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Ankie Spitzer
Photo: Jonas Opperskalski / laif / DER SPIEGEL
The Munich commemoration of the 50th anniversary recently threatened to become an unworthy event due to the dispute over the processing of the 1972 Olympic assassination attempt.
Apparently, there is still timely agreement on the question of adequate compensation for the families of the victims.
According to SPIEGEL information, the survivors of the eleven murdered should get 28 million euros.
The spokeswoman for the families, Ankie Spitzer, agreed to this during the day, government circles confirmed to SPIEGEL on Tuesday.
Ankie Spitzer himself told SPIEGEL in the evening that the deal was "very close" but still had to sign a few papers and agreements.
Spitzer did not name a sum.
The "Süddeutsche Zeitung" also reported on the new offer of 28 million euros, but initially did not report an agreement.
Most recently, the victims' families had announced that they would not be traveling to the memorial event in Munich on September 5 if the question of compensation had not been resolved by then.
Families of victims have been complaining about the lack of investigation for 50 years
The federal government had recently declared that it intended to pay late compensation to the families of the victims half a century after the attack on the Israeli Olympic team, as a result of a "reassessment" of the attack and its consequences.
Ankie Spitzer, spokeswoman for the surviving dependents, rejected an initial offer of around ten million euros in mid-August as an “insult” and “tip”.
Previous payments from 1972 and 2002 totaling around four and a half million euros should be taken into account.
When Palestinian terrorists attacked at the Summer Olympics in Munich on September 5 and 6, 1972, eleven Israeli athletes and supervisors and a German policeman were killed.
Two members of the team from Israel were murdered in the Olympic Village, the others died during a failed liberation operation at the Fürstenfeldbruck airfield.
It later became known that the German authorities, among other things, had neglected previous warnings of a possible terrorist attack and had made numerous fatal mistakes during the attempted hostage rescue.
The families of the Israeli victims had already announced last May that they would stay away from the memorial service in Munich if the question of compensation remained unresolved.
"If they don't even pay us compensation according to international standards, we won't come at all," Ankie Spitzer told SPIEGEL.
Over the past 50 years, the victims' families have repeatedly complained about the inadequate processing of the events and the non-release of investigation files;
In addition, no one on the German side ever apologized for the failure of the authorities in the course of the hostage-taking.
Most recently, the federal government also promised the families that a commission made up of German and Israeli historians would be set up to fully investigate the events in Munich.