Munich: The Israeli Response to the 1972 Munich Olympic Massacre and the Development of Independent Covert Action Teams

Israelis and top intelligence officials put pressure on Meir, and he reluctantly gave the go-ahead for the broad assassination campaign to begin. But when West Germany released the three people who were still alive after the massacre a few months later, as the hijackers of Lufthansa Flight 615 had asked, she no longer felt ambivalent. For Israeli intelligence, the committee’s first task was to compile a list of all those involved in Munich who warranted death. This was possible with the help of PLO agents working for Mossad and information from European intelligence agencies that were friendly. Reports say that the final number of targets is between 20 and 35, with a mix of Black September and PLO elements. No one knows what’s on the whole list. After this was done, Mossad was told to find the people and kill them.

The idea of plausible deniability-that it shouldn’t be possible to show a direct link between the killings and Israel-was very important to the planning. The operations also aimed to intimidate Palestinian militants from a wider perspective. David Kimche, who used to be the deputy head of Mossad, said, ＂The goal wasn’t so much revenge as to scare them [the Palestinian terrorists].＂ It was our goal for them to feel like we were watching them from behind. So, we tried not to do something as simple as shooting a guy in the street. That would have been easy and fair.