Operation Wrath of God
Encyclopedia
Operation Wrath of God ,This title was an invention of later writers, and was most likely not used by the Mossad itself. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2527133.stm also called Operation Bayonet, was a covert operation
directed by Israel
and the Mossad
to assassinate
individuals alleged to have been directly or indirectly involved in the 1972 Munich massacre
.
Their targets included members of the Palestinian
militant group Black September
, who were responsible for the Munich attack, and members of the Palestine Liberation Organization
(PLO) accused of being involved.There is much debate as to how Black September, Fatah
, the PFLP
, and the PLO were connected. Based on books by Abu Iyad
, who headed Black September, and Abu Daoud
, who helped plan Munich, Black September was an offshoot of Fatah, yet it also included members from various other factions. At that time Fatah was in control of the PLO Palestinian National Authority
http://www.ict.org.il/articles/articledet.cfm?articleid=145. Authorized by Israeli Prime Minister
Golda Meir
in the autumn of 1972, the operation may have continued for more than 20 years.Veterans of the Mossad speaking anonymously have said that there was no reason to suspend the campaign until 1993, when the Oslo Accords
were signed http://www.ew.com/ewarticlereuters0,24012,1143841_10_0_,00.html.
Covert Israeli assassination units killed dozens of suspected conspirators across Europe during this time, including the mistaken murder of an innocent waiter in Lillehammer
, Norway
, in what became known as the Lillehammer affair
. An additional military assault
was launched by Israeli commandos deep inside Lebanon
to kill several high-profile Palestinian targets. This string of assassinations spurred retaliatory attacks by Black September against a variety of Israeli government targets around the world. It has also prompted criticism of Israel over its choice of targets, tactic of assassination, and overall effectiveness. Because of the secretive nature of the operation, some details are unverifiable beyond a single source
, including the story of Yuval Aviv
, who claims to have led an Israeli assassination squad. Some or all information about the operation might have been placed by the Mossad itself, to cover the tracks of its agents, and spread useful rumours (e.g., in the book upon which the feature Sword of Gideon was based, most Mossad agents involved in the operation get killed, possibly a cover to protect them from revenge).
The operation was depicted in the television film Sword of Gideon
(1986), and Steven Spielberg
's Munich
(2005).
at the 1972 Summer Olympics
by the Palestinian
militant group Black September
moved Israel to consider measures to deter future similar actions. Soon after the incident, Prime Minister Golda Meir
created Committee X, a small group of government officials tasked with formulating an Israeli response, with herself and Defense Minister Moshe Dayan
at the head. She also appointed General Aharon Yariv
as her Advisor on Counterterrorism; he, along with Mossad
Director Zvi Zamir
, took the principal role in directing the ensuing operation. The committee came to the conclusion that to deter future violent incidents against Israel they needed to assassinate those who had supported or carried out the Munich massacre, and in dramatic fashion. Pressured by Israeli public opinion and top intelligence officials, Meir reluctantly authorized the beginning of the broad assassination campaign
. Yet when the three surviving perpetrators of the massacre were released just months later by West Germany
in compliance with the demands of the hijackers
of a Lufthansa
aircraft, any remaining ambivalence she felt was removed. The committee's first task for Israeli intelligence was to draw up an assassination list of all those involved in Munich. This was accomplished with the aid of PLO operatives working for Mossad, and with information provided by friendly European intelligence agencies. While the contents of the entire list are unknown, reports put the final number of targets at 20–35, a mix of Black September and PLO elements.Reeve states that intelligence sources put the number at 20 (Reeve, 162), while Ostrovsky puts it at 35 (Ostrovsky, 179). Once this was complete, the Mossad was charged with locating the individuals and assassinating them.
Critical in the planning was the idea of plausible deniability
, that it should be impossible to prove a direct connection between the assassinations and Israel. In addition, the operations were intended to strike a more general fear into Palestinian militants. According to David Kimche
, former deputy head of Mossad, "The aim was not so much revenge but mainly to make them [the militant Palestinians] frightened. We wanted to make them look over their shoulders and feel that we are upon them. And therefore we tried not to do things by just shooting a guy in the street – that’s easy … fairly."
It is also known that Mossad agent Michael Harari
led the creation and direction of the teams, although some may not have always been under government responsibility. Author Simon Reeve explains that the Mossad team—whose squad names are letters of the Hebrew alphabet
—consisted of:
This is similar to former Mossad katsa
Victor Ostrovsky
's description of the Mossad's own assassination teams, the Kidon
. In fact, Ostrovsky says in his book that it was Kidon units that performed the assassinations. This is supported by author Gordon Thomas who was given access to the debriefing reports submitted by the eight Kidon and 80 member backup team that were involved in the assassinations.
Another report by author Aaron Klein
says that these teams were actually part of a unit called Caesarea, which would be renamed and reorganized into Kidon in the mid-1970s. Harari eventually commanded three Caesarea teams of around 12 members each. They were each further divided into logistics, surveillance, and assassination squads.
One of the covert teams was revealed in the aftermath of the Lillehammer affair (see Ali Hassan Salameh section below), when six members of the Mossad assassination team were arrested by Norwegian
authorities. Harari escaped to Israel, and it is possible that others were able to evade capture with him. An article in Time
magazine immediately after the killing put the total number of Mossad personnel at 15, which would also be similar to the above descriptions.
A much different account comes from Yuval Aviv in the book Vengeance, where he states that the Mossad set up a five-man unit of trained intelligence personnel which he led in Europe. Aviv also says that the team operated outside of direct government control, and that its only communications were with Harari.
Several hours before each assassination, each man's family received flowers with a condolence card reading: "A reminder we do not forget or forgive."
. Mossad agents had been waiting for him to return from dinner, and shot him eleven times, one time for each Israeli fatality of the Munich massacre. After the shooting, they were spirited away to a safe house
. At the time Zwaiter was the PLO
representative in Italy
, and while Israel privately claimed he was a member of Black September and was involved in a failed plot against an El Al
airliner, members of the PLO argued that he was in no way connected. Abu Iyad
, deputy-chief of the PLO, stated that Zwaiter was "energetically" against terrorism.
The second target of the Mossad was Dr. Mahmoud Hamshari, the PLO representative in France
. Israel believed that he was the leader of Black September in France. Using an agent posing as an Italian journalist, the Mossad lured him from his apartment in Paris
to allow a demolition team to enter and install a bomb underneath a desk telephone. On December 8, 1972, the agent posing as a journalist called Hamshari's apartment and asked him if it was Hamshari. After Hamshari said that it was him, the agent signalled to other colleagues, who then sent a detonation signal down the telephone line. Hamshari was fatally wounded, but managed to remain counscious long enough to tell Parisian detectives what had happened. Hamshari died in hospital several weeks later. Another assassination took place in London
, where a Palestinian activist was expertly pushed under a bus during rush hour
.
On the night of January 24, 1973, Hussein Al Bashir (Jordan
ian), the Fatah
representative in Cyprus
, turned off the lights in his Olympic Hotel room in Nicosia
. Moments later, a bomb planted under his bed was remotely detonated, killing him and destroying the room. Israel believed him to be the head of Black September in Cyprus, though another reason for his assassination may have been for his close ties with the KGB
.
On April 6, 1973, Dr. Basil al-Kubaissi, a law professor at the American University of Beirut
suspected by Israel of providing arms logistics for Black September as well as being involved in other Palestinian plots, was gunned down in Paris
while returning home from dinner. Like previous assassinations, he was shot around 12 times by two Mossad agents.
Three of the targets on the Mossad's list lived in heavily guarded houses in Lebanon
that were beyond the reach of previous assassination methods. In order to assassinate them, Operation Spring of Youth was launched as a sub-operation of the larger Wrath of God campaign. On the night of April 9, 1973, Sayeret Matkal
, Shayetet 13
, and Sayeret Tzanhanim commandons landed on the coast of Lebanon
in Zodiac speedboats launched from Israeli Navy missile boats offshore. The commandos were met by Mossad
agents, who drove them to their targets in cars rented the previous day, and later drove them back to the beaches for extraction. The commandos were disguised as civilians, and some were dressed as women. In Beirut
, they raided guarded apartment buildings and killed Muhammad Youssef al-Najjar
(Operations leader in Black September), Kamal Adwan (A Chief of Operations in the PLO) and Kamal Nasser
(PLO Executive Committee member and spokesman). During the operation, two Lebanese police officers, an Italian citizen, and Najjar's wife were also killed. One Israeli commando was wounded. Sayeret Tzanhanim paratroopers raided a six-story building that served as the headquarters of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
. The paratroopers met strong resistance and lost two soldiers, but managed to destroy the building. Shayetet 13 naval commandos and Sayeret Tzanhanim paratroopers also raided PLO arms-manufacturing facilities and fuel dumps. Some 12-100 PLO and PFLP operatives were killed during the attacks.
Three attacks quickly followed the Lebanon operation. Zaiad Muchasi, the replacement for Hussein Al Bashir in Cyprus, was killed by a bomb in his Athens
hotel room on April 11. Two minor Black September members, Abdel Hamid Shibi and Abdel Hadi Nakaa, were injured in their car in Rome.
Mossad agents also began to follow Mohammad Boudia, the Algeria
n-born director of operations for Black September in France
, who was known for his disguises and womanizing. On June 28, 1973, Boudia was killed in Paris by a pressure-activated bomb packed with heavy nuts and bolts placed under his car seat.
On December 15, 1979, two Palestinians, Ali Salem Ahmed and Ibrahim Abdul Aziz, were killed in Cyprus
. According to police, both men were shot with silenced weapons at point-blank range.
On June 17, 1982, two senior PLO officials in Italy
were killed in separate attacks. Nazeyh Mayer, a leading figure in the PLO's Rome office, was shot dead outside his home. Kamal Husain, deputy director of the PLO office in Rome, was killed by a shrapnel bomb placed under the back seat of his car as he drove home, less than seven hours after he had visited the home of Mayer and helped the police in their investigation.
On July 23, 1982, Fadl Dani, deputy director of the PLO office in Paris, was killed by a bomb that had been placed in his car. On August 21, 1983, PLO official Mamoun Meraish was killed in his car in Athens
by two Mossad operatives who shot him from a motorcycle.
On June 10, 1986, Khaled Ahmed Nazal, Secretary-General of the PLO's DFLP
faction, was gunned down outside a hotel in Athens
, Greece
. Nazal was shot four times in the head. On October 21, 1986, Munzer Abu Ghazala, a senior PLO official and member of the Palestinian National Council
, was killed by a bomb as he drove through a suburb of Athens.
On February 14, 1988, a car bomb exploded in Limassol
, Cyprus, killing Palestinians Abu Al Hassan Qasim and Hamdi Adwan, and wounding Marwan Kanafami.
, nicknamed the Red Prince, who was the head of Force 17
and the Black September operative believed by Israel to be the mastermind behind the Munich massacre. This belief has since been challenged by accounts of senior Black September officials, who say that while he was involved in many attacks in Europe, Salameh was not at all connected with the events in Munich.
