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JERUSALEM, Sept 4 (Reuters) – Ankie Spitzer was 26 when her husband Andre, coach of the Israeli fencing team, was killed by Palestinian gunmen at the 1972 Munich Olympics 50 years ago this week, and the memories of that day have dominated his life ever since.
The attack on the Israeli team by gunmen associated with the Palestinian militant group Black September shocked the world, largely on live television watched by millions of viewers.
In the end, 11 members of the Israeli team were killed, as well as a German policeman and five of the Palestinian gunmen. German and Olympic authorities faced bitter criticism for their response to the attack.
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“I was only married a year and three months to Andre, we were a young couple, very much in love with a little baby, you know, we were on top of the world,” Spitzer told Reuters before a ceremony in Germany commemorative week of the massacre.
“I was with him at the Olympics and I was in the room after they were killed, just a few hours later, and I looked around, everything was covered in blood,” he said.
“I said to myself … if they can do this I will never shut up, I will never stop talking about it, just for one reason, so that this never happens again.”
When militants infiltrated the poorly defended Olympic Village in the early hours of September 5, 1972 and entered Israeli apartments, it was the start of a bloody 24-hour standoff that began with a fight between the gunmen and unarmed. athletes trying to defend themselves.
The attackers demanded the release of more than 200 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons, as well as the release of German Red Army Faction radicals Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof and a plane to the Middle East.
After a rescue attempt was called off when police realized it was being broadcast on live television, German authorities agreed to bring the attackers and several hostages to the airport.
A further rescue attempt also failed with a firefight at the Furstenfeldbruck airbase, which eventually ended when the surviving gunmen were captured.
Along with other family members and survivors, Spitzer had initially refused to attend Monday’s ceremony in Munich, outraged by Germany’s paltry compensation offers, until a $28 million settlement was reached last week. euros ($28 million). Read more
Israeli President Isaac Herzog will attend the ceremony in Munich on Monday with German leaders, including President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, but for those who lived through it, the scars will not fade.
“For me the trauma of 1972 will remain,” said Ilana Romano, whose husband Joseph, a weightlifter, was another of the athletes killed in the attack.
“I hope the world will understand better and be willing to do more, and the most important thing is not to support terror and understand that terrorism destroys all good things.”
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Written by James Mackenzie; Edited by Hugh Lawson
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