Was Israel’s military operation “Wrath of God” carried out in an ethical and justifiable manner?

A. Plan of Investigation

The assassinations of eleven Israeli athletes during the 1972 Munich Olympics were a major blow to every country worldwide, but none more so than Israel themselves. Soon after the assassinations Israel announced an anti-terrorism military operation, “Wrath of God” .This investigation will thoroughly examine this operation and the motives behind it and finally the manner in which it was carried out. It will touch on the actual attacks in Munich but will not delve in to the actual motive behind the attacks. Two books will be used as the key sources for this investigation, the first Countering Terrorism a thesis by Alexander B. Calahanand the second, Vengeance by George Jonas. Though these are the main sources, many other websites and books will be used to investigate the topic.

B. Summary of Evidence

1. The Munich Massacre

The assassination of the eleven Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics has come to be known as the “Munich Massacre. On September 5, 1972 eight members of a Palestinian organization called Black September stormed in to the complex of the Israeli athletes and began taking hostages. After the first night on the initial raid three men were already killed for trying to fight back at their captives while trying to make time for their fellow athletes to escape. The captives and negotiators did not meet the demands of Black September and a raid which went awry spelled death for eight more of the hostages before it was all over. After the unsuccessful rescue the games continued but the Israelis were left visibly disgusted.

2. Operation Wrath of God

Operation Wrath of God was a mission allegedly created by Israel soon after the killings in Munich. The goal of the operation was to eliminate anyone who had absolutely anything to do with the Munich Massacre. This included any important Palestinians, any

members of the Palestine Liberation Organization, and all of the members of Black September who were directly or indirectly involved with the assassinations of their athletes. The first assassination took place on October 16, 1972, when a man by the name of Abdel Wael Zwaiter was shot and killed in his apartment in Rome. Abdel was the Palestine Liberation Organization representative in Italy. Whether Zwaiter was actually a terrorist or not is still being debated to date. Over the next twenty years after its announcement the operation went on to kill hundreds of Palestinians. The Israelis were ruthless in their attacks and it is suspected they ended up killing many more innocent men during the operation. The Israeli government was adamant that operation wrath of God was an anti-terrorism program rather than the attempt at revenge the rest of the world thought it to be. Even the families of those who had relatives killed in the Munich Massacre did not like the operation. Even considering the injustice done to them in Munich it is still questionable whether a reaction so severe can ever be justified.

3. Operation Spring of Youth

Operation Spring of Youth was a raid made by Israel during operation Wrath of God. The Israeli’s went in to Lebanon on April ninth and tenth of 1973. It was the largest raid made during the entire operation and the killing was substantial. The main targets for the attack were two seven story buildings located in West Beirut. Three key members of the Palestine Liberation Organization were killed, along with another estimated 20-100 Palestinians. In addition an Italian woman and two Lebanese women who were in the building were killed as well. Of all the attacks made against the Palestinians by the Israeli’s this one was said to be the most ruthless slaying of all.

4. The Lillehammer Incident

After over a year of tracking the agents involved with the operation located who they thought was a man by the name of Ali Hassan Salameh in Lillehammer, Norway. They followed the man around for a day and on July 21, 1973 and watched as he went about his business such as seeing a movie and going back to his hotel. As the man was walking off the bus with a pregnant woman he had been seen with all day at his side the agents made their move, shot and killed the man before fleeing the scene. The authorities were alerted and the man was later identified, not as Ali Hassan Salameh, but as Ahmed Bouchiki, an innocent Moroccan man who was making his living as a waiter in Morocco. The pregnant woman he was seen with for the entire day preceding the attack was his wife. The operation was blown open and five of the men involved with the slaying were tried and found guilty.