Almost a full year after Munich, the Mossad believed they had finally located Salameh in the small Norwegian
town Lillehammer
. On July 21, 1973, in what would become known as the Lillehammer affair
, a team of Mossad agents shot and killed Ahmed Bouchiki, a Moroccan
waiter unrelated to the Munich attack and Black September, after an informant mistakenly identified Bouchiki as Salameh. Six Mossad agents, including two women, were captured by Norwegian police, while others, including the team leader, Mike Harari, managed to escape back to Israel. Five of the captured were convicted of the killing and imprisoned, but were released and returned to Israel in 1975. Victor Ostrovsky claimed that Salameh was instrumental in leading the Mossad off course by giving the Mossad false information about his whereabouts.
In January 1974, Mossad agents covertly deployed to Switzerland
after receiving information that Salameh would meet PLO leaders in a church on January 12. Two assassins entered the church at the time of the meeting, and encountered three men who appeared to be Arab. One of them made a move for his weapon, and all three were then immediately shot and killed. The Mossad agents continued into the church to search for Salameh, but did not find him. In a short time, the decision was made to abort the mission and escape.
Shortly afterward, three Mossad operatives traveled to London
to meet with a source who offered information on Salameh. When the source failed to show up, the team members to believe they were under surveillance. A female assassin-for-hire seduced one of the agents in the Europa Hotel
, then shot him dead in his hotel room. The Mossad team members located the woman in Amsterdam
three months later, and local sources revealed that she was a freelance assassin. It was never learned who exactly contracted her to kill the agent. On August 21, the woman was shot dead near her home. The kidon team leader was later reprimanded for acting outside the assigned scope of the mission.
Following the incident, operation commander Michael Harari
ordered the mission to kill Salameh be aborted. The kidon team, however, elected to ignore the order and try one more time to kill Salameh. Intelligence placed Salameh at a house in Tarifa
, Gibraltar
. As three agents approached, they were approached by an Arab security guard. The guard raised an AK-47
assault rifle, and was immediately shot. The operation was aborted, and the team escaped to a safe house.
In the aftermath of the Lillehammer affair, international outrage over the mistaken murder prompted Golda Meir to order the suspension of Operation Wrath of God. The ensuing Norwegian investigation and revelations by the captured agents compromised Mossad assets across Europe, including safe houses, agents, and operational methods. Five years later, it was decided to recommence the operation under new Prime Minister Menachem Begin
, and find those on the list still at large.
The Mossad began surveillance of Salameh's movements after tracking him to Beirut
during late autumn of 1978. In November 1978, a female Mossad agent identifying herself as Erika Chambers
entered Lebanon with a British passport
issued in 1975, and rented an apartment on the Rue Verdun, a street frequently used by Salameh. Several other agents arrived, including two using the pseudonyms Peter Scriver and Roland Kolberg, traveling with British and Canadian passport
s respectively. Some time after their arrival a Volkswagen
packed with plastic explosives was parked along Rue Verdun within view of the rented apartment. At 3:35 p.m. on January 22, 1979, as Salameh and four bodyguards drove down the street in a Chevrolet
station wagon, the explosives in the Volkswagen were detonated from the apartment with a radio device, killing everyone in the vehicle. After five unsuccessful attempts, the Mossad had assassinated Salameh. However, the blast also killed four innocent bystanders, including a British student and a German
nun, and injured 18 other people in the vicinity. Immediately following the operation the three Mossad officers fled without trace, as well as up to 14 other agents believed to have been involved in the operation.
airbase on the final night of the hostage crisis and were taken into German custody: Jamal Al-Gashey
, Adnan Al-Gashey, and Mohammed Safady. They were released several weeks later after hijackers of Lufthansa
flight LH 615 demanded their release from the West German government.
It had been thought that Adnan Al-Gashey and Mohammed Safady were both assassinated several years after the massacre; Al-Gashey was found after making contact with a cousin in a Gulf State
, and Safady was found by remaining in touch with family in Lebanon. This account was challenged by Israeli author Aaron Klein, who wrote that Adnan died of heart failure in the 1970s and that Safady was either killed by Christian Phalangists
in Lebanon
in the early 1980s or, according to a PLO operative friendly with Safady, is still living today. Jamal Al-Gashey went into hiding in North Africa
; he granted an interview in 1999 to director Kevin MacDonald
for the documentary One Day in September
, and is believed to still be alive.
against Palestinian officials across Europe. Historian Benny Morris
writes that these attacks caused non-fatal injuries to their targets, which included persons in Algeria
and Libya
, Palestinian student activists in Bonn
and Copenhagen
, and a Red Crescent official in Stockholm
. Klein also cites an incident in Cairo
where a bomb malfunctioned, sparing the two Palestinian targets.
Former Mossad katsa Victor Ostrovsky
claimed that the Mossad also used psychological warfare
tactics such as running obituaries of still-living militants and sending highly detailed personal information to others. Reeve further stated that the Mossad would call junior Palestinian officials, and after divulging to them their personal information, would warn them to disassociate from any Palestinian cause. British intelligence writer Gordon Thomas
wrote that hours before each militant was killed, his family would receive flowers and a condolences card bearing the words "A reminder we do not forget or forgive". Thomas further claimed that after each killing, the Mossad's psychological warfare department published a notice about the dead terrorist in Arabic-language newspapers throughout the Middle East.
, the PLO representative in London
, was shot and killed. The assassination is suspected of being the work of either the Mossad or the Abu Nidal Organization. On August 3, 1978, Ezzedine Kalak, chief of the PLO's Paris bureau, and his deputy Hamad Adnan, were killed at their offices in the Arab League
building. Three other members of the Arab League and PLO staff were wounded. This attack was either the work of the Mossad or the Abu Nidal Organization. On July 27, 1979. Zuheir Mohsen
, head of PLO military operations, was gunned down in Cannes
, France
, just after leaving a casino. Responsibility for the attack has been placed by various sources on the Mossad, other Palestinians, and possibly Egypt
. On June 1, 1981, Naim Khader, the PLO representative in Belgium
, was assassinated in Brussels
. Officials at the PLO information and liaison office in Brussels issued a statement accusing Israel of being behind the killing. Abu Daoud
, a Black September commander who openly claimed to have helped plan the Munich attack, was shot multiple times on August 1, 1981 by a gunman in a Warsaw
hotel cafe. Daoud survived the attack. It is unclear whether it was the Mossad or another breakaway Palestinian faction. Daoud claimed that the attack was carried out by a Palestinian double agent for Mossad, who was killed by the PLO ten years later. On March 1, 1982, PLO official Nabil Wadi Aranki was killed in Madrid
. On June 8, 1992 PLO head of intelligence Atef Bseiso
was shot and killed in Paris
by two gunmen with suppressed
weapons. While the PLO and a book by Israeli author Aaron Klein
blamed the Mossad for the killing, other reports indicate that the Abu Nidal Organization
was behind it.
Similar to the Mossad's letter bomb campaign, dozens of letter bombs were sent from Amsterdam
to Israeli diplomatic posts around the world in September and October 1972. One such attack killed Ami Shachori, an Israeli Agricultural Counselor Ami Shachori in Britain.
An operation was planned by Black September when it learned that Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir
would be travelling to Rome to meet with Pope Paul VI
in January 1973. The planned visit was placed under a regime of strict secrecy in Israel, and news of the upcoming visit was probably leaked by a pro-Palestinian priest in the Vatican Secretariat of State. Black September commander Ali Hassan Salameh
began planning a missile attack against Meir's plane as it arrived in Rome. Salameh's goal was to kill not only Meir, but also key cabinet ministers and senior Mossad officers accompanying her. At the time, Salameh was negotiating with the Soviet Union
, asking for safe haven, and he hoped that by the time Israel recovered from this blow, he and his men would be in the Soviet Union and out of Israel's reach. Black September smuggled several shoulder-launched Strela 2 missiles
to Bari, Italy
, from Dubrovnik
, Yugoslavia
, by boat. The missiles were then smuggled to Rome
and positioned around Fiumicino Airport shortly before Meir's arrival. To divert the Mossad's vigilance away from Rome in the run-up to the attack, Salameh planned an attack on the Israeli embassy in Bangkok
, Thailand
.
On December 28, 1972, four Black September members took over the Israeli embassy in Bangkok, holding 12 hostages. The terrorists raised the PLO flag over the building, and threatened to kill the hostages unless 36 PLO prisoners were released. The building was surrounded by Thai troops and police. The option of a rescue operation was considered in Israel but ruled out. A rescue operation was considered a logistical impossibility, and it was also thought that as the embassy was in busy central Bangkok, the Thai government would never allow the possibility of a shootout to occur. Though their demands were not met, negotiations secured the release of all the hostages and the Black September militants were given safe passage to Cairo.
The Mossad found out about the plan to assassinate Golda Meir on January 14, 1973, when a sayan, or local volunteer, informed the Mossad that he had handled two telephone calls from a payphone in an apartment block where PLO members sometimes stayed. The calls were in Arabic
, which the sayan spoke. Speaking in code, the caller stated that it was "time to deliver the birthday candles for the celebration". Mossad Director-General Zvi Zamir
was convinced that this was a coded order connected to an upcoming attack. Zamir had been convinced that the Bangkok embassy raid was a diversion for a larger attack, due to the participants in the raid having so easily given up, something he did not expect from a group as well-trained, financed, strategically cunning, and motivated as Black September. Zamir further interpreted that "birthday candles" could refer to weapons, and the most likely one with a candle connonation was rocket. Zamir linked the possible upcoming missile attack with Meir's upcoming arrival, and guessed that Black September was planning to shoot down Meir's plane. Zamir then sent a Mossad katsa
, or field intelligence officer, to Rome, and travelled to the city with a team of Mossad officers. Zamir met with the head of DIGOS, the Italian anti-terrorism unit, and laid out his concerns. DIGOS officers raided the apartment blocks from where the calls had been made, and found a Russian instruction manual for launching missiles. Throughout the night, DIGOS teams, each accompanied by a Mossad katsa, raided known PLO apartments, but found no evidence of any plot to kill Meir. In the morning, a few hours before Meir's plane arrived, Mossad agents and Italian police surrounded Fiumicino Airport.
A Mossad katsa spotted a Fiat
van parked in a field close to the flight path. The agent ordered the driver to step out. The back door then flew open, and two militants opened fire. The agent returned fire, severely wounding both of them. The van was found to contain six missiles. The driver escaped on foot, and was pursued by the agent. He was captured as he tried to hijack a car driven by another patrolling Mossad operative. The driver was bundled into the car and taken to the truck that served as the Mossad's mobile command post, where he revealed the whereabouts of the second missile team after being severely beaten. The truck then sped off, heading north. A cafe-van with three missile launchers protruding from the roof was spotted. The truck then rammed the van, turning it over, trapping the launch team inside and half-crushing them beneath the weight of the missiles, and turning the van's fixed launchers away from the sky. The unconscious driver was pulled from the van and tossed to the side of the road, and DIGOS was alerted that there had been "an interesting accident they should look into". Zamir briefly considered killing the terrorists, but felt that their deaths would serve as an embarassment to Golda Meir's audience with the pope. The Black September operatives, who had participated in the Munich massacre, were taken to hospital and eventually allowed to fly to Libya
, but within months, all were killed by the Mossad.
