{"id":98215,"date":"2022-09-06T17:00:48","date_gmt":"2022-09-06T15:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=98215"},"modified":"2022-09-06T07:45:28","modified_gmt":"2022-09-06T05:45:28","slug":"16-00-72","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/?p=98215","title":{"rendered":"Germany Asks for Forgiveness for \u2018Fatal\u2019 Failures of 1972 Munich Olympics Attack on Israeli Athletes"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>Germany Asks for Forgiveness for \u2018Fatal\u2019 Failures of 1972 Munich Olympics Attack on Israeli Athletes<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/h5>\n

Sharon Wrobel<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Herzog speaks at the commemoration ceremony of the Munich Olympics attack on Israeli athletes. Credit: Amos Ben-Gershom\/GPO<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Germany\u2019s president on Monday asked for forgiveness for the \u201cfatal\u201d failures by his country to protect the eleven Israeli athletes murdered by Palestinian militants 50 years ago at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAs the head of state of this country and in the name of the Federal Republic of Germany, I ask your forgiveness for the woefully inadequate protection afforded to the Israeli athletes at the Olympic Games in Munich and for the woefully inadequate investigation afterwards \u2013 for the fact that it was possible for what happened to happen,\u201d German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier said at a commemoration ceremony to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1972 Olympic Games, which was attended by the victims\u2019 relatives and German and Israeli officials.<\/span><\/p>\n

The ceremony was held just days after the victims\u2019 families, who had threatened to boycott the commemoration event, last week reached a\u00a0compensation<\/a>\u00a0agreement with the German government, ending a decades-long dispute.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cToday\u2019s act of remembrance can only be sincere if we are prepared to recognise painful facts \u2013 if we acknowledge that the story of the Olympic attack is also a story of misjudgements and of dreadful, fatal mistakes: of, in fact, failure,\u201d Steinmeier admitted. \u201cWe are talking about a great tragedy and a triple failure.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe first failure regards the preparations for the games and the security strategy; the second comprises the events of Sept. 5 and 6, 1972; and the third failure begins the day after the attack: the silence, the denial, the forgetting,\u201d he elaborated.<\/span><\/p>\n

Steinmeier emphasized that it was Germany\u2019s responsibility as the host of the games to protect sportsmen and women from around the world, especially those from Israel.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere were survivors of the Shoah among the athletes and their coaches,\u201d Steinmeier said. \u201cTheir safety had been entrusted to us. What a great vote of confidence it was to take part, after the crimes against humanity of the Shoah, in Olympic Games hosted by the country of the perpetrators.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe were not prepared for an attack of this kind, and yet we ought to have been; that, too, is part of the bitter truth,\u201d he conceded.<\/span><\/p>\n

Steinmeier announced that the German government will establish an Israeli-German commission of historians to \u201cshed light onto that dark chapter.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Addressing the victims\u2019 families, Steinmeier said: \u201cYou have a right to finally know the truth, to finally receive answers to the questions that have tormented you for decades. And they include the question of why you were left alone with your suffering, your pain, for so long.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Also speaking at the memorial ceremony, Israel\u2019s President Isaac Herzog commended the German government for taking responsibility for the failures surrounding and following the Munich massacre after decades of neglect.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cFor the families of the victims, their pain and sorrow for their loved ones\u2019 loss, were compounded by their anguish about this indifference and cold shoulder,\u201d Herzog said. \u201cThese were years in which it seemed like one simple truth had been forgotten: this was not a uniquely Jewish and Israeli tragedy\u2014this was a global tragedy! A tragedy that must be recalled and commemorated at every Olympic Games.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

One of the widows of the 11 killed Israeli athletes, Ankie Spitzer, whose husband was fencing coach Andre Spitzer, addressed him during her speech noting that \u201calthough after 50 years, we are finally reaching our goal, at the end of the day you are still gone and nothing can change that.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEverybody is asking now if I feel closure,\u201d Spitzer said. \u201cThey don\u2019t understand that there will never be closure. The hole in my heart will never, ever heal.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

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Germany Asks for Forgiveness for \u2018Fatal\u2019 Failures of 1972 Munich Olympics Attack on Israeli Athletes Sharon Wrobel Herzog speaks at the commemoration ceremony of the Munich Olympics attack on Israeli athletes. Credit: Amos Ben-Gershom\/GPO Germany\u2019s president on Monday asked for forgiveness for the \u201cfatal\u201d failures by his country to protect the eleven Israeli athletes murdered […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[26,24],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98215"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=98215"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98215\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98228,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98215\/revisions\/98228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=98215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=98215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.reunion68.se\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=98215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}