C. Evaluation of Sources

Both of the sources mentioned above, in “Part A”, Vengeance by George Jonas and Countering Terrorism a thesis by Alexander Calahan come together nicely to give most of the information needed to conduct this investigation. The book gives us a firsthand account of Operation Wrath of God and how brutal the conditions for the people enlisted in the operation were. It gives us a day by day account of the team searching out and systematically murdering each person involved with the Munich Massacre. It is a very valuable source of information because; while it is not actually written by someone who was involved with the operation it is written from their point of view. The author’s source of information was the man depicted in the book; he was very reliable because he was a major part of the operation. One problem with the book is that it is written in the format of a story. This limits it because it did not and could never have given an overview of every aspect of the operation. Because it was written from the point of view of someone involved with the operation, we received a firsthand account of the events being investigated. Furthermore, even though this single source of information seemed very reliable in the book there is a heavy biased in the sense that the sole source of information for the book came from an Israeli agent. When reading the book however, this biased is never really noted as the book both praises and criticizes operation Wrath of God. The entire book rides on the story of one source which proves to be a bit of a problem. The thesis gave an excellent background pertaining to the Munich Massacre and the other events leading up to Operation Wrath of God. One key thing provided was the effects each separate mission during the Operation had on Palestine, Israel and the World in general. It was valuable because it was formed using a wide variety of sources, which subsequently made it a lot more accurate. This source did not delve in to the intricacies of the operation and it was written years after all was said in done, this can be seen as both an advantage and a disadvantage. It is an advantage because the author then had an overview of the entire event but a disadvantage because the longer period of time something is left unresearched the more possibility information will be lost or looked over. Overall both sources proved to be formidable suppliers of information in this investigation.

D. Analysis

After thoroughly researching the topic it is clear that the assassination in Munich was a full blown atrocity. Though there had always been conflict between Israel and Palestine the athletes involved did nothing to deserve such a heartless slaying. The fact that Black September was so quick to kill any of the athletes who opposed them tells us that there was never really an effort to negotiate by the Palestinians. Unless everyone involved was perfect the “terms” of Black September could never have been met. However, the question remains was Israel’s counter-strike, Operation Wrath of God, a justifiable means of revenge. From the evidence presented we can see that the Israelites began the attack with the intentions of avenging their dead athletes. However, what was supposed to be a simple operation soon turned in to the slaughtering of hundreds of in some cases innocent people. From the evidence we see that the first killing was of Abdel Wael Zwaiter, a key figure in the Palestine Liberation Organization. Though the man was the head of the PLO his involvement in the Munich Massacre or any kind of terrorism was questionable at best. You would think that one would be certain about the man’s involvement before killing. This was only the beginning of the hard evidence piled up against the operation. Operation Spring of Youth was one of the only public raids done during the operation. The three key members of the PLO who were murdered could be seen as having a purpose because it is likely, although it has never proven that they were involved with the Munich Massacre. However, why did the raid have to end up killing anywhere from twenty to one hundred people? The raid quickly went from being a tactical assassination of select members of the PLO to a senseless slaughter of all of the Palestinians in sight. The killing of the three women who weren’t even Palestinian just added to the brutality of the operation. The Lillehammer incident took place months after about 9 months after the operation began. An innocent man was killed as a result of a mistaken identity. The men responsible were apprehended and found guilty of murder. The murder of anyone is never right, but the ideals behind operation Wrath of God were quickly deteriorating, the death toll was rising but nothing was truly accomplished. The evidence is in support of the theory that the attacks were not carried out in an ethical manner and the slaughter of hundreds will never be justifiable. This investigation is important in history because it delves in to the heat of many years of conflict between Palestine and Israel. If both the Munich Massacre and operation Wrath of God could be resolved and forgiven for then the two nations could once again find themselves on good terms with each other. One major historic problem with this topic is that it has been covered up by the Israeli government. Any internal documents about operation Wrath of God are strictly classified information so we will never truly know the exact events until all of these documents are either recovered or declassified.

E. Conclusion

Was Israel’s military operation “Wrath of God” carried out in an ethical and justifiable manner? We have examined the incident in Munich itself and it is clear that it too was a true atrocity to the Israelites but, the correct way of dealing with it was not to respond with an atrocity of their own. It would be questionable whether the operation was ethical had the Israelites killed even one man who was directly involved in the Munich Massacre. However, in this they went overboard. It is clear that there was no care, precision or tact used when the murders of certain key figures in the PLO and Black September were planned. From the evidence we see just a few of the killings which had questionable reasoning behind them and one which ended with the death of an innocent man. Operation Wrath of God could never be justified and it was clearly not carried out in any sort of an ethical manner.