Two Israelis suspected of being intelligence agents were shot and killed, as well as an Israeli official in Washington
. Baruch Cohen, a Mossad agent in Madrid
, was killed on January 23, 1973 by a young Palestinian contact. At least three Palestinians involved in Cohen's murder were subsequently assassinated. Vittorio Olivares, an Italian El Al
employee suspected by Black September, was shot and killed in Rome in April 1973. The Israeli military attaché to the United States, Colonel Yosef Alon
, was assassinated on July 1, 1973 in Chevy Chase
, Maryland
.
Black September conducted several other attacks only indirectly against Israel, including the seizure of Western diplomats in the Saudi
embassy in Khartoum
(see: 1973 Khartoum diplomatic assassinations), but the group was officially dissolved by al-Fatah in December 1974.
in April 1973 – that truly shocked the Arab world
. The audacity of the mission, plus the fact that senior leaders such as Yasser Arafat
, Abu Iyad and Ali Hassan Salameh
were only yards away from the fighting, contributed to the creation of the belief that Israel was capable of striking anywhere, anytime. It also brought about popular mourning. At the funerals for the victims of the raid, half a million people came into the streets of Beirut. Nearly six years later, 100,000 people, including Arafat, turned out in the same city to bury Salameh.
The operation also caused some of the less radical Arab governments to begin putting pressure on Palestinians to stop attacks against Israeli targets. Threatening to pull support for the Palestinians if they used their governments' passports during the course of attacks against Israel, some militants began to instead use forged Israeli documents.
In the 2005 book Striking Back, author Aaron Klein
(who says he based his book in large part on rare interviews with key Mossad officers involved in the reprisal missions) contends that the Mossad got only one man directly connected to the massacre. The man, Atef Bseiso
, was killed in Paris
in 1992. Klein goes on to say that the intelligence on Wael Zwaiter, the first Palestinian to die, was "uncorroborated and improperly cross-referenced. Looking back, his assassination was a mistake." He elaborates, stating that the real planners and executors of Munich had gone into hiding along with bodyguards in the Eastern bloc
and Arab world
, where Israel could not reach them. Most of those killed were minor Palestinian figures who happened to be wandering unprotected around Western Europe. "Israeli security officials claimed these dead men were responsible for Munich; PLO pronouncements made them out to be important figures; and so the image of the Mossad as capable of delivering death at will grew and grew." The operation functioned not just to punish the perpetrators of Munich but also to disrupt and deter future terrorist acts, writes Klein. "For the second goal, one dead PLO operative was as good as another." Klein quotes a senior intelligence source: "Our blood was boiling. When there was information implicating someone, we didn't inspect it with a magnifying glass."
Abu Daoud, one of the main planners of the Munich massacre, has said in interviews before the release of the movie Munich
that Israel did not assassinate people in the operation's group responsible for conducting the Munich attack. He supports this by saying that "I returned to Ramallah in 1995, and Israel knew that I was the planner of the Munich operation." The leader of Black September, Abu Iyad, was also not killed by Israel, although he was assassinated in 1991 in Tunis
by the Abu Nidal Organization. Former Mossad chief Zvi Zamir has countered this in an interview in 2006, when he said that Israel was more interested in striking the "infrastructure of the terrorist organizations in Europe" than those directly responsible for Munich. "We had no choice but to start with preventive measures."
Rami Adwan, the son of Kamal Adwan, who was in his father's Beirut apartment when he was killed, said that his father was not at all involved in Munich. However, he admitted to organizing resistance against the Israeli military occupation of the West Bank
. According to Rami, then, the Munich attack "was a godsend opportunity for the Israelis to actually kill people."
, felt ambivalent. The wife of assassinated Mossad agent Baruch Cohen has called the operation, especially a side operation directed against those who had murdered her husband, sickening.
(security correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronoth and expert on Mossad): "This campaign stopped most PLO terrorism outside the borders of Israel. Did it help in any way to bring peace to the Middle East? No. Strategically it was a complete failure."
Former katsa Victor Ostrovsky
has said that the direction Meir set the Mossad on, namely that of focusing heavily on the people and operations of the PLO, took energy away from intelligence gathering on Israel's neighbors. This led the Mossad to miss the warning signs of the 1973 Yom Kippur War
, which caught Israeli defenses by surprise.
, by Canadian
journalist George Jonas
, tells the story of an Israeli assassination squad from the viewpoint of a self-described former Mossad agent and leader of the squad, Avner. Avner has since been revealed as a pseudonym
for Yuval Aviv
, an Israeli who now runs a private investigation agency in New York
. However, Aviv's account of the operation has not been independently verified beyond the fact checking Jonas says he has done. Jonas points to a former Director General of the RCMP Security Service
, John Starnes, who he says believes Aviv's essential story. In spite of this, the Mossad director at the time of the operation, Zvi Zamir, has stated that he never knew Aviv. Several former Mossad officers who took part in Operation Wrath of God have also told British journalists that Yuval Aviv's version of events is not accurate. After its 1984 publication the book was listed on the fiction and non-fiction bestseller lists in Britain.
Since its release, two films have been based on Vengeance. In 1986, Michael Anderson
directed the HBO film Sword of Gideon
. Steven Spielberg
released a second movie based on the account in December 2005 entitled Munich
. Both movies use Yuval Aviv's pseudonym Avner and take a certain amount of artistic license
with his account.
Covert operation
A covert operation is a military, intelligence or law enforcement operation that is carried clandestinely and, often, outside of official channels. Covert operations aim to fulfill their mission objectives without any parties knowing who sponsored or carried out the operation...
directed by Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
and the Mossad
Mossad
The Mossad , short for HaMossad leModi'in uleTafkidim Meyuchadim , is the national intelligence agency of Israel....
to assassinate
Assassination
To carry out an assassination is "to murder by a sudden and/or secret attack, often for political reasons." Alternatively, assassination may be defined as "the act of deliberately killing someone, especially a public figure, usually for hire or for political reasons."An assassination may be...
individuals alleged to have been directly or indirectly involved in the 1972 Munich massacre
Munich massacre
The Munich massacre is an informal name for events that occurred during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Bavaria in southern West Germany, when members of the Israeli Olympic team were taken hostage and eventually killed by the Palestinian group Black September. Members of Black September...
.
Their targets included members of the Palestinian
Palestinian people
The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...
militant group Black September
Black September (group)
The Black September Organization was a Palestinian paramilitary group, founded in 1970. It was responsible for the kidnapping and murder of eleven Israeli athletes and officials, and fatal shooting of a West German policeman, during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, their most publicized event...
, who were responsible for the Munich attack, and members of the Palestine Liberation Organization
Palestine Liberation Organization
The Palestine Liberation Organization is a political and paramilitary organization which was created in 1964. It is recognized as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" by the United Nations and over 100 states with which it holds diplomatic relations, and has enjoyed...
(PLO) accused of being involved.There is much debate as to how Black September, Fatah
Fatah
Fataḥ is a major Palestinian political party and the largest faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization , a multi-party confederation. In Palestinian politics it is on the left-wing of the spectrum; it is mainly nationalist, although not predominantly socialist. Its official goals are found...
, the PFLP
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine is a Palestinian Marxist-Leninist organisation founded in 1967. It has consistently been the second-largest of the groups forming the Palestine Liberation Organization , the largest being Fatah...
, and the PLO were connected. Based on books by Abu Iyad
Salah Khalaf
Salah Mesbah Khalaf , also known as Abu Iyad was deputy chief and head of intelligence for the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the second most senior official of Fatah after Yasser Arafat....
, who headed Black September, and Abu Daoud
Abu Daoud
Mohammad Daoud Oudeh , commonly known by his nom de guerre Abu Daoud or Abu Dawud was a Palestinian militant known as the planner, architect and mastermind of the Munich massacre...
, who helped plan Munich, Black September was an offshoot of Fatah, yet it also included members from various other factions. At that time Fatah was in control of the PLO Palestinian National Authority
Palestinian National Authority
The Palestinian Authority is the administrative organization established to govern parts of the West Bank and Gaza Strip...
http://www.ict.org.il/articles/articledet.cfm?articleid=145. Authorized by Israeli Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Israel
The Prime Minister of Israel is the head of the Israeli government and the most powerful political figure in Israel . The prime minister is the country's chief executive. The official residence of the prime minister, Beit Rosh Hamemshala is in Jerusalem...
Golda Meir
Golda Meir
Golda Meir ; May 3, 1898 – December 8, 1978) was a teacher, kibbutznik and politician who became the fourth Prime Minister of the State of Israel....
in the autumn of 1972, the operation may have continued for more than 20 years.Veterans of the Mossad speaking anonymously have said that there was no reason to suspend the campaign until 1993, when the Oslo Accords
Oslo Accords
The Oslo Accords, officially called the Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements or Declaration of Principles , was an attempt to resolve the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli conflict...
were signed http://www.ew.com/ewarticlereuters0,24012,1143841_10_0_,00.html.
Covert Israeli assassination units killed dozens of suspected conspirators across Europe during this time, including the mistaken murder of an innocent waiter in Lillehammer
Lillehammer
is a town and municipality in Oppland county, Norway, globally known for hosting the 1994 Winter Olympics. It is part of the traditional region of Gudbrandsdal. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Lillehammer. As of May 2011, the population of the town of Lillehammer was...
, Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
, in what became known as the Lillehammer affair
Lillehammer affair
The Lillehammer affair was the killing by Mossad agents of a Moroccan waiter, Ahmed Bouchiki, in Lillehammer, Norway on July 21, 1973. The Israeli agents had mistaken their victim for Ali Hassan Salameh, the chief of operations for Black September...
. An additional military assault
Operation Spring of Youth
The 1973 Israeli raid on Lebanon took place on the night of April 9 and early morning of April 10, 1973 when Israel Defense Forces special forces units attacked several Palestine Liberation Organization targets in Beirut and Sidon, Lebanon...
was launched by Israeli commandos deep inside Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
to kill several high-profile Palestinian targets. This string of assassinations spurred retaliatory attacks by Black September against a variety of Israeli government targets around the world. It has also prompted criticism of Israel over its choice of targets, tactic of assassination, and overall effectiveness. Because of the secretive nature of the operation, some details are unverifiable beyond a single source
Independent sources
The term "multiple independent sources" in journalism, criminal justice, science and general research, refers to two or more unconnected people, organizations, entities or objects which provide a given set of information or samples. For example, two separate people who witness a traffic accident,...
, including the story of Yuval Aviv
Yuval Aviv
Juval Aviv is an Israeli-American writer and security consultant. He may be best-known for his claim that he is the source of the 1984 book Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team by George Jonas, on which Steven Spielberg's 2005 film Munich was based...
