Germany agrees to pay new compensation for 1972 Munich attack

The German Interior Ministry agreed to pay additional compensation to the families of Israeli Olympians killed by Palestinian terrorists in Munich in 1972 and is now negotiating with these families. 

The ministry said that the 50th anniversary of the tragic events should be an occasion for Berlin to give a clear political assessment of what happened, AP reports.   

The amount of payments has not yet been named.

At the 1972 Munich Olympics, the Palestinian Black September group took Israeli athletes hostage and demanded the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel and two others in Germany. The German security forces made an unsuccessful attempt to free the hostages. A total of 17 Israelis and one German policeman were killed.

Immediately after the attack, Germany paid the families of the victims a total of 4.19 million deutsche marks (about 2 million euros or $2.09 million).

In 2002, at that time, the living relatives of the victims received another $3.04 million.

The families of those killed believed that they were entitled to about 40 million deutsche mark in compensation and pointed to major miscalculations in the protection of the Olympic village and then in the police operation. Some of them have vowed to boycott the commemorative ceremony in Munich in 2022.

In June 2022, the Bavarian authorities promised to declassify all documents related to the 1972 terrorist attack.