On Monday, the families of the 11 Israeli athletes who were killed in an attack at the Munich Olympics 49 years ago have demanded that the United Nations provide them with €110 million euros ($124.5 million) in compensation from Libya.
Supported by the Israeli government, the families asked the UN to grant them compensation from Libya’s frozen funds, according to a report by German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung.
They claim Muammer Gaddafi contributed to financing the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which carried out the attack, and therefore they are entitled to receive compensation from Libya.
Israel’s Ambassador to the UN, Gilad Erdan assisted in presenting the UN with documents that prove Gaddafi’s involvement. He also provided the Bar Association representing the families with a report stating that some of the gunmen entered Germany with forged Libyan passports, granting them access to the Olympics ground to carry out the attack.
“Gaddafi awarded then-Palestinian late leader Yasser Arafat $5 million as a gift for the attack,” it read, adding that the gunmen were trained on Libyan soil.
On 5 September 1972, during the 20th Olympic Games, eight gunmen from the PLO splinter group “Black September” raided the Israeli team’s quarters in the Olympic village in Munich, Germany.
They killed a weightlifter and a wrestling coach almost immediately, took nine others hostage and demanded the release of 236 prisoners held in Israel.
Later at Fuerstenfeldbruck military airfield near Munich, from where the gunmen were hoping to leave Germany, police opened fire and a gunfight erupted.
All nine hostages were killed, five of the gunmen, and a German Policeman also died.
The three remaining gunmen, who were captured alive, were freed when Palestinian hijackers took a Lufthansa airliner in October 1972.