, who claims to have led an Israeli assassination squad. Some or all information about the operation might have been placed by the Mossad itself, to cover the tracks of its agents, and spread useful rumours (e.g., in the book upon which the feature Sword of Gideon was based, most Mossad agents involved in the operation get killed, possibly a cover to protect them from revenge).
The operation was depicted in the television film Sword of Gideon
Sword of Gideon
Sword of Gideon is a 1986 television film about Mossad agents hunting down terrorists associated with the 1972 Munich massacre. It was first shown on the CTV network in Canada as a four hour miniseries and later on the HBO television network. Directed by Michael Anderson and written by Chris...
(1986), and Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
's Munich
Munich (film)
Munich is a 2005 historical fiction film about the Israeli government's secret retaliation attacks after the massacre of Israeli athletes by the Black September terrorist group during the 1972 Summer Olympics. The film stars Eric Bana and was produced and directed by Steven Spielberg...
(2005).
Background and planning
The killing of 11 Israeli athletesMunich massacre
The Munich massacre is an informal name for events that occurred during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Bavaria in southern West Germany, when members of the Israeli Olympic team were taken hostage and eventually killed by the Palestinian group Black September. Members of Black September...
at the 1972 Summer Olympics
1972 Summer Olympics
The 1972 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XX Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Munich, West Germany, from August 26 to September 11, 1972....
by the Palestinian
Palestinian people
The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...
militant group Black September
Black September (group)
The Black September Organization was a Palestinian paramilitary group, founded in 1970. It was responsible for the kidnapping and murder of eleven Israeli athletes and officials, and fatal shooting of a West German policeman, during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, their most publicized event...
moved Israel to consider measures to deter future similar actions. Soon after the incident, Prime Minister Golda Meir
Golda Meir
Golda Meir ; May 3, 1898 – December 8, 1978) was a teacher, kibbutznik and politician who became the fourth Prime Minister of the State of Israel....
created Committee X, a small group of government officials tasked with formulating an Israeli response, with herself and Defense Minister Moshe Dayan
Moshe Dayan
Moshe Dayan was an Israeli military leader and politician. The fourth Chief of Staff of the Israel Defense Forces , he became a fighting symbol to the world of the new State of Israel...
at the head. She also appointed General Aharon Yariv
Aharon Yariv
Aharon "Aharale" Rabinovich Yariv was an Israeli politician and soldier.Born in Moscow in the Soviet Union. When he was 15 he immigrated to Israel and studied at the Pardes Hanna Agricultural High School. Yariv began his military service in the Haganah and later the British Army. He then joined...
as her Advisor on Counterterrorism; he, along with Mossad
Mossad
The Mossad , short for HaMossad leModi'in uleTafkidim Meyuchadim , is the national intelligence agency of Israel....
Director Zvi Zamir
Zvi Zamir
Zvi Zamir born Zvicka Zarzevsky was a Major General in the Israel Defense Forces and the Director of the Mossad from 1968 to 1974. Born in Poland, Zamir immigrated with his family to the then British Mandate of Palestine when only seven months old...
, took the principal role in directing the ensuing operation. The committee came to the conclusion that to deter future violent incidents against Israel they needed to assassinate those who had supported or carried out the Munich massacre, and in dramatic fashion. Pressured by Israeli public opinion and top intelligence officials, Meir reluctantly authorized the beginning of the broad assassination campaign
Assassination campaign
An assassination campaign is a series of assassinations carried out to achieve a larger political goal.In the 19th century, Will of the People carried out a campaign of assassinations against high-ranking Russian leaders....
. Yet when the three surviving perpetrators of the massacre were released just months later by West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
in compliance with the demands of the hijackers
Aircraft hijacking
Aircraft hijacking is the unlawful seizure of an aircraft by an individual or a group. In most cases, the pilot is forced to fly according to the orders of the hijackers. Occasionally, however, the hijackers have flown the aircraft themselves, such as the September 11 attacks of 2001...
of a Lufthansa
Lufthansa
Deutsche Lufthansa AG is the flag carrier of Germany and the largest airline in Europe in terms of overall passengers carried. The name of the company is derived from Luft , and Hansa .The airline is the world's fourth-largest airline in terms of overall passengers carried, operating...
aircraft, any remaining ambivalence she felt was removed. The committee's first task for Israeli intelligence was to draw up an assassination list of all those involved in Munich. This was accomplished with the aid of PLO operatives working for Mossad, and with information provided by friendly European intelligence agencies. While the contents of the entire list are unknown, reports put the final number of targets at 20–35, a mix of Black September and PLO elements.Reeve states that intelligence sources put the number at 20 (Reeve, 162), while Ostrovsky puts it at 35 (Ostrovsky, 179). Once this was complete, the Mossad was charged with locating the individuals and assassinating them.
Critical in the planning was the idea of plausible deniability
Plausible deniability
Plausible deniability is, at root, credible ability to deny a fact or allegation, or to deny previous knowledge of a fact. The term most often refers to the denial of blame in chains of command, where upper rungs quarantine the blame to the lower rungs, and the lower rungs are often inaccessible,...
, that it should be impossible to prove a direct connection between the assassinations and Israel. In addition, the operations were intended to strike a more general fear into Palestinian militants. According to David Kimche
David Kimche
David "Dave" Kimche was a British-born Israeli diplomat, a deputy director of the Mossad and a spymaster. He was also a journalist early in his career...
, former deputy head of Mossad, "The aim was not so much revenge but mainly to make them [the militant Palestinians] frightened. We wanted to make them look over their shoulders and feel that we are upon them. And therefore we tried not to do things by just shooting a guy in the street – that’s easy … fairly."
Organization
Several descriptions have emerged as to the groups formed by Mossad who carried out the assassination campaign. It is possible that different groups were formed for different objectives, and existed at different or overlapping periods of time, which may account for the variety of reports. Certainty exists solely about the assassinations that actually took place, while further information is based on limited sources.It is also known that Mossad agent Michael Harari
Michael Harari
Michael "Mike" Harari was an Israeli intelligence officer in the Mossad. Harari was involved in several notable operations, including the failed Lillehammer affair and the rescue of hostages at Entebbe....
led the creation and direction of the teams, although some may not have always been under government responsibility. Author Simon Reeve explains that the Mossad team—whose squad names are letters of the Hebrew alphabet
Hebrew alphabet
The Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
—consisted of:
...fifteen people divided into five squads: "AlephHebrew alphabetThe Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
", two trained killers; "BetHebrew alphabetThe Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
", two guards who would shadow the Alephs; "HetHebrew alphabetThe Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
", two agents who would establish cover for the rest of the team by renting hotel rooms, apartments, cars, and so on; "AyinHebrew alphabetThe Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
", comprising between six and eight agents who formed the backbone of the operation, shadowing targets and establishing an escape route for the Aleph and Bet squads; and "QophHebrew alphabetThe Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
", two agents specializing in communications.
This is similar to former Mossad katsa
Katsa
A katsa is a field intelligence officer of Mossad. He or she collects information and runs agents, similar to the case officer of the CIA.-Operation:...
Victor Ostrovsky
Victor Ostrovsky
Victor John Ostrovsky is an author, artist and former katsa for the Israeli Mossad . He authored two non-fiction books about his service with the Mossad: By Way of Deception, a New York Times No. 1 bestseller in 1990, and The Other Side of Deception several years later...
's description of the Mossad's own assassination teams, the Kidon
Kidon
Kidon is the name of a department within Israel's Mossad that is allegedly responsible for assassination and kidnapping. Kidon is suspected of being behind a number of assassinations in the Operation Wrath of God campaign carried out by Israel after the 1972 Munich massacre...
. In fact, Ostrovsky says in his book that it was Kidon units that performed the assassinations. This is supported by author Gordon Thomas who was given access to the debriefing reports submitted by the eight Kidon and 80 member backup team that were involved in the assassinations.
Another report by author Aaron Klein
Aaron Klein
Aaron Klein is an American author, Middle East correspondent, head of the Jerusalem bureau for WorldNetDaily , columnist for The Jewish Press, and a radio talk show host who, among other things, is known for interviewing middle eastern political figures, along with various leaders of terrorist...
says that these teams were actually part of a unit called Caesarea, which would be renamed and reorganized into Kidon in the mid-1970s. Harari eventually commanded three Caesarea teams of around 12 members each. They were each further divided into logistics, surveillance, and assassination squads.
One of the covert teams was revealed in the aftermath of the Lillehammer affair (see Ali Hassan Salameh section below), when six members of the Mossad assassination team were arrested by Norwegian
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
authorities. Harari escaped to Israel, and it is possible that others were able to evade capture with him. An article in Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine immediately after the killing put the total number of Mossad personnel at 15, which would also be similar to the above descriptions.
A much different account comes from Yuval Aviv in the book Vengeance, where he states that the Mossad set up a five-man unit of trained intelligence personnel which he led in Europe. Aviv also says that the team operated outside of direct government control, and that its only communications were with Harari.
Several hours before each assassination, each man's family received flowers with a condolence card reading: "A reminder we do not forget or forgive."
1972-1988
The first assassination occurred on October 16, 1972, when Palestinian Wael Zwaiter was killed in RomeRome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
. Mossad agents had been waiting for him to return from dinner, and shot him eleven times, one time for each Israeli fatality of the Munich massacre. After the shooting, they were spirited away to a safe house
Safe house
In the jargon of law enforcement and intelligence agencies, a safe house is a secure location, suitable for hiding witnesses, agents or other persons perceived as being in danger...
. At the time Zwaiter was the PLO
Palestine Liberation Organization
The Palestine Liberation Organization is a political and paramilitary organization which was created in 1964. It is recognized as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" by the United Nations and over 100 states with which it holds diplomatic relations, and has enjoyed...
representative in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, and while Israel privately claimed he was a member of Black September and was involved in a failed plot against an El Al
El Al
El Al Israel Airlines Ltd , trading as El Al , is the flag carrier of Israel. It operates scheduled domestic and international services and cargo flights to Europe, North America, Africa and the Far East from its main base in Ben Gurion International Airport...
airliner, members of the PLO argued that he was in no way connected. Abu Iyad
Salah Khalaf
Salah Mesbah Khalaf , also known as Abu Iyad was deputy chief and head of intelligence for the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the second most senior official of Fatah after Yasser Arafat....
, deputy-chief of the PLO, stated that Zwaiter was "energetically" against terrorism.
The second target of the Mossad was Dr. Mahmoud Hamshari, the PLO representative in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. Israel believed that he was the leader of Black September in France. Using an agent posing as an Italian journalist, the Mossad lured him from his apartment in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
to allow a demolition team to enter and install a bomb underneath a desk telephone. On December 8, 1972, the agent posing as a journalist called Hamshari's apartment and asked him if it was Hamshari. After Hamshari said that it was him, the agent signalled to other colleagues, who then sent a detonation signal down the telephone line. Hamshari was fatally wounded, but managed to remain counscious long enough to tell Parisian detectives what had happened. Hamshari died in hospital several weeks later. Another assassination took place in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, where a Palestinian activist was expertly pushed under a bus during rush hour
Rush hour
A rush hour or peak hour is a part of the day during which traffic congestion on roads and crowding on public transport is at its highest. Normally, this happens twice a day—once in the morning and once in the evening, the times during when the most people commute...
