Halt funding after Abbas outburst, says a German politician. And also, he says, make sure full compensation is paid to victims’ families for five decades of German blunders and indifference to the 1972 Munich Olympic killings.

23 August 2022 By Paul Martin

VERSION ONE

Exclusive.

A senior German political figure has called on the Federal Government to halt the flow of funds to the Palestinian Authority, as a result of the “50 Holocausts” remark made by the PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Berlin last week.

Ludwig Spaenle held the posts of Minister of Culture, Sports, Science and Education over ten years for Bavaria, which includes Munich. He is the Bavarian State Government’s Commissioner for Jewish Life, Commissioner against Antisemitism, and Commissioner for Work of Remembrance.

Mr Abbas had been askedin Berlin if the Palestinians would apologise for the killings in Munich of eleven Israeli athletes and a German security officer during the Olympic Games in 1972.

“Abbas used the moment and the place, in the headquarters of the German government. It was clearly very planned,” Mr Spaenle told Correspondent.World.

He also condemned the German Chancellor for shaking hands with Mr Abbas after the inflammatory statement, which came at the end of a joint press conference in the German Chancellery.

“There is a discussion going on now about what actions should be taken, including the amount the German gives to the PA. There is no final decision. I think it should be stopped — even if only for a while.”

Mr Spaenle, who regularly attends events in Israel, said talk of bringing in criminal sanctions against Mr Abbas or banning him from German soil were misplaced. “We cannot do criminal sanctions,” he told the Correspondent.World. “It could bring in even more radical elements to rule the Palestinian people.”

He added: “We should consider stopping the financing of the PA not only by Germany but also from the EU. It should be stopped — even if only for a while, perhaps.”

He added: “It was an unbelievable abuse of the Holocaust, and Abbas did it very severely. How could Abbas say these illiberal things, especially where he was and when it was? It should not have been allowed to happen.”

Mr Spaenle is currently trying unofficially to mediate a solution that would result in families of victims and survivors of the 1972 Olympic Games killings to attend a special 50th anniversary commemoration on September 5. The families have announced they will boycott the event unless there is a significant change of approach by the German authorities.

Two widows, Anke Spitzer and Ilana Romano, have led a decades-long struggle for full recognition and compensation for German blunders that, by all accounts, led to the deaths of their husbands and nine other members of the Israeli Olympic team on September 5 1972.

They have written to the German government explaining why they intend to boycott the commémoration events.

“If no solution is found and the families do not come, it is a disaster for Germany, and the event will be severely tarnished,” said Mr Spaenle. “It is a very very sensitive situation.”

He found it “shameful” that for forty years the Federal government, the Bavarian state government, and his own city, Munich, had not commemorated the killings annually, nor had it built a memorial. Ten years ago, when Mrs Spitzer gave an emotional address at the airport where nine of the eleven hostages died, the Bavarian government appointed him to construct a fitting memorial, which was erected between the Olympic Village and the Olympic Stadium and opened in 2017.

The memorial is to be a centrepiece of a series of special events on September 4 and 5. Israeli security officers last week were seen at the site, in conversation with German security, planning for an israel presence at the ceremony there.

Israel’s President Isaac Herzog has indicated he will not attend unless the families do, and the International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach is also set to boycott the event if the families are absent, sources told Correspondent.World.

Mr Spaenle said the families deserved full compensation for their losses and their ill-treatment over decades by the German Authorities. He claimed the German government had swept aside commemorations and reparations in the past because it wanted the legacy of its “shameful” past to be forgotten.

“It’s necessary for my country as a democratic country to talk to the families, victims and survivors, in a right way. They have been pushed aside. That is a weird situation for a democratic country 50 years after that event.”

The authorities had tried, he said, to present what it termed the Cheerful Games, as a means to cleanse its image and show it was now a democratic and free country.

Now it needed to cleanse its image properly by doing right to the victims’ families and making its own German people aware of past wrongs.

“I wrote to the Chancellor three months ago, expressing the urgent need to tackle the problem. But I received no reply.

“The Government wants to make the event forgotten. There was an attempt to put it away — to avoid remembrance.

“The way how the families have been treated is a shame on our country.”

Mr Spaenle says he had a particular reason to be focused on the 1972 Olympic events. ” When I was an 11-year-old, I heard the helicopters flying the doomed Israeli athletes to the airfield, as they flew near my house.

“But these days, in schools it has been forgotten– like many other historical events.

” Now though, the European Multi-Games championships, the 50th anniversary row, and the Abbas Holocaust comments, have to an extent brought this back to public consciousness.

“In general, Holocaust education should be stepped up, particularly as the last generation of Holocaust survivors die out. It ‘s a big duty,” he concluded.

NOTE 1:

It’s not only the German government that is declining to use frozen Libyan funds. Britain has also rejected calls to use frozen Libyan funds it holds to compensate victims of IRA bombings, where Libyan-supplied Semtex high explosives were used.

NOTE 2:

Among the German blunders were:

*Letting live television pictures of security forces gathering on rooftops. The terrorists had TV running live on the Olympic village rooms they had captured

*Not having sharpshooting weapons, just rifles

*Failing to coordinate their firing at an airport. That gave the gunmen the chance to blow up or shoot up two parked helicopters filled with nine hostages — the other two had tried to resist the first hold-ups.

