On this day - 5 September
Historical items of interest as featured in the papers of the day.
Hostages taken at Munich Olympics
Early in the morning of September 5th 1972, while the Olympic athletes were asleep in the Olympic village, tracksuit clad members of the Black September faction of the Palestine Liberation Organization broke in and took 9 hostages. The security in the Olympic village was reasonably lax with athletes scaling the 6 1/2 foot fences surrounding the village rather than using official entrances. All of the hostages were either members of, or coaches for, the Israeli Olympic team.
Rescue attempts to save the hostages were unsuccessful and all of the hostages died while in captivity.
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