.
On the night of January 24, 1973, Hussein Al Bashir (Jordan
Jordan
Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...
ian), the Fatah
Fatah
Fataḥ is a major Palestinian political party and the largest faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization , a multi-party confederation. In Palestinian politics it is on the left-wing of the spectrum; it is mainly nationalist, although not predominantly socialist. Its official goals are found...
representative in Cyprus
Cyprus
Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...
, turned off the lights in his Olympic Hotel room in Nicosia
Nicosia
Nicosia from , known locally as Lefkosia , is the capital and largest city in Cyprus, as well as its main business center. Nicosia is the only divided capital in the world, with the southern and the northern portions divided by a Green Line...
. Moments later, a bomb planted under his bed was remotely detonated, killing him and destroying the room. Israel believed him to be the head of Black September in Cyprus, though another reason for his assassination may have been for his close ties with the KGB
KGB
The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
.
On April 6, 1973, Dr. Basil al-Kubaissi, a law professor at the American University of Beirut
American University of Beirut
The American University of Beirut is a private, independent university in Beirut, Lebanon. It was founded as the Syrian Protestant College by American missionaries in 1866...
suspected by Israel of providing arms logistics for Black September as well as being involved in other Palestinian plots, was gunned down in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
while returning home from dinner. Like previous assassinations, he was shot around 12 times by two Mossad agents.
Three of the targets on the Mossad's list lived in heavily guarded houses in Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
that were beyond the reach of previous assassination methods. In order to assassinate them, Operation Spring of Youth was launched as a sub-operation of the larger Wrath of God campaign. On the night of April 9, 1973, Sayeret Matkal
Sayeret Matkal
Sayeret Matkal is a special forces unit of the Israel Defence Forces , which is subordinated to the intelligence directorate Aman. First and foremost a field intelligence-gathering unit, conducting deep reconnaissance behind enemy lines to obtain strategic intelligence, Sayeret Matkal is also...
, Shayetet 13
Shayetet 13
Shayetet 13 is the elite naval commando unit of the Israeli Navy. The unit is considered one of the primary Special Forces units of the Israel Defense Forces . S'13 specializes in sea-to-land incursions, counter-terrorism, sabotage, maritime intelligence gathering, maritime hostage rescue, and...
, and Sayeret Tzanhanim commandons landed on the coast of Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
in Zodiac speedboats launched from Israeli Navy missile boats offshore. The commandos were met by Mossad
Mossad
The Mossad , short for HaMossad leModi'in uleTafkidim Meyuchadim , is the national intelligence agency of Israel....
agents, who drove them to their targets in cars rented the previous day, and later drove them back to the beaches for extraction. The commandos were disguised as civilians, and some were dressed as women. In Beirut
Beirut
Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...
, they raided guarded apartment buildings and killed Muhammad Youssef al-Najjar
Muhammad Youssef Al-Najjar
Muhammad Youssef Al-Najjar , commonly known as Abu Youssef, was a Palestinian militant. Originally from Yibna, he began his involvement in the General Union of Palestinian Students. When the Fatah organization formed in the late 1950s, Youssef was an early activist, traveling to Qatar to form...
(Operations leader in Black September), Kamal Adwan (A Chief of Operations in the PLO) and Kamal Nasser
Kamal Nasser
Kamal Nasser was a Palestinian PLO political leader, writer and poet.-Early life:Nasser was born in Gaza to a Palestinian Christian family from Bir Zeit near Ramallah. He was educated at Bir Zeit school Kamal Nasser (1925 – April 9/April 10, 1973) was a Palestinian PLO political leader, writer and...
(PLO Executive Committee member and spokesman). During the operation, two Lebanese police officers, an Italian citizen, and Najjar's wife were also killed. One Israeli commando was wounded. Sayeret Tzanhanim paratroopers raided a six-story building that served as the headquarters of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine
The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine is a Palestinian Marxist-Leninist organisation founded in 1967. It has consistently been the second-largest of the groups forming the Palestine Liberation Organization , the largest being Fatah...
. The paratroopers met strong resistance and lost two soldiers, but managed to destroy the building. Shayetet 13 naval commandos and Sayeret Tzanhanim paratroopers also raided PLO arms-manufacturing facilities and fuel dumps. Some 12-100 PLO and PFLP operatives were killed during the attacks.
Three attacks quickly followed the Lebanon operation. Zaiad Muchasi, the replacement for Hussein Al Bashir in Cyprus, was killed by a bomb in his Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
hotel room on April 11. Two minor Black September members, Abdel Hamid Shibi and Abdel Hadi Nakaa, were injured in their car in Rome.
Mossad agents also began to follow Mohammad Boudia, the Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
n-born director of operations for Black September in France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, who was known for his disguises and womanizing. On June 28, 1973, Boudia was killed in Paris by a pressure-activated bomb packed with heavy nuts and bolts placed under his car seat.
On December 15, 1979, two Palestinians, Ali Salem Ahmed and Ibrahim Abdul Aziz, were killed in Cyprus
Cyprus
Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...
. According to police, both men were shot with silenced weapons at point-blank range.
On June 17, 1982, two senior PLO officials in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
were killed in separate attacks. Nazeyh Mayer, a leading figure in the PLO's Rome office, was shot dead outside his home. Kamal Husain, deputy director of the PLO office in Rome, was killed by a shrapnel bomb placed under the back seat of his car as he drove home, less than seven hours after he had visited the home of Mayer and helped the police in their investigation.
On July 23, 1982, Fadl Dani, deputy director of the PLO office in Paris, was killed by a bomb that had been placed in his car. On August 21, 1983, PLO official Mamoun Meraish was killed in his car in Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
by two Mossad operatives who shot him from a motorcycle.
On June 10, 1986, Khaled Ahmed Nazal, Secretary-General of the PLO's DFLP
Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine
The Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine is a Palestinian Marxist-Leninist, secular political and military organization. It is also frequently referred to as the Democratic Front, or al-Jabha al-Dimuqratiyah...
faction, was gunned down outside a hotel in Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
, Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....
. Nazal was shot four times in the head. On October 21, 1986, Munzer Abu Ghazala, a senior PLO official and member of the Palestinian National Council
Palestinian National Council
The Palestinian National Council is the legislative body of the Palestine Liberation Organization and elects its Executive Committee, which assumes leadership of the organization between its sessions. The Council normally meets every two years. Resolutions are passed by a simple majority with a...
, was killed by a bomb as he drove through a suburb of Athens.
On February 14, 1988, a car bomb exploded in Limassol
Limassol
Limassol is the second-largest city in Cyprus, with a population of 228,000 . It is the largest city in geographical size, and the biggest municipality on the island. The city is located on Akrotiri Bay, on the island's southern coast and it is the capital of Limassol District.Limassol is the...
, Cyprus, killing Palestinians Abu Al Hassan Qasim and Hamdi Adwan, and wounding Marwan Kanafami.
Ali Hassan Salameh
The Mossad continued to search for Ali Hassan SalamehAli Hassan Salameh
Ali Hassan Salameh was the chief of operations—code name Abu Hassan—for Black September, the organization responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre and other attacks. He was also the founder of Force 17...
, nicknamed the Red Prince, who was the head of Force 17
Force 17
Force 17 was a commando and special operations terror unit of the Palestinian Fatah movement and later of the Office of the Chairman of the Palestinian Authority. It was formed in the early 1970s by Ali Hassan Salameh ....
and the Black September operative believed by Israel to be the mastermind behind the Munich massacre. This belief has since been challenged by accounts of senior Black September officials, who say that while he was involved in many attacks in Europe, Salameh was not at all connected with the events in Munich.
Almost a full year after Munich, the Mossad believed they had finally located Salameh in the small Norwegian
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
town Lillehammer
Lillehammer
is a town and municipality in Oppland county, Norway, globally known for hosting the 1994 Winter Olympics. It is part of the traditional region of Gudbrandsdal. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Lillehammer. As of May 2011, the population of the town of Lillehammer was...
. On July 21, 1973, in what would become known as the Lillehammer affair
Lillehammer affair
The Lillehammer affair was the killing by Mossad agents of a Moroccan waiter, Ahmed Bouchiki, in Lillehammer, Norway on July 21, 1973. The Israeli agents had mistaken their victim for Ali Hassan Salameh, the chief of operations for Black September...
, a team of Mossad agents shot and killed Ahmed Bouchiki, a Moroccan
Morocco
Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...
waiter unrelated to the Munich attack and Black September, after an informant mistakenly identified Bouchiki as Salameh. Six Mossad agents, including two women, were captured by Norwegian police, while others, including the team leader, Mike Harari, managed to escape back to Israel. Five of the captured were convicted of the killing and imprisoned, but were released and returned to Israel in 1975. Victor Ostrovsky claimed that Salameh was instrumental in leading the Mossad off course by giving the Mossad false information about his whereabouts.
In January 1974, Mossad agents covertly deployed to Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
after receiving information that Salameh would meet PLO leaders in a church on January 12. Two assassins entered the church at the time of the meeting, and encountered three men who appeared to be Arab. One of them made a move for his weapon, and all three were then immediately shot and killed. The Mossad agents continued into the church to search for Salameh, but did not find him. In a short time, the decision was made to abort the mission and escape.
Shortly afterward, three Mossad operatives traveled to London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
to meet with a source who offered information on Salameh. When the source failed to show up, the team members to believe they were under surveillance. A female assassin-for-hire seduced one of the agents in the Europa Hotel
Europa Hotel
The Europa Hotel is a four-star hotel in Great Victoria Street, Belfast, Northern Ireland. It has hosted presidents, prime ministers and celebrities, including President Bill Clinton during his visits to Belfast in 1995 and 1998....
, then shot him dead in his hotel room. The Mossad team members located the woman in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
three months later, and local sources revealed that she was a freelance assassin. It was never learned who exactly contracted her to kill the agent. On August 21, the woman was shot dead near her home. The kidon team leader was later reprimanded for acting outside the assigned scope of the mission.
Following the incident, operation commander Michael Harari
Michael Harari
Michael "Mike" Harari was an Israeli intelligence officer in the Mossad. Harari was involved in several notable operations, including the failed Lillehammer affair and the rescue of hostages at Entebbe....
ordered the mission to kill Salameh be aborted. The kidon team, however, elected to ignore the order and try one more time to kill Salameh. Intelligence placed Salameh at a house in Tarifa
Tarifa
Tarifa is a small town in the province of Cádiz, Andalusia, on the southernmost coast of Spain. The town is located on the Costa de la Luz and across the Straits of Gibraltar facing Morocco. The municipality includes Punta de Tarifa, the southernmost point in continental Europe. There are five...
, Gibraltar
Gibraltar
Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...
. As three agents approached, they were approached by an Arab security guard. The guard raised an AK-47
AK-47
The AK-47 is a selective-fire, gas-operated 7.62×39mm assault rifle, first developed in the Soviet Union by Mikhail Kalashnikov. It is officially known as Avtomat Kalashnikova . It is also known as a Kalashnikov, an "AK", or in Russian slang, Kalash.Design work on the AK-47 began in the last year...
assault rifle, and was immediately shot. The operation was aborted, and the team escaped to a safe house.
