Bavaria: Spaenle: Higher compensation for victims of the Olympic attack

The dispute has been smoldering for decades: the survivors of the victims of the 1972 Olympic attack are fighting for access to the files and more compensation. They are now receiving support from the Bavarian Anti-Semitism Commissioner.

Würzburg (dpa / lby) – The Bavarian anti-Semitism commissioner Ludwig Spaenle (CSU) calls for higher compensation for the victims of the Olympic attack in 1972. The sums paid so far are not in relation to the decades-long, cost-intensive efforts of those affected to clarify them privately, writes Spaenle in a letter to Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD), which is available to the German Press Agency. “The 50th anniversary of the Olympic assassination will probably be the last opportunity, with a gesture of generosity, to at least partially make up for the losses suffered by the relatives, their years of often fruitless efforts to be heard, to be recognized and enlightened.”

According to Spaenle, the Federal Republic paid a total of 3.2 million Deutschmarks in compensation in 1972, and in 2002 there was a further 3.07 million euros from the federal government, the Free State of Bavaria and the city of Munich.

Eleven members of the Israeli Olympic team, a German policeman and five of the terrorists were killed in the attack in September 1972. The Palestinian terrorists had taken hostages in the Israeli team’s compound. The events later shifted to the Fürstenfeldbruck military airfield. The use of the police to free the hostages is controversial. Critics accuse those responsible for the use of several serious errors and glitches. The dispute over the processing and above all the compensation of the bereaved has been smoldering for decades.

“To this day, in Israel, in addition to the terrorists’ murder, the amateurish and ultimately fatal rescue operation by the German security forces is also very much in the public eye,” Spaenle wrote to Scholz. There is often talk of an open wound. In the context of the anniversary on September 5, “possibly the last chance to heal this wound from the German side opens up”.