*Boasting for half an hour on TV that they had saved most of the hostages when they knew all were dead

*Refusing for decades to let victims’ families view the official files that detail a range of blunders and failures.

VERSION TWO

By Paul Martin in Munich.

Exclusive.

A senior German political figure has accused the German government of an ulterior motive in rejecting a bigger financial offer to families of the victims of the 1972 Olympic Games massacre in Munich.

He says the Government is trying to avoid setting a dangerous precedent.

He told Correspondent.World: “The German government is afraid other countries will want reparations for the cruel things that happened in the Second World War.”.

But Mr Spaenle insisted: “The Government has to solve it by itself — with German money. It is necessary for my own country to establish a right way; it would be a good act for the country.”

Mr Spaenle also rejected a compromise solution of donating money to charities rather than to the victims’ families. “To charity? No. They are the victims and must be paid.”

Mr Spaenle says he was at a loss to understand why, to avoid paying directly from German funds, money could not be allocated from frozen Libyan funds, since there were billions in German banks.

Libya is said to have funded and supplied passports to the attackers in 1972. It may also have been involved in arranging the hijacking of a Lufthansa plane that led to the three suriviving terrorists from Munich being freed and sent to Libya, to a heroes welcome, just 54 days after the killings.

“I want the Gaddafi money to be used. The victims of the Lockerbie attack got their money. And actually some American victims of a Libyan-supported hijacking got money from frozen Libyan accounts..

Though I’m not an international lawyer, I think this was a simple and very fine way to solve the problem.”

He also called on the Federal Government to halt the flow of funds to the Palestinian Authority, as a result of the “50 Holocausts” remark made by the PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Berlin last week.

Mr Abbas had been asked if the Palestinians would apologise for the killings in Munich of eleven Israeli athletes and a German security officer during the Olympic Games in 1972.

“Abbas used the moment and the place, in the headquarters of the German government. It was clearly very planned,” Spaenle told Correspondent.World.

“It was an unbelievable abuse of the Holocaust, and Abbas did it very severely. How could Abbas say these illiberal things, especially where he was and when it was? It should not have been allowed to happen.”

He also condemned the German Chancellor for shaking hands with Mr Abbas after the inflammatory statement, which came at the end of a joint press conference in the German Chancellery.

Mr Spaenle, who regularly attends events in Israel, said talk of bringing in criminal sanctions against Mr Abbas or banning him from German soil were misplaced. “We cannot do criminal sanctions,” he told Correspondent.World. “It could bring in even more radical elements to rule the Palestinian people.”

He added: “We should consider stopping the financing of the PA not only by Germany but also from the EU. It should be stopped — even if only for a while, perhaps.”

They have written to the German government explaining why they intend to boycott the commemoration events.

“If no solution is found and the families do not come, it is a disaster for Germany, and the event will be severely tarnished,” said Mr Spaenle. “It is a very very sensitive situation.”

He found it “shameful” that for forty years the Federal government, the Bavarian state government, and his own city, Munich, had not commemorated the killings annually, nor had built a memorial. Ten years ago, when Mrs Spitzer gave an emotional address at the airport where nine of the eleven hostages died, the Bavarian government appointed him to construct a fitting memorial, which was erected between the Olympic village and the Olympic stadium and opened in 2017.

The authorities had tried, he said, to present what it termed the Cheerful Games, as a means to cleanse its image and show it was now a democratic and free country.

Now it needed to cleanse its image properly by doing right to the victims’ families and making its own German people aware of past wrongs.

“I wrote to the Chancellor three months ago, expressing the urgent need to tackle the problem. But I received no reply.

“The Government wants to make the event forgotten. There was an attempt to put it away out of remembrance.

“The way how the families have been treated is a shame on our country.

“It’s painful how they have been treated. For more than four decades my own city refused to remember. Only the little county that includes the airfield had done something. There has been a memorial at the entrance to the airfield [ where nine of the eleven Israelis died].

“Each year in September there has been a little remembrance. Often families of victims come and so does the head of the Jewish society in Munich.”

He accused the German government of an ulterior motive: trying to avoid setting a dangerous precedent.

“The Government has to solve it by itself — with German money. It is necessary for my own country to establish a right way; it would be a good act for the country.”

He told Correspondent.World: “The German government is afraid other countries will want reparations for the cruel things that happened in the Second World War.”.

Mr Spaenle also rejected a compromise solution of donating money to charities rather than to the victims’ families. “To charity? No. They are the victims and must be paid.”

Mr Spaenle says he was at a loss to understand why, to avoid paying directly from German funds, money could not be allocated from frozen Libyan funds, since there were billions in German banks.

Libya is said to have funded the Munich operation and to have supplied passports to the attackers in 1972. It may also have been involved in arranging the hijacking of a Lufthansa plane that led to the three surviving terrorists being freed and sent from Munich to Libya, to a heroes’ welcome, just 54 days after the killings.

“I want the Gaddafi money to be used. The victims of the Lockerbie attack got their money , and actually some American victims of a Libyan-supported hijacking got money from frozen Libyan accounts.

“Though I’m not an international lawyer, I think this is a simple and very fine way to solve the problem.”

Mr Spaenle says he had a particular reason to be focused on the 1972 Olympic events. “When I was an 11-year-old, I heard the helicopters flying the doomed Israeli athletes to the airfield, as they flew near my house.