In the aftermath of the Lillehammer affair, international outrage over the mistaken murder prompted Golda Meir to order the suspension of Operation Wrath of God. The ensuing Norwegian investigation and revelations by the captured agents compromised Mossad assets across Europe, including safe houses, agents, and operational methods. Five years later, it was decided to recommence the operation under new Prime Minister Menachem Begin
Menachem Begin
' was a politician, founder of Likud and the sixth Prime Minister of the State of Israel. Before independence, he was the leader of the Zionist militant group Irgun, the Revisionist breakaway from the larger Jewish paramilitary organization Haganah. He proclaimed a revolt, on 1 February 1944,...
, and find those on the list still at large.
The Mossad began surveillance of Salameh's movements after tracking him to Beirut
Beirut
Beirut is the capital and largest city of Lebanon, with a population ranging from 1 million to more than 2 million . Located on a peninsula at the midpoint of Lebanon's Mediterranean coastline, it serves as the country's largest and main seaport, and also forms the Beirut Metropolitan...
during late autumn of 1978. In November 1978, a female Mossad agent identifying herself as Erika Chambers
Erika Chambers
Erika Chambers is the assumed pseudonym of the Mossad agent behind the action on January 22, 1979 that killed Ali Hassan Salameh, leader of Black September and lead plotter behind the Munich massacre.-Munich Massacre:...
entered Lebanon with a British passport
British passport
British passports may be issued to people holding any of the various forms of British nationality, and are used as evidence of the bearer's nationality and immigration status within the United Kingdom or the issuing state/territory.-Issuing:...
issued in 1975, and rented an apartment on the Rue Verdun, a street frequently used by Salameh. Several other agents arrived, including two using the pseudonyms Peter Scriver and Roland Kolberg, traveling with British and Canadian passport
Canadian passport
A Canadian passport is a passport issued to citizens of Canada for the purpose of international travel; allowing the bearer to travel in foreign countries in accordance with visa requirements; facilitating the process of securing assistance from Canadian consular officials abroad, if necessary; and...
s respectively. Some time after their arrival a Volkswagen
Volkswagen
Volkswagen is a German automobile manufacturer and is the original and biggest-selling marque of the Volkswagen Group, which now also owns the Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Lamborghini, SEAT, and Škoda marques and the truck manufacturer Scania.Volkswagen means "people's car" in German, where it is...
packed with plastic explosives was parked along Rue Verdun within view of the rented apartment. At 3:35 p.m. on January 22, 1979, as Salameh and four bodyguards drove down the street in a Chevrolet
Chevrolet
Chevrolet , also known as Chevy , is a brand of vehicle produced by General Motors Company . Founded by Louis Chevrolet and ousted GM founder William C. Durant on November 3, 1911, General Motors acquired Chevrolet in 1918...
station wagon, the explosives in the Volkswagen were detonated from the apartment with a radio device, killing everyone in the vehicle. After five unsuccessful attempts, the Mossad had assassinated Salameh. However, the blast also killed four innocent bystanders, including a British student and a German
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
nun, and injured 18 other people in the vicinity. Immediately following the operation the three Mossad officers fled without trace, as well as up to 14 other agents believed to have been involved in the operation.
Munich hostage-takers
Three of the eight militants that carried out the Munich massacre survived the German rescue attempt at FürstenfeldbruckFürstenfeldbruck
Fürstenfeldbruck is a town in Bavaria, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Fürstenfeldbruck. it has a population of 35,494. Since the 1930s, Fürstenfeldbruck has had an air force base....
airbase on the final night of the hostage crisis and were taken into German custody: Jamal Al-Gashey
Jamal Al-Gashey
Jamal Al-Gashey was a member of the Black September offshoot of the Palestine Liberation Organization and is believed to be the last surviving member of the group of eight terrorists who carried out the massacre of eleven Israeli athletes during the 1972 Munich Olympics. He is visible several...
, Adnan Al-Gashey, and Mohammed Safady. They were released several weeks later after hijackers of Lufthansa
Lufthansa
Deutsche Lufthansa AG is the flag carrier of Germany and the largest airline in Europe in terms of overall passengers carried. The name of the company is derived from Luft , and Hansa .The airline is the world's fourth-largest airline in terms of overall passengers carried, operating...
flight LH 615 demanded their release from the West German government.
It had been thought that Adnan Al-Gashey and Mohammed Safady were both assassinated several years after the massacre; Al-Gashey was found after making contact with a cousin in a Gulf State
Persian Gulf
The Persian Gulf, in Southwest Asia, is an extension of the Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.The Persian Gulf was the focus of the 1980–1988 Iran-Iraq War, in which each side attacked the other's oil tankers...
, and Safady was found by remaining in touch with family in Lebanon. This account was challenged by Israeli author Aaron Klein, who wrote that Adnan died of heart failure in the 1970s and that Safady was either killed by Christian Phalangists
Kataeb Party
The Lebanese Phalanges , better known in English as the Phalange , is a traditional right-wing Lebanese political party. Although it is officially secular, it is mainly supported by Maronite Christians. The party played a major role in the Lebanese War...
in Lebanon
Lebanon
Lebanon , officially the Republic of LebanonRepublic of Lebanon is the most common term used by Lebanese government agencies. The term Lebanese Republic, a literal translation of the official Arabic and French names that is not used in today's world. Arabic is the most common language spoken among...
in the early 1980s or, according to a PLO operative friendly with Safady, is still living today. Jamal Al-Gashey went into hiding in North Africa
North Africa
North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...
; he granted an interview in 1999 to director Kevin MacDonald
Kevin MacDonald (director)
Kevin Macdonald is a Scottish director, best known for his films One Day in September, State of Play, The Last King of Scotland and Touching the Void.-Personal life:...
for the documentary One Day in September
One Day in September
One Day in September is a 1999 documentary film directed by Kevin Macdonald examining the 5 September 1972 murder of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany...
, and is believed to still be alive.
Other actions
Along with direct assassinations, the Mossad used a variety of other means to respond to the Munich massacre and deter future terrorist action. Mossad engaged in a campaign of letter bombsMailbomb
A letter bomb, also called parcel bomb, mail bomb or post bomb, is an explosive device sent via the postal service, and designed with the intention to injure or kill the recipient when opened. They have been used in terrorist attacks such as those of the Unabomber...
against Palestinian officials across Europe. Historian Benny Morris
Benny Morris
Benny Morris is professor of History in the Middle East Studies department of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in the city of Be'er Sheva, Israel...
writes that these attacks caused non-fatal injuries to their targets, which included persons in Algeria
Algeria
Algeria , officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria , also formally referred to as the Democratic and Popular Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of Northwest Africa with Algiers as its capital.In terms of land area, it is the largest country in Africa and the Arab...
and Libya
Libya
Libya is an African country in the Maghreb region of North Africa bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
, Palestinian student activists in Bonn
Bonn
Bonn is the 19th largest city in Germany. Located in the Cologne/Bonn Region, about 25 kilometres south of Cologne on the river Rhine in the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, it was the capital of West Germany from 1949 to 1990 and the official seat of government of united Germany from 1990 to 1999....
and Copenhagen
Copenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
, and a Red Crescent official in Stockholm
Stockholm
Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...
. Klein also cites an incident in Cairo
Cairo
Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...
where a bomb malfunctioned, sparing the two Palestinian targets.
Former Mossad katsa Victor Ostrovsky
Victor Ostrovsky
Victor John Ostrovsky is an author, artist and former katsa for the Israeli Mossad . He authored two non-fiction books about his service with the Mossad: By Way of Deception, a New York Times No. 1 bestseller in 1990, and The Other Side of Deception several years later...
claimed that the Mossad also used psychological warfare
Psychological warfare
Psychological warfare , or the basic aspects of modern psychological operations , have been known by many other names or terms, including Psy Ops, Political Warfare, “Hearts and Minds,” and Propaganda...
tactics such as running obituaries of still-living militants and sending highly detailed personal information to others. Reeve further stated that the Mossad would call junior Palestinian officials, and after divulging to them their personal information, would warn them to disassociate from any Palestinian cause. British intelligence writer Gordon Thomas
Gordon Thomas
Gordon Thomas is a Welsh author who has written fifty-three books. The total sales of his works exceed 45 million copies. Thomas divides his time between his homes in Ireland and England, with his wife, an interior designer...
wrote that hours before each militant was killed, his family would receive flowers and a condolences card bearing the words "A reminder we do not forget or forgive". Thomas further claimed that after each killing, the Mossad's psychological warfare department published a notice about the dead terrorist in Arabic-language newspapers throughout the Middle East.
Other assassinations
Several assassinations or assassination attempts have been attributed to the Wrath of God campaign, although doubt exists as to whether the Mossad was behind them, with breakaway Palestinian factions being suspected of carrying them out. The first such assassination occurred on 4, 1978, when Said HammamiSaid Hammami
Said Hammami was a Palestinian politician, diplomat and journalist. He was assassinated in his office in London on January 4, 1978, where he was serving as the representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization to the United Kingdom....
, the PLO representative in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, was shot and killed. The assassination is suspected of being the work of either the Mossad or the Abu Nidal Organization. On August 3, 1978, Ezzedine Kalak, chief of the PLO's Paris bureau, and his deputy Hamad Adnan, were killed at their offices in the Arab League
Arab League
The Arab League , officially called the League of Arab States , is a regional organisation of Arab states in North and Northeast Africa, and Southwest Asia . It was formed in Cairo on 22 March 1945 with six members: Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan , Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. Yemen joined as a...
building. Three other members of the Arab League and PLO staff were wounded. This attack was either the work of the Mossad or the Abu Nidal Organization. On July 27, 1979. Zuheir Mohsen
Zuheir Mohsen
Zuheir Mohsen was a Palestinian leader of the pro-Syria as-Sa'iqa faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization between 1971 and 1979...
, head of PLO military operations, was gunned down in Cannes
Cannes
Cannes is one of the best-known cities of the French Riviera, a busy tourist destination and host of the annual Cannes Film Festival. It is a Commune of France in the Alpes-Maritimes department....
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, just after leaving a casino. Responsibility for the attack has been placed by various sources on the Mossad, other Palestinians, and possibly Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
. On June 1, 1981, Naim Khader, the PLO representative in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
, was assassinated in Brussels
Brussels
Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...
. Officials at the PLO information and liaison office in Brussels issued a statement accusing Israel of being behind the killing. Abu Daoud
Abu Daoud
Mohammad Daoud Oudeh , commonly known by his nom de guerre Abu Daoud or Abu Dawud was a Palestinian militant known as the planner, architect and mastermind of the Munich massacre...
