25 must read books - XX

One day in September

 September 1972. Munich Olympics.

Germany had put up a massive display in place with a hope of that this would put the memories of World War II and Hitler behind it. To enhance its international image the German authorities had dressed down the security arrangements and even removed the weapons from the security personnel.

This created an opportunity for the Palestinian terrorist group, Black September, to execute a strike.

At 4.30 AM on the morning of September 5, the terrorists scaled the perimeter wall of Olympic village.  They invaded the Israeli quarter and took 11 athletes and coaches as hostages. By this act they wanted to bring the spotlight back on the Palestinian issue and force the release of hundreds of Arabs held prisoner by Israelis.

The negotiations started. Nothing positive emerged. The German authorities refused to accept the help of help of israeli anti- terrorist squad. Late in the evening,  two German helicopters  took the terrorists and the surviving hostages to a little used airfield in Munich, from where they were to be flown off to a neutral country.

Things went terribly wrong there. The attempted rescue operation was badly botched up. Within a short time 15 people lay dead - all the hastages, five of the terrorists and one German policeman.

The German government went into a camouflaging mode for over two decades. This book answers all the "why"s.  

With hundreds of interviews under his belt and hundreds more documents in hand - many released following petitions filed by families of the victims.

The author, Simon Reeve,  goes to great lengths to present a balanced history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and he reveals an extensive and irresponsible German cover-up. The Israelis hit back ruthlessly. The book covers the reprisal by Israel. The complete incident was one of the drivers for fuelling the Arab-Israel conflict for the next three decades.

Simon Reeve is a journalist and writer by profession.

Namaste

Prabir

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