The 1972 Munich Olympics Massacre Part 4
31 Connollystraße today
Tensions Rising
As the afternoon of September 5, 1972 bled into early evening, the situation had only grown worse for the nine living Israeli hostages being held in apartment one at 31 Connollystraße in Munich’s Olympic Village.
There was still no idea what these terrorists might do. They had started the ordeal by killing two people. Even though their leader, Issa, claimed those deaths were because of self defense, the Germans did not believe him.
As the day wore on, the captors had become desperate as they realized their demands were being ignored by the only person who had the power to accept them. Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir.
Despite what German officials were telling Issa and the rest of his men, the Palestinians suspected Meir had not agreed to the release of the prisoners being held in Israel.
Because negotiations were at a stalemate, the terrorists needed to fall back on their alternative orders: take the hostages out of Germany to an Arab friendly country. According to Jamal Al Gashey, one of the surviving terrorists, they had been instructed to go no more than twenty-four hours. That was the point when the Palestinians would start to fail psychologically.
But the captors, crammed in the same space as their hostages, must have felt the weight of the reality of the situation. Surrounded by thousands of German police and being watched by millions of people was taking a toll.
To the police, who were examining every action by the terrorists, Issa seemed more nervous, and closer to doing something stupid, like blowing them up with one of the grenades he carried. Or what if one of the other Palestinians opened fire?
“I certainly was fearful of the outcome,” said Walther Tröger, “because, having spent so many hours with the terrorists, I knew exactly that they were absolutely desperate, that they were really tough guys and they would not give in without defend[ing] themselves, and any defense from the terrorists would be to the detriment of the hostages.”
During the afternoon, police detective Anneliese Graes, who had been standing outside the apartment building, had formed a bond with Issa. Simon Reeve used her testimony in the book One Day in September.
Not only did Graes speak directly with Issa several times, she overheard many other conversations. Her eyewitness accounts provided much of the reported information.
Graes overheard Issa say the idea of going to Cairo came from the hostages. However suspicious that might have sounded, the Germans needed to ensure that the hostages agreed with the flight before moving forward with the plan.
The officials demanded proof of life and the ability to talk over the proposal with the hostages. As pointed out in part three, Interior Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher and Olympic City Mayor Walther Tröger were allowed a brief visit inside the room.
The Palestinian document with the demands to be flown out of the country. Note: the Palestinians originally asked for three planes.
Document translation:
COMMUNE
The arrogant attitude of the Israeli military regime and its refusal to comply with our demands would not seduce us into abandoning our humane stance and to continue our efforts to find a way to rescue the Israeli prisoners under the following conditions:
The Federal Republic should declare its readiness to bring the Israeli prisoners to any place determined by our revolutionary forces in the Olympic Village.
The Federal Republic must provide our forces with three aircraft, on board of which the Israeli prisoners, together with our armed forces, will be transported in three consecutive groups to a location yet to be determined. Each group will leave Munich as soon as the previous group has reached its destination.
Any attempt to disrupt our operation will result in the liquidation of all Israeli prisoners, and the Federal Republic will be held responsible for this.
This ultimatum expires in three hours. From then on, the Federal Republic will bear full responsibility for all consequences.
After the expiration of the ultimatum, if our demand to leave German territory is not accepted, our revolutionary forces will be ordered to use revolutionary and just force to teach the war chiefs of the Israeli military machine and the arrogance of the Federal Republic a very harsh lesson.
Revolutionaries of the world, unite!
Once inside the room, the German officials had been stunned by the morbid conditions, with weightlifter Yossef Roman’s body lying on the floor and covered with a sheet. According to Tröger, blood had been everywhere, even on the walls.
The officials asked the Israeli hostages for their consent to be moved out of the village and flown out of the country. Each hostage agreed to the plan.
One last reason for the visit was for Genscher and Tröger, to get a headcount of the terrorists. But the officials were led through the maze of apartments, never fully comprehending what they were up against.
Tröger reported seeing five terrorists. This information was wrong but the police department was desperate to get any information. The count should never have been taken as accurate.
In the meantime, the IOC was relieved to see the crisis about to be moved out of their venue. As we already established, the IOC had no plan if the games were stopped for more than one day.
Most crucial, the Germans refused to actually allow the hostages (their guests) to be taken out of the country. This meant an ambush had to be planned. They went to work working up different scenarios, hoping to capture the terrorists before ever leaving the Olympic Village.
There also needed to be a backup plan in case everything went wrong and the plane left Germany. This meant Cairo, the destination requested by the Palestinians, needed to be brought into the plan. The German officials needed reassurance from Egypt that the Israelis would be kept safe.
Nothing would go right once they left the village.
Before moving on, we’ll explore how a rarely mentioned conversation before Genscher and Tröger’s visit may have influenced Black September members to realize they needed to leave Germany.
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The All-Arab Delegation
On September 5, Magdi Gohary was an Egyptian living in Munich. And even though he had a degree in chemistry, Gohary was considered by many to be an expert in Middle Eastern affairs. At seven that morning, he received a call from German Officials. Gohary was informed that his presence was required and car would be by to pick him up.