, a Black September commander who openly claimed to have helped plan the Munich attack, was shot multiple times on August 1, 1981 by a gunman in a Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
hotel cafe. Daoud survived the attack. It is unclear whether it was the Mossad or another breakaway Palestinian faction. Daoud claimed that the attack was carried out by a Palestinian double agent for Mossad, who was killed by the PLO ten years later. On March 1, 1982, PLO official Nabil Wadi Aranki was killed in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
. On June 8, 1992 PLO head of intelligence Atef Bseiso
Atef Bseiso
Atef Bseiso was the PLO head of intelligence. He was killed in Paris in 1992. Yasser Arafat blamed the Israeli secret service Mossad for the killing. This involvement, to date, has not been proven...
was shot and killed in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
by two gunmen with suppressed
Suppressor
A suppressor, sound suppressor, sound moderator, or silencer, is a device attached to or part of the barrel of a firearm which reduces the amount of noise and flash generated by firing the weapon....
weapons. While the PLO and a book by Israeli author Aaron Klein
Aaron Klein
Aaron Klein is an American author, Middle East correspondent, head of the Jerusalem bureau for WorldNetDaily , columnist for The Jewish Press, and a radio talk show host who, among other things, is known for interviewing middle eastern political figures, along with various leaders of terrorist...
blamed the Mossad for the killing, other reports indicate that the Abu Nidal Organization
Abu Nidal
Abu Nidal , born Sabri Khalil al-Banna , was the founder of Fatah–The Revolutionary Council , a militant Palestinian group more commonly known as the Abu Nidal Organization...
was behind it.
Black September response
Black September never succeeded in carrying out another operation of the magnitude of the Munich massacre after Operation Wrath of God, although it did attempt and carry out a number of attacks and hostage takings against Israel.Similar to the Mossad's letter bomb campaign, dozens of letter bombs were sent from Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
to Israeli diplomatic posts around the world in September and October 1972. One such attack killed Ami Shachori, an Israeli Agricultural Counselor Ami Shachori in Britain.
An operation was planned by Black September when it learned that Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir
Golda Meir
Golda Meir ; May 3, 1898 – December 8, 1978) was a teacher, kibbutznik and politician who became the fourth Prime Minister of the State of Israel....
would be travelling to Rome to meet with Pope Paul VI
Pope Paul VI
Paul VI , born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini , reigned as Pope of the Catholic Church from 21 June 1963 until his death on 6 August 1978. Succeeding Pope John XXIII, who had convened the Second Vatican Council, he decided to continue it...
in January 1973. The planned visit was placed under a regime of strict secrecy in Israel, and news of the upcoming visit was probably leaked by a pro-Palestinian priest in the Vatican Secretariat of State. Black September commander Ali Hassan Salameh
Ali Hassan Salameh
Ali Hassan Salameh was the chief of operations—code name Abu Hassan—for Black September, the organization responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre and other attacks. He was also the founder of Force 17...
began planning a missile attack against Meir's plane as it arrived in Rome. Salameh's goal was to kill not only Meir, but also key cabinet ministers and senior Mossad officers accompanying her. At the time, Salameh was negotiating with the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, asking for safe haven, and he hoped that by the time Israel recovered from this blow, he and his men would be in the Soviet Union and out of Israel's reach. Black September smuggled several shoulder-launched Strela 2 missiles
Strela 2
The 9K32 “Strela-2” is a man-portable, shoulder-fired, low-altitude surface-to-air missile system with a high explosive warhead and passive infrared homing guidance...
to Bari, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, from Dubrovnik
Dubrovnik
Dubrovnik is a Croatian city on the Adriatic Sea coast, positioned at the terminal end of the Isthmus of Dubrovnik. It is one of the most prominent tourist destinations on the Adriatic, a seaport and the centre of Dubrovnik-Neretva county. Its total population is 42,641...
, Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
, by boat. The missiles were then smuggled to Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
and positioned around Fiumicino Airport shortly before Meir's arrival. To divert the Mossad's vigilance away from Rome in the run-up to the attack, Salameh planned an attack on the Israeli embassy in Bangkok
Bangkok
Bangkok is the capital and largest urban area city in Thailand. It is known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon or simply Krung Thep , meaning "city of angels." The full name of Bangkok is Krung Thep Mahanakhon Amon Rattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom...
, Thailand
Thailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
.
On December 28, 1972, four Black September members took over the Israeli embassy in Bangkok, holding 12 hostages. The terrorists raised the PLO flag over the building, and threatened to kill the hostages unless 36 PLO prisoners were released. The building was surrounded by Thai troops and police. The option of a rescue operation was considered in Israel but ruled out. A rescue operation was considered a logistical impossibility, and it was also thought that as the embassy was in busy central Bangkok, the Thai government would never allow the possibility of a shootout to occur. Though their demands were not met, negotiations secured the release of all the hostages and the Black September militants were given safe passage to Cairo.
The Mossad found out about the plan to assassinate Golda Meir on January 14, 1973, when a sayan, or local volunteer, informed the Mossad that he had handled two telephone calls from a payphone in an apartment block where PLO members sometimes stayed. The calls were in Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
, which the sayan spoke. Speaking in code, the caller stated that it was "time to deliver the birthday candles for the celebration". Mossad Director-General Zvi Zamir
Zvi Zamir
Zvi Zamir born Zvicka Zarzevsky was a Major General in the Israel Defense Forces and the Director of the Mossad from 1968 to 1974. Born in Poland, Zamir immigrated with his family to the then British Mandate of Palestine when only seven months old...
was convinced that this was a coded order connected to an upcoming attack. Zamir had been convinced that the Bangkok embassy raid was a diversion for a larger attack, due to the participants in the raid having so easily given up, something he did not expect from a group as well-trained, financed, strategically cunning, and motivated as Black September. Zamir further interpreted that "birthday candles" could refer to weapons, and the most likely one with a candle connonation was rocket. Zamir linked the possible upcoming missile attack with Meir's upcoming arrival, and guessed that Black September was planning to shoot down Meir's plane. Zamir then sent a Mossad katsa
Katsa
A katsa is a field intelligence officer of Mossad. He or she collects information and runs agents, similar to the case officer of the CIA.-Operation:...
, or field intelligence officer, to Rome, and travelled to the city with a team of Mossad officers. Zamir met with the head of DIGOS, the Italian anti-terrorism unit, and laid out his concerns. DIGOS officers raided the apartment blocks from where the calls had been made, and found a Russian instruction manual for launching missiles. Throughout the night, DIGOS teams, each accompanied by a Mossad katsa, raided known PLO apartments, but found no evidence of any plot to kill Meir. In the morning, a few hours before Meir's plane arrived, Mossad agents and Italian police surrounded Fiumicino Airport.
A Mossad katsa spotted a Fiat
Fiat
FIAT, an acronym for Fabbrica Italiana Automobili Torino , is an Italian automobile manufacturer, engine manufacturer, financial, and industrial group based in Turin in the Italian region of Piedmont. Fiat was founded in 1899 by a group of investors including Giovanni Agnelli...
van parked in a field close to the flight path. The agent ordered the driver to step out. The back door then flew open, and two militants opened fire. The agent returned fire, severely wounding both of them. The van was found to contain six missiles. The driver escaped on foot, and was pursued by the agent. He was captured as he tried to hijack a car driven by another patrolling Mossad operative. The driver was bundled into the car and taken to the truck that served as the Mossad's mobile command post, where he revealed the whereabouts of the second missile team after being severely beaten. The truck then sped off, heading north. A cafe-van with three missile launchers protruding from the roof was spotted. The truck then rammed the van, turning it over, trapping the launch team inside and half-crushing them beneath the weight of the missiles, and turning the van's fixed launchers away from the sky. The unconscious driver was pulled from the van and tossed to the side of the road, and DIGOS was alerted that there had been "an interesting accident they should look into". Zamir briefly considered killing the terrorists, but felt that their deaths would serve as an embarassment to Golda Meir's audience with the pope. The Black September operatives, who had participated in the Munich massacre, were taken to hospital and eventually allowed to fly to Libya
Libya
Libya is an African country in the Maghreb region of North Africa bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
, but within months, all were killed by the Mossad.
Two Israelis suspected of being intelligence agents were shot and killed, as well as an Israeli official in Washington
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
. Baruch Cohen, a Mossad agent in Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
, was killed on January 23, 1973 by a young Palestinian contact. At least three Palestinians involved in Cohen's murder were subsequently assassinated. Vittorio Olivares, an Italian El Al
El Al
El Al Israel Airlines Ltd , trading as El Al , is the flag carrier of Israel. It operates scheduled domestic and international services and cargo flights to Europe, North America, Africa and the Far East from its main base in Ben Gurion International Airport...
employee suspected by Black September, was shot and killed in Rome in April 1973. The Israeli military attaché to the United States, Colonel Yosef Alon
Yosef Alon
Yosef Alon was an Israeli Air Force officer who was mysteriously shot and killed in the driveway of his home in Maryland, USA.-Early life:...
, was assassinated on July 1, 1973 in Chevy Chase
Chevy Chase, Maryland
Chevy Chase is the name of both a town and an unincorporated census-designated place in Montgomery County, Maryland. In addition, a number of villages in the same area of Montgomery County include "Chevy Chase" in their names...
, Maryland
Maryland
Maryland is a U.S. state located in the Mid Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware to its east...
.
Black September conducted several other attacks only indirectly against Israel, including the seizure of Western diplomats in the Saudi
Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia , commonly known in British English as Saudi Arabia and in Arabic as as-Sa‘ūdiyyah , is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab World...
embassy in Khartoum
Khartoum
Khartoum is the capital and largest city of Sudan and of Khartoum State. It is located at the confluence of the White Nile flowing north from Lake Victoria, and the Blue Nile flowing west from Ethiopia. The location where the two Niles meet is known as "al-Mogran"...
(see: 1973 Khartoum diplomatic assassinations), but the group was officially dissolved by al-Fatah in December 1974.
Arab reaction
While the first wave of assassinations from October 1972 to early 1973 caused greater consternation among Palestinian officials, it was the raid on Lebanon – Operation Spring of YouthOperation Spring of Youth
The 1973 Israeli raid on Lebanon took place on the night of April 9 and early morning of April 10, 1973 when Israel Defense Forces special forces units attacked several Palestine Liberation Organization targets in Beirut and Sidon, Lebanon...
in April 1973 – that truly shocked the Arab world
Arab world
The Arab world refers to Arabic-speaking states, territories and populations in North Africa, Western Asia and elsewhere.The standard definition of the Arab world comprises the 22 states and territories of the Arab League stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the...
. The audacity of the mission, plus the fact that senior leaders such as Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat
Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini , popularly known as Yasser Arafat or by his kunya Abu Ammar , was a Palestinian leader and a Laureate of the Nobel Prize. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization , President of the Palestinian National Authority...
, Abu Iyad and Ali Hassan Salameh
Ali Hassan Salameh
Ali Hassan Salameh was the chief of operations—code name Abu Hassan—for Black September, the organization responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre and other attacks. He was also the founder of Force 17...
were only yards away from the fighting, contributed to the creation of the belief that Israel was capable of striking anywhere, anytime. It also brought about popular mourning. At the funerals for the victims of the raid, half a million people came into the streets of Beirut. Nearly six years later, 100,000 people, including Arafat, turned out in the same city to bury Salameh.
