Sometimes the wheels of justice turn slowly, especially when it comes to the notoriously self-protective International Olympic Committee.
However, 43 years after the most heinous crime in the history of the Olympics, a measure of justice is being done in memory of the 11 Israeli Olympic athletes and coaches slain by Palestinian terrorists at the 1972 Munich Games.
It’s a very small measure.
After decades of refusal to honor the memory of the victims in any way, the IOC finally blinked. As our story this week details, the committee announced it will erect a memorial to the victims in Munich near the site of the massacre.
Moreover, in Rio de Janiero, site of the 2016 Games, a similar memorial will be erected, this one honoring the memory of all who have been injured or killed at the Olympics, including the 11 Israelis.
To some, especially Israelis and their supporters, these long-overdue steps are minimal, perhaps laughably so. The September 1972 hostage crisis, which caused the Games to be suspended, transfixed the world with its audacity and utter cruelty. Who can forget the grainy black-and-white image of masked PLO terrorists leaning over the balcony of a room at the Olympic Village, while behind them, unseen but ever present, huddled the bound Israeli athletes?
In those days, officials did not know what to do with terrorism on this scale. German police bungled an ambush/rescue attempt, using poorly trained shooters as snipers and inadvertently tipping off the terrorists who, although doomed, slaughtered the captives.
What did the IOC do? After a memorial service the next day, the Games resumed. Medals were handed out. It was as if nothing happened. And that’s the way things remained for 43 years.
During the 2012 Olympiad in London, the 40th anniversary of the massacre, American sportscaster Bob Costas criticized the IOC for refusing the request for an official moment of silence during the opening ceremony. Then Costas defiantly kept silent as the Israeli Olympic team marched into the stadium.
It was a brave act, perhaps creating a tipping point in IOC policy, though most of the credit goes to the widows of the slain Israelis, all of them true heroes.
There is still more the IOC could and should do to honor the victims of terror, an official moment of silence next year in Rio being one of those steps. But we are glad that the IOC has made a first move, however late.
May the memory of the 11 be for a blessing.