-
an Olympic village which, in spite of
some political crisis, has been happy...
and now today has been
absolutely shattered...
by this tragedy.
As we were flying...
we began to get the feeling
that a trap was waiting for us...
so we began to prepare ourselves.
In the event of an ambush,
we had been told to fight...
with all our strength,
as though in battle.
We were to do
everything necessary...
to defend ourselves
and our operation.
The marksmen,
who had no radio links...
were still only expecting
a total of five terrorists.
Nobody from the village
thought to inform them...
that there were now known
to be eight.
We rushed quickly
into the main building...
we moved to the second floor.
It was dark-
dark in the place.
There were very many people in
the corridors and around the building-
behind the building.
From the window we could watch
and see the two helicopters...
landing in front of us.
Just as the helicopters...
bearing the Palestinians
and Israelis were landing...
the police squad
assigned to the decoy plane...
fearing that
they were under-trained...
took a vote
to abandon their mission.
It was quite simply
a suicide mission...
and we unanimously voted
to abandon it.
And this was seconds before-
not even minutes-
seconds before
the helicopters landed.
I told the minister,
I said, "I'm sure...
this will blow the whole affair. "
The Germans had marksmen
on the roof of the control tower...
and marksmen at ground level...
but they had no communications
between each other.
They were just briefed to shoot.
When the first marksmen opened fire,
they would all open fire...
but there was
no coordination of targets.
Some of us got out of
the helicopters...
but others waited inside it with
the hostages, who were now very scared.
We told them that it was in everybody's
interests for them to remain quiet.
Now, the leader of the team,
he and another one...
went to check the aircraft.
The Palestinians
were obviously missing...
the whole crew,
because they came back...
and were yelling.
They were, of course, excited.
As the leader returned
from the airplane...
the whole area suddenly lit up...
and an enormous
amount of firing started.
So we all opened fire in the direction
the shooting was coming from.
And a key marksman was moving
from one position...
to another, blocked by a pillar...
Gerald Seymour
ITN News Reporter
to get into another shooting position
when the shooting started...
and therefore missed the crucial shot
against the Black September commander.
Issa managed to get back to the cover
of the helicopters unscathed.
Sniper Two was more successful,
seriously wounding Issa's deputy.
Snipers Three and Four opened fire
on the six terrorists...
guarding the helicopters...
but inexplicably
managed to kill only one.
Sniper Five did not fire
a single shot.
Because the helicopters had been
landed in the wrong place...
he found himself
in the direct line of fire...
of his fellow marksmen
on the tower.
Like the others, he had not been
supplied with a bulletproof vest...
or steel helmet and found himself
hopelessly exposed.
Meanwhile, a policeman standing
by a window inside the tower...
was killed when a stray bullet
struck him in the head.
They weren't capable.
I can tell you that I doubt
whether the snipers...
were really snipers
according to what I listened to.
One was lying on the roof...
not far away from us.
He wasn't firing
with a sniper's rifle.
But they didn't see it.
They didn't see the targets.
Unbelievable.
The latest word
we get from the airport...
is that, quote, "All hell
has broken loose out there"...
that there is still shooting going on-
but all seems to be confusion.
Nothing is nailed down.
We have no idea what has happened
to the hostages.
The leader was now
on his feet again and shooting...
but his deputy
was seriously wounded.
I crawled over to him
and was hit in the hand.
My gun flew from my hand.
I tried to grab his gun
so I could head for cover...
but I just couldn't do it.
And I only hope that our people...
and the Israelis, that they could
get out of the helicopter...
but they had tied them together
or whatever...
and so they couldn't leave
the helicopters.
The entire area
is ringed off by troops-
heavily armed troops with dogs,
keeping everybody away.
We tried to approach, were stopped by
one of the guards with a machine gun...
and he said, " Do not come closer.
They're heavily armed.
You're going to get hurt. "
But it's total confusion out there.
Just about everybody
and his brother and his sister...
got into their cars
and they've driven to the area.
They've clogged the roads.
Police reinforcements
had a bad time getting there...
because all of these people
are curious, flocking to the area...
clogging up the roads.
Just absolute confusion.
Then I decided to try and find
the commander of the police...
and then we said...
Zvi Zamir, Chief of Mossad
(Israel Secret Service) 1968-74
"What else?
What are you doing?"
Then he said
that he is waiting...
for armored cars to arrive...
from somewhere near Munich.
The police had forgotten
to order the armored cars...
to come to the airport earlier...
and it was only now,
that they radioed to Munich
for them to be sent.
But because the roads
were congested with onlookers...
they did not arrive at the scene
for another hour...
by which time
most of the fighting was over.
Still no word...
the word we really want,
from the hostages.
We asked them to let us
go on top of the roof...
and try to negotiate
with the terrorists.
They refused at the beginning...
but then they said,
'All right, on certain conditions. "
We went up on top of the roof...
and we started to speak Arabic
to the terrorists.
Their reply was clear,
very clear.
They opened fire on the building.
General Ulrich K. Wegener
They fired at the tower,
and I told the minister he should lie down...
and he touched down
under the desk of the commander.
Very funny,
from our view today.
One of the surviving terrorists
now made a dash for it...
heading straight for Sniper Five.
As the terrorist ran towards him,
Sniper Number Five...
fired his only shots of the night...
point-blank
into the fleeing man's face.