The operation also caused some of the less radical Arab governments to begin putting pressure on Palestinians to stop attacks against Israeli targets. Threatening to pull support for the Palestinians if they used their governments' passports during the course of attacks against Israel, some militants began to instead use forged Israeli documents.
Possible wrong targets
Since the knowledge of the assassinations has become known, Israel has faced accusations that it targeted people that were not involved in the Munich massacre or in terrorism at all.In the 2005 book Striking Back, author Aaron Klein
Aaron Klein
Aaron Klein is an American author, Middle East correspondent, head of the Jerusalem bureau for WorldNetDaily , columnist for The Jewish Press, and a radio talk show host who, among other things, is known for interviewing middle eastern political figures, along with various leaders of terrorist...
(who says he based his book in large part on rare interviews with key Mossad officers involved in the reprisal missions) contends that the Mossad got only one man directly connected to the massacre. The man, Atef Bseiso
Atef Bseiso
Atef Bseiso was the PLO head of intelligence. He was killed in Paris in 1992. Yasser Arafat blamed the Israeli secret service Mossad for the killing. This involvement, to date, has not been proven...
, was killed in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
in 1992. Klein goes on to say that the intelligence on Wael Zwaiter, the first Palestinian to die, was "uncorroborated and improperly cross-referenced. Looking back, his assassination was a mistake." He elaborates, stating that the real planners and executors of Munich had gone into hiding along with bodyguards in the Eastern bloc
Eastern bloc
The term Eastern Bloc or Communist Bloc refers to the former communist states of Eastern and Central Europe, generally the Soviet Union and the countries of the Warsaw Pact...
and Arab world
Arab world
The Arab world refers to Arabic-speaking states, territories and populations in North Africa, Western Asia and elsewhere.The standard definition of the Arab world comprises the 22 states and territories of the Arab League stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the...
, where Israel could not reach them. Most of those killed were minor Palestinian figures who happened to be wandering unprotected around Western Europe. "Israeli security officials claimed these dead men were responsible for Munich; PLO pronouncements made them out to be important figures; and so the image of the Mossad as capable of delivering death at will grew and grew." The operation functioned not just to punish the perpetrators of Munich but also to disrupt and deter future terrorist acts, writes Klein. "For the second goal, one dead PLO operative was as good as another." Klein quotes a senior intelligence source: "Our blood was boiling. When there was information implicating someone, we didn't inspect it with a magnifying glass."
Abu Daoud, one of the main planners of the Munich massacre, has said in interviews before the release of the movie Munich
Munich (film)
Munich is a 2005 historical fiction film about the Israeli government's secret retaliation attacks after the massacre of Israeli athletes by the Black September terrorist group during the 1972 Summer Olympics. The film stars Eric Bana and was produced and directed by Steven Spielberg...
that Israel did not assassinate people in the operation's group responsible for conducting the Munich attack. He supports this by saying that "I returned to Ramallah in 1995, and Israel knew that I was the planner of the Munich operation." The leader of Black September, Abu Iyad, was also not killed by Israel, although he was assassinated in 1991 in Tunis
Tunis
Tunis is the capital of both the Tunisian Republic and the Tunis Governorate. It is Tunisia's largest city, with a population of 728,453 as of 2004; the greater metropolitan area holds some 2,412,500 inhabitants....
by the Abu Nidal Organization. Former Mossad chief Zvi Zamir has countered this in an interview in 2006, when he said that Israel was more interested in striking the "infrastructure of the terrorist organizations in Europe" than those directly responsible for Munich. "We had no choice but to start with preventive measures."
Rami Adwan, the son of Kamal Adwan, who was in his father's Beirut apartment when he was killed, said that his father was not at all involved in Munich. However, he admitted to organizing resistance against the Israeli military occupation of the West Bank
West Bank
The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...
. According to Rami, then, the Munich attack "was a godsend opportunity for the Israelis to actually kill people."
Moral objections
Other criticism has been directed at the tactic of assassination itself. As the campaign continued, relatives of the athletes killed at Munich were informed of the latest Mossad killings. Simon Reeve writes that some felt vindicated, while others, including the wife of fencer Andre SpitzerAndre Spitzer
Andre Spitzer , was a fencing master and coach of Israel's 1972 Summer Olympics team. He was one of 11 athletes and coaches taken hostage and subsequently killed by Palestinians in the Munich massacre.-Early life:...
, felt ambivalent. The wife of assassinated Mossad agent Baruch Cohen has called the operation, especially a side operation directed against those who had murdered her husband, sickening.
Effect on Arab armed operations
Still others have questioned the effectiveness of the operation in meeting its goals. According to Ronen BergmanRonen Bergman
Ronen Bergman is an Israeli investigative journalist and author. He is Currently a senior political and military analyst for Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel’s largest-circulation daily.Mr...
(security correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronoth and expert on Mossad): "This campaign stopped most PLO terrorism outside the borders of Israel. Did it help in any way to bring peace to the Middle East? No. Strategically it was a complete failure."
Former katsa Victor Ostrovsky
Victor Ostrovsky
Victor John Ostrovsky is an author, artist and former katsa for the Israeli Mossad . He authored two non-fiction books about his service with the Mossad: By Way of Deception, a New York Times No. 1 bestseller in 1990, and The Other Side of Deception several years later...
has said that the direction Meir set the Mossad on, namely that of focusing heavily on the people and operations of the PLO, took energy away from intelligence gathering on Israel's neighbors. This led the Mossad to miss the warning signs of the 1973 Yom Kippur War
Yom Kippur War
The Yom Kippur War, Ramadan War or October War , also known as the 1973 Arab-Israeli War and the Fourth Arab-Israeli War, was fought from October 6 to 25, 1973, between Israel and a coalition of Arab states led by Egypt and Syria...
, which caught Israeli defenses by surprise.
In popular culture
The 1984 book Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist TeamVengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team
Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team is a 1984 book by George Jonas describing part of Operation Wrath of God, the Israeli assassination campaign launched after the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre...
, by Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
journalist George Jonas
George Jonas
George Jonas is a Hungarian-born Canadian writer and columnist. He is the author of 15 books. They include Vengeance , the story of an Israeli operation to kill the terrorists responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre...
, tells the story of an Israeli assassination squad from the viewpoint of a self-described former Mossad agent and leader of the squad, Avner. Avner has since been revealed as a pseudonym
Pseudonym
A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...
for Yuval Aviv
Yuval Aviv
Juval Aviv is an Israeli-American writer and security consultant. He may be best-known for his claim that he is the source of the 1984 book Vengeance: The True Story of an Israeli Counter-Terrorist Team by George Jonas, on which Steven Spielberg's 2005 film Munich was based...
, an Israeli who now runs a private investigation agency in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
. However, Aviv's account of the operation has not been independently verified beyond the fact checking Jonas says he has done. Jonas points to a former Director General of the RCMP Security Service
RCMP Security Service
The RCMP Security Service is the former branch of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police which had responsibilities of domestic intelligence and security for Canada...
, John Starnes, who he says believes Aviv's essential story. In spite of this, the Mossad director at the time of the operation, Zvi Zamir, has stated that he never knew Aviv. Several former Mossad officers who took part in Operation Wrath of God have also told British journalists that Yuval Aviv's version of events is not accurate. After its 1984 publication the book was listed on the fiction and non-fiction bestseller lists in Britain.
Since its release, two films have been based on Vengeance. In 1986, Michael Anderson
Michael Anderson (director)
Michael Joseph Anderson, Sr. is an English film director, best known for directing The Dam Busters , Around the World in 80 Days and Logan's Run .-Early life:...
directed the HBO film Sword of Gideon
Sword of Gideon
Sword of Gideon is a 1986 television film about Mossad agents hunting down terrorists associated with the 1972 Munich massacre. It was first shown on the CTV network in Canada as a four hour miniseries and later on the HBO television network. Directed by Michael Anderson and written by Chris...
. Steven Spielberg
Steven Spielberg
Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
released a second movie based on the account in December 2005 entitled Munich
Munich (film)
Munich is a 2005 historical fiction film about the Israeli government's secret retaliation attacks after the massacre of Israeli athletes by the Black September terrorist group during the 1972 Summer Olympics. The film stars Eric Bana and was produced and directed by Steven Spielberg...
. Both movies use Yuval Aviv's pseudonym Avner and take a certain amount of artistic license
Artistic license
Artistic licence is a colloquial term, sometimes euphemism, used to denote the distortion of fact, alteration of the conventions of grammar or language, or rewording of pre-existing text made by an artist to improve a piece of...
with his account.
See also
- State terrorismState terrorismState terrorism may refer to acts of terrorism conducted by a state against a foreign state or people. It can also refer to acts of violence by a state against its own people.-Definition:...
- Israeli targeted killingsIsraeli targeted killingsIn the course of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the Israel Defense Forces use the term "focused foiling" against those it considers proven to have intentions of performing a specific act of violence in the very near future or to be linked indirectly with several acts of violence , thus raising...
- Targeted killingTargeted killingTargeted killing is the deliberate, specific targeting and killing, by a government or its agents, of a supposed terrorist or of a supposed "unlawful combatant" who is not in that government's custody...
- List of Israeli assassinations
- Selective assassination
- Samson OptionSamson OptionThe Samson Option is a term used to describe Israel’s alleged deterrence strategy of massive retaliation with nuclear weapons as a “last resort” against nations whose military attacks threaten its existence, and possibly against other targets as well....
- Dahiya doctrineDahiya doctrineThe Dahiya doctrine is a military strategy put forth by the Israeli general Gadi Eizenkot that pertains to asymmetric warfare in an urban setting, in which the army deliberately targets civilian infrastructure, as a means of inducing suffering for the civilian population, thereby establishing...
- Counter-terrorismCounter-terrorismCounter-terrorism is the practices, tactics, techniques, and strategies that governments, militaries, police departments and corporations adopt to prevent or in response to terrorist threats and/or acts, both real and imputed.The tactic of terrorism is available to insurgents and governments...
- Israeli-Palestinian conflictIsraeli-Palestinian conflictThe Israeli–Palestinian conflict is the ongoing conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. The conflict is wide-ranging, and the term is also used in reference to the earlier phases of the same conflict, between Jewish and Zionist yishuv and the Arab population living in Palestine under Ottoman or...
- Arab-Israeli conflict
- Moral equivalenceMoral equivalenceMoral equivalence is a term used in political debate, usually to criticize any denial that a moral hierarchy can be assessed of two sides in a conflict, or in the actions or tactics of two sides...
- Special Activities DivisionSpecial Activities DivisionThe Special Activities Division is a division in the United States Central Intelligence Agency's National Clandestine Service responsible for covert operations known as "special activities"...
- Tzipi LivniTzipi LivniTzipporah Malkah "Tzipi" Livni is an Israeli lawyer and politician. She is the current Israeli Opposition Leader and leader of Kadima, the largest party in the Knesset. Raised an ardent nationalist, Livni has become one of her nation's leading voices for the two-state solution. In Israel she has...