This was the start of a long day for the chemist.
He arrived at the village to find the Ministry of the Interior, Federal Police, City of Munich, and Chief of Police Manfred Schreiber. Their objective: to discover a calm solution to a situation that was already uncontrollable.
Gohary was asked to decode the abbreviations on the leaflets tossed by the terrorists. But they meant nothing to him.
Then the officials questioned Gohary about his knowledge of Black September. It was a name he recognized.
The police were then curious about Gohary’s perspective. But he believed he wasn’t the specialist the Germans were seeking. Although he asked to leave, the police detained him.
They wanted him to stay and meet a group arriving on a flight from Bonn, bringing the Tunisian ambassador and the head of the Office of the Arab League in Bonn.
The Arab League representative recognized Gohary and insisted he stay.
The primary strategy that emerged was to buy time. The thinking was the longer the Palestinians were kept talking the better the chance of resolving the situation with no more killing.
Gohary took part in one round of negotiations in the early afternoon. He was now part of an all-Arab delegation that hoped to leverage their shared cultural background to make progress with the hostage-takers.
In the early afternoon, Gohary and his colleagues met with Issa at 31 Connolly Street. Despite the tension, Gohary recalled being more focused on his role than fearful of his safety.
His approach was pragmatic: to convince the hostage-takers that they had already achieved global attention and that further violence would be counterproductive.
The delegation’s job was to get Black September to surrender. But Gohary knew that would never happen. When he spoke with Issa, he told them Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir would not free a single prisoner.
He tried to present the hostage-takers with a solution that allowed them to save face. He let them know the significant international focus they had already attracted.
According to Gohary, the plan to fly the Palestinians and hostages to Cairo was discussed. This was before Issa claimed the hostages suggested the idea.
The event would have repercussions on Gohary. Two weeks later he would be deported-along with 200 other Palestinians-on “suspicion of terrorism.”
Sadat Isn't Home
Once they knew the destination was to be Cairo, Germany attempted to involve Egypt in ensuring the safety of the hostages and apprehending the terrorists. In Bonn, Chancellor Willy Brandt placed at least twelve calls to Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, who refused to answer the phone. This left Brandt to communicate only with Prime Minister Aziz Sidky.
Brandt and Sidky gave different versions of their conversation. Brandt claimed Sidky refused to entertain the idea of helping ensure the safety of the hostages, whom he referred to as “those people.”
Sidky bluntly refuted Brandt’s claim, saying that they would do their best, but could not “guarantee” the safety of the hostages.
Brandt became frustrated. It was at this point he decided there was no way they could allow the plane to leave Munich. It went against everything he stood for to allow their guests to be taken out of the country when he couldn’t guarantee their safety. The German police would save or lose the lives of the hostages. They had a plan that might have worked; but they would had to have had an accurate count of the terrorists and real snipers to execute the plan.
End Game
German authorities presented the final plan to the Palestinians: they would provide them with one plane to fly both them and the hostages to Cairo. In reality, the Germans were not going to allow the trip to happen. The idea was to ambush the group at Fürstenfeldbruck, a military airbase outside Munich.
The first choice had been the public airport in Munich (Riem). Walther Tröger disagreed with the choice, saying,: “Well, isn’t that crazy? We have another airport that isn’t public … Fürstenfeldbruck.”
Fürstenfeldbruck was a quiet Luftwaffe base, used to take strain off of Riem during the busy season in October. During the Second World War, the base served as an air war school. In 1945, it had surrendered to U.S. troops, and was eventually part of the Berlin airlift. Since 1956, the air base had been a training center of the German Air Force. It was the perfect place for the Germans to stage an ambush.
In Israel, Golda Meir thought the Germans had well-trained men to handle the situation. She was wrong.
It was now after 6 P.M. The hostages had less than seven hours to live.
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Sources
1 One Day in September. NTSC, Dolby, Color, Closed-captioned, DVD, Subtitled, Dubbed, Widescreen, Documentary. Sony Pictures Classics, 2005.
2 Filmed interview with Walther Tröger.
3 “Place of Remembrance Fürstenfeldbruck - Olympia 1972.” Accessed September 3, 2024. https://www.erinnerungsort-fuerstenfeldbruck1972.de/en.
4 Reeve, One Day in September, Loc 2072.
5 Issa had asked for three planes, but the Germans convinced him that was impossible.
6 Reeve, One Day in September, Loc 2107.
7 “Olympic Assassination 1972 - Monument in Fürstenfeldbruck.” Accessed September 7, 2024. https://www.outdooractive.com/en/poi/furstenfeldbruck/olympic-assassination-1972-monument-in-fuerstenfeldbruck/55132912/.
8 One Day in September. NTSC, Dolby, Color, Closed-captioned, DVD, Subtitled, Dubbed, Widescreen, Documentary. Sony Pictures Classics, 2005.