Memorie.al brings to mind the tragic event of 1972, during the development of the 20th Olympic Games, where five Palestinian terrorists, disguised as Jewish fans, entered the Olympic village and kidnapped 11 Israeli athletes. Minutes after the minute, all the details of the painful event that rocked the Olympics and the tragic end of that hurdle left 11 Israelian sportsmen, 5 Palestinian terrorists dead and one German policeman dead.
On September 5, 1972, when the 20th Olympic Games, which were taking place in Munich, began an unusual event that shocked Germany and the Olympic sports committees not only in Europe but around the world. Five Palestinian terrorists from the Black September organization, in order to influence the Israeli government to release their Palestinian terrorist friends, who were imprisoned in the Middle East, disguise themselves at the hotel where the Israeli Olympic delegation was accommodated, and receive hostage 11 Jewish athletes and their trainers, threatening to kill them. Then everything went into a tragedy.
That’s how the hacking started
On August 21, 1972, in the city of Munich, Southeast Germany, the 20th Olympic Games began, attended by Olympic delegations from over 190 countries, including Germans, together with the Israelis, who declared the extinction of the old WWII hostilities. But against the Jewish athletes, the kidnapping was followed by a new tragedy, and this time, by their Palestinian neighbors. On September 5, 1972, five Palestinian terrorists, disguised as Jews, wearing their traditional hats and dresses and bouquets of flowers in hand, declaring to German police officers that they were friends of Israeli athletes and especially Israeli athletes, managed to trick themselves into hotel “Olidorf”, in the Olympic village “Konolkishtrase-31”, where the delegation of Israeli athletes was accommodated. Upon entering the hotel, they pulled out the bouquets of flowers they had hidden in and were thrown into the room where the best Jewish athletes, such as David Berger, Yossef Romano, etc., were housed, and taken away, taking them hostage. threatened that if the Israeli government led by Kty Prime Minister Golda Meir did not release more than 100 Palestinian fighters from Israeli prisons in the Middle East within 24 hours, they would brutally kill all 11 of their athletes and trainers in their rooms. hotel. At this time, according to the Olympic Games program, the final athletics competition would take place and the Israeli athletes, who claimed to win the races and become champions, were not appearing on the runway.
Concerned by this fact, special agents and German police went to the hotel where the athletes were staying and, unaware that they had been taken hostage, was told to go to the Olympic Stadium, where the final race would take place. But then they see one of the masked Palestinian terrorists pointing a gun at an Israeli athlete, and the German police and security guards there realize that something had happened on the third floor of the Olidorf Hotel. with the athletes. After that, they decided to intervene forcefully to clarify the situation. But as soon as German special forces intervened to free the hostage-takers, the head of the Palestinian terrorists in disguise came out to the balcony of the hotel and informed the German police and special forces of their conditions. A tense situation immediately swept across the Bavarian Bavarian countryside. The final race, which was to take place in minutes, was canceled and all the world Olympic sports delegations were isolated in their hotels, under the strict surveillance of German police and special forces. While the Palestinian hostel, along with Israeli hostages, was surrounded on all sides by soldiers guarding snipers against the terraces of the hotels around the scene. German police entered into negotiations with Palestinian terrorists, promising the hostages to do their utmost to fulfill their demands. But in the meantime, they practically devised a plan of forcible intervention into the building in order to save the lives of the hostages as soon as possible. But the plan required courage and speed, as other Olympic teams were deployed on the second floor, including the Albanian Olympic team. Meanwhile, the German government was immediately notified of this problem, which made the Israeli government aware of the problem of athletes’ participation in the Olympic village. At that moment, the Palestinian terrorists realized that the bomb was coming and would occasionally go out on the balcony of the hotel, firing at German police and journalists with envelopes containing dangerous chemical fumes. After a few minutes, the Palestinian terrorists at the hotel received the bad news, saying that the Israeli government, headed by Prime Minister Golda Meir, had refused to meet the Palestinians’ demand to release their Arab comrades from Israeli prisons. At that moment, the Palestinian terrorists, seeing the situation created and without hope, realized that the German special forces would attack and to further aggravate the situation they took and killed one of the Israeli athletes who had been kidnapped. At this time, German special forces realized that Palestinian terrorists, by killing one hostage, threatened to kill all other hostages. As a result of this situation, they decided to intervene strongly by relying on snipers installed on the terraces to unlock the situation. Meanwhile, enraged by German police intervention, Palestinian terrorists decided to turn the event into a tragedy. They brutally executed all other Israeli hostages, bringing the death toll to 11. The Jewish athletes who were executed in those fateful moments were David Berger, Ze’ev Friedman, Yossef Gutfreund, Elieser Halfin, Yossef Romano, Amitzur Shapira, Kehat Shorr, Mark Slavin, Andrea Spitzer, Yakov Springer, and Moshe Weinberg. After completing their terrorist offensive, the Palestinian hostages, escorted by unceasing bullets from German snipers and special forces, left the Oledorf hotel, fleeing to Munich Airport in order to escape Germany.
Ending the tragic situation
After carrying out the terrorist act of killing 11 Israeli hostages, terrorists from the Black September organization were able to flee to Munich Airport. On arriving there, they found themselves under the full siege of German special forces, which ordered the terrorists to surrender their weapons and not move from their cars. Palestinian terrorists refused to surrender to German police and began to resist, firing at them. As a result, they killed one of the German police officers who were closest to them. To put an end to this tragic incident, German police and agents began firing unintentionally on the car of Palestinian terrorists, killing a fifth inside their car.
Albanian weightlifter, Pampuri, on the scene
Among the many Olympic athletes who watched closely the tragic event of their peers’ hostage-taking was the well-known Albanian weightlifter Ymer Pampuri, who was close to the Israeli team’s room. And along with other members of the Olympic delegation Albanian, he closely followed the whole tragic scene of the hijacking, which occurred that September day, where the 20th Olympic Games were taking place. The following day, Israel withdrew from the Munich Olympics, as the bodies of 11 Israeli athletes were honored at their last home in their homeland, Jerusalem. A week later, in retaliation, the Israeli armed forces destroyed the entire structure of the Black September organization in Palestine. The tragic event in Munich shocked the world, but it was more felt by the Communist regime of Enver Hoxha in Albania, as official Tirana was, among other things, supporting, assisting, training and funding the leaders of Palestinian terrorist groups, where many most of them had their bases in Tirana. As a result, just hours after the hostage event in Munich, at the behest of Enver Hoxha, as commander-in-chief, the entire Albanian army and other structures of the armed forces went into combat No.1, as in the event of war. This came as official Tirana feared any possible military intervention from abroad due to the fact that it housed and funded Palestinian terrorists.
