German police knew that one of the Palestinians who took Israeli athletes hostage during the 1972 Munich Olympics lived in Berlin for several years following the attack, the Suddeutsche Zeitung daily reported on Saturday.The three suviving hostage-takers were captured, but released weeks later in an exchange when gunmen hijacked a Lufthansa plane on October 29, 1972, and demanded their release.On Saturday the German daily said that one of the three Palestinians who was released then lived for years in Berlin, citing a report in Munich police archives.According to the report, the Munich police - in charge of investigating the attack - was told by the BKA federal police that the Palestinian in question was living in West Berlin and that he went to East Berlin almost daily, to work at the office of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).Following the release of the three hostage-takers, a theory made the rounds that then West Germany had facilitated the release in order to avoid any more operations by Palestinian militants on its territory."We can pose the question if the police really wanted to act or if they wanted to give up arresting someone to avoid a new attack by Palestinian militants" in West Germany, German historian Dominik Aufleger, who had access to the same documents as the paper for his research on the attack, told the daily.
It would be unbelievable if we didn't already know that the German government was involved in planning that hijacking to release the terrorists.
I guess here's something to add to my list of Munich massacre facts that most people don't know.
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