Seeing these shots...
police reinforcements
arriving at the scene...
with no knowledge of the precise
location of their own snipers...
mistakenly identified Sniper Five
and the helicopter pilot...
who had fled for cover beside him
as terrorists...
and opened fire on them.
Both were seriously wounded.
At midnight
came the official announcement...
of the spokesman
of the German government...
who said all the Israelis are saved...
and all the terrorists are dead.
Conrad Ahlers
German Government Spokesman
I'm very glad that, as far as we can see now,
this police action was successful.
Of course,
it's an unfortunate interruption...
of the Olympic Games...
but, I mean, if all that comes out...
as we hope it will come out
or has come out...
I think it will be forgotten
after a few weeks.
Ankie Spitzer
People all over Holland were calling me-
all my friends, my family.
A neighbor came to us
with this bottle of champagne...
Alex Springer
and we all...
was very glad and happy...
and I think that I went to sleep.
Then the Israeli ambassador
in The Hague, he called me and said...
"Ankie, I just heard the news.
Congratulations,
and everybody is saved...
and everything is okay. "
Originally they said
that the hostages were safe.
Now that has been changed...
and an Olympic spokesman said...
"We are afraid the information
given so far is too optimistic. "
That's where we seem to stand.
So I called the Olympic village.
I called every half-hour, and every
time the news got worse and worse...
and at 3:00 in the morning I said...
"If you know that something happened,
then you tell me now...
because I'm not Hercules.
I have been waiting
from 7:00 in the morning...
and now it's 3:00 the next morning.
I just want to know
what happened to Andre. "
We keep hearing
that the indications are not good...
that Johnny Klein
may have very bad news.
After almost two hours of fighting...
one of the surviving Palestinians
threw a hand grenade...
into the eastern helicopter.
The helicopter was refueled...
and within minutes...
the helicopter
and the area around it...
was in fire.
Simultaneously,
one of his comrades...
sprayed a full clip of bullets
into the other helicopter.
Then there was silence.
And I told the minister...
"I think I have to go to look
for what the police is doing. "
And then I went to the captain
of the police company there...
and said,
"Are you going to do something?
You have to move your people there.
You pull out the hostages
or whatever, you know...
and do something. "
They didn't do anything.
"I have no orders," he said.
It was-
It was a really tragic story...
and so we could only look,
you know.
And when after-
You could hear them yelling,
you know.
We've just gotten the final word.
When I was a kid,
my father used to say...
"Our greatest hopes and our
worst fears are seldom realized. "
Our worst fears
have been realized tonight.
They have now said
that there were 11 hostages.
Two were killed in their rooms...
yesterday morning.
Nine were killed
at the airport tonight.
They're all gone.
That afternoon,
the Games continued.
The surviving members
of the Israeli team...
flew home with their dead.
The bodies of the five
dead Palestinians...
were handed over to Libya,
where they received a hero's funeral.
Mohammed Safady, Aged 19
The three surviving terrorists
were never to stand trial.
Adnan Al Gashey, Aged 27
Jamal Al Gashey, Aged 18
Seven weeks later,
a Lufthansa jet...
en route from Beirut to Frankfurt
was hijacked.
The hijackers demanded the release
of the three Munich terrorists.
Acting with indecent haste and without
consulting the Israeli government...
the Germans
handed over the three prisoners.
The circumstances
surrounding the hijacking...
have long been thought suspicious.
Why were only 12 passengers
on board such a large plane?
Why no women or children?
Why such haste in agreeing
to the hijackers' demands?
For the first time, one of
the Palestinians involved...
has revealed
that the entire affair was a setup...
organized by the German government
in collusion with the terrorists.
The Germans thought
that in this way...
they would prevent future
terror attacks on their country...
and dispose the embarrassing evidence
of their failure that day in September.
I think-
I think it's probably true, yes.
At this time,
the mentality was so, you know.
Really.
Hans Jochen Vogel
Mayor of Munich 1960-1972
On such questions, Willy Brandt,
as I remember very well...
always made this gesture.
I can't say and do more.
Terrorists arrive in Libya
Did you shoot
any of the Israeli hostages?
It's not important to say
if I killed Israeli or not.
What do you think you achieved?
One would have-
We have made our voice heard...
by the world-
Are those your words?
- Of course.
- The same thing.
They have made their voice heard
by the universe or the world...
who has not been hearing before.
I'm proud of what I did at Munich...
because it helped
the Palestinian cause enormously.
Before Munich the world had no idea
about our struggle...
but on that day the name of" Palestine"
was repeated all over the world.
It was only a year and three months
that I was married to Andre Spitzer.
But I remember that year
as the most beautiful...
and most wonderful year of my life.
This is the grave
of Amitzur Shapiro.
He was the athletics coach.
He had four little children,
one my age.
And here is Kehat Shorr.
He was the shooting coach.
Eliezer Halfin was a wrestler...
and so was Mark Slavin,
who I think was only 18 years old.
And here's my father's grave.
Anouk Spitzer
And it says on it his name: Andre Spitzer.
It says, "Son of Tibor,
fencing coach...
murdered by- killed by murderers...
in the Olympic Games in Munich...
as a representative
of the Israeli sport. "
Then it says his date of birth
and the date that he was murdered.
And I always bring him sunflowers
because that's his favorite flower.