In the early hours of the morning of September 5, 1972, Palestinian terrorists took eleven members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage in the athletes' village in Munich.
THE Munich Massacre was a Palestinian terrorist attack on the Israeli Olympic team at the 1972 Summer Games.
Here's the lowdown on the craven murder of unarmed athletes that rocked the world 46 years ago.
In the early hours of the morning of September 5, 1972, Palestinian terrorists took eleven members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage in the athletes' village in Munich.
The Olympians had enjoyed a night out the preceding evening taking in a performance of Fiddler on the Roof before returning to the village.
At 4.30am local time on September 5, as the athletes slept, eight members of Black September, a wing of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), disguised in tracksuits scaled a 6½ft chain-link fence.
They were helped by unsuspecting athletes who were also sneaking back into the Olympic Village.
The terrorists were also carrying duffel bags loaded with AKM assault rifles, Tokarev pistols and grenades.
The Black September group forced their way into the apartments of the Israeli Olympic teamand were confronted by Yossef Gutfreund, a wrestling referee, and Moshe Weinberg, a wrestling coach in Apartment 1.
Weinberg was shot while fighting with the attackers, who forced him at gunpoint to lead them to the rooms of the remaining Israeli coaches and athletes.
They bypassed Apartment 2 as that was where the shooting team were sleeping.
In Apartment 3 the terrorists gathered more hostages and forced them back to Apartment 1.
Wrestler Gad Tsabari broke from the group and dashed down a flight of stairs toward an underground parking garage, and Weinberg took advantage of the confusion to again fight the attackers.
Weinberg had nearly gained control of a terrorist’s gun when he was shot and killed.
Despite being on crutches due to an injury during competition, Yossef Romano, a weightlifter, also made an attempt to disarm one of the terrorists.
Romano was killed and his mutilated body was left on the floor of Apartment 1 as a warning.
While two Israelis lay dead in the Olympic Village and nine others were being held hostage, International Olympic Committee chairman Avery Brundage insisted that the games continue.
The terrorists demanded the liberation of more than 200 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons, the release of Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof of the Red Army Faction from German prisons, and a plane to fly them to the Middle East.
While negotiations were ongoing, a planned rescue attempt had to be called off when it was realised the West German police were being broadcast live to nearly 1billion people around the world and to the many televisions throughout the Olympic Village.
At about 10pm on September 5, believing they had reached an agreement, the terrorists led the hostages on to buses that took them to waiting helicopters.
The helicopters carried them to Fürstenfeldbruck Air Base, 15 miles west of the Olympic Village, where police were lying in ambush.
Police officers killed five of the eight Black September members during a failed attempt to rescue the hostages.
A West German policeman died in the crossfire and all the hostages were slaughtered.
The other three Palestinian hijackers were captured.
The next month, however, following the hijacking of Lufthansa Flight 615, the West German government released them in a hostage exchange.
Mossad responded with the 1973 Israeli raid on Lebanon and Operation Wrath of God, tracking down and killing Palestinians suspected of involvement in the attack.
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