| Black September Organization | |
|---|---|
| منظمة أيلول الأسود | |
| Leaders |
|
| Dates of operation | September 1970 –c. 1988 |
| Active regions | Global, mostly concentrated in Europe and the Middle East |
| Ideology | Palestinian nationalism Anti-Zionism |
| Notable attacks | Munich massacre (seelist of Black September attacks) |
| Status | Inactive |
TheBlack September Organization (BSO;Arabic:منظمة أيلول الأسود,romanized: Munaẓẓamat Aylūl al-Aswad) was aPalestinian militant organization, which was founded in September 1970.[1] Besides other actions, the group was responsible for theassassination of the Jordanian Prime Minister Wasfi Tal, and theMunich massacre, in which eleven Israeli athletes and officials were kidnapped and killed, as well as aWest German policeman dying, during the1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, their most publicized event. These attacks led to the creation or specialization of permanentcounter-terrorism forces in many European countries.
The group's name is derived from theBlack September conflict (1970 – 71, also knwn as the Jordanian Civil War) which began on 16 September 1970, whenKing Hussein ofJordan declaredmilitary rule in response to theDawson's Field hijackings byPalestinianfedayeen, with the aftermath of the conflict resulting in the deaths and expulsions of thousands of Palestinians from Jordan. The BSO began as a small cell ofFatah men determined to take revenge upon King Hussein and theJordanian Armed Forces. Recruits from thePFLP,as-Sa'iqa, and other groups also joined.
Initially, most of its members were dissidents within Fatah who had been close toAbu Ali Iyad, the commander of Fatah forces in northern Jordan who continued to fight the Jordanian Army after thePLO leadership withdrew. He was killed, allegedly through execution, by Jordanian forces on 23 July 1971.[2] It was alleged by them that the Jordanian Prime Minister at the time,Wasfi Tal, was personally responsible for his torture and death.[3]
There is disagreement among historians, journalists, and primary sources about the nature of the BSO and the extent to which it was controlled byFatah, thePalestine Liberation Organization (PLO) faction controlled at the time byYasser Arafat.
In his bookStateless, Salah Khalaf (Abu Iyad), Arafat's chief of security and a founding member of Fatah, wrote that: "Black September was not a terrorist organization, but was rather an auxiliary unit of the resistance movement, at a time when the latter was unable to fully realize its military and political potential. The members of the organization always denied any ties between their organization and Fatah or the PLO."
The denial described in Abu Iyad's claim was mutual: according to a 1972 article in the Jordanian newspaperAd-Dustour, Mohammed Daoud Oudeh, also known asAbu Daoud, a BSO operative and former senior PLO member, told Jordanian police: "There is no such organization as Black September. Fatah announces its own operations under this name so that Fatah will not appear as the direct executor of the operation." A March 1973 document released in 1981 by the U.S.State Department seemed to confirm thatFatah was Black September's parent organization.[4]
According to American journalistJohn K. Cooley, the BSO represented a "total break with the old operational and organizational methods of thefedayeen. Its members operated in air-tight cells of four or more men and women. Each cell's members were kept purposely ignorant of other cells. Leadership was exercised from outside by intermediaries and 'cut-offs' [sic]", though there was no centralized leadership.[5]
Cooley writes that many of the cells in Europe and around the world were made up of Palestinians and other Arabs who had lived in their countries of residence as students, teachers, businessmen, and diplomats for many years. Operatingwithout a central leadership, it was a "true collegial direction".[5] The cell structure and the need-to-know operational philosophy protected the operatives by ensuring that the apprehension or surveillance of one cell would not affect the others. The structure offeredplausible deniability to the Fatah leadership, which was careful to distance itself from Black September operations.
Fatah needed Black September, according to historianBenny Morris. He writes that there was a "problem of internal PLO or Fatah cohesion, with extremists constantly demanding greater militancy. The moderates apparently acquiesced in the creation of Black September in order to survive".[6] As a result of pressure from militants, writes Morris, a Fatah congress inDamascus in August–September 1971 agreed to establish Black September. The new organization was based on Fatah's existing special intelligence and security apparatus, and on the PLO offices and representatives in various European capitals, and from very early on, there was cooperation between Black September and the PFLP.[6]
The PLO closed Black September down in September 1973, on the anniversary it was created by the "political calculation that no more good would come of terrorism abroad" according to Morris.[7] In 1974 Arafat ordered the PLO to withdraw from acts of violence outside theWest Bank, theGaza Strip and Israel.
The group was responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre in which eleven Israeli Olympic athletes were murdered, nine of whom were first taken hostage, and the killing of a German police officer, during the1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, Germany.
Following the attack, the Israeli government, headed by Prime MinisterGolda Meir, launched anassassination campaign and orderedMossad to assassinate those known to have been involved in the Munich massacre.[8] By 1979, at least one Mossad unit had assassinated eight Black September and PLO members, includingAli Hassan Salameh, nicknamed the "Red Prince", the wealthy, flamboyant son of an upper-class family, and commander ofForce 17,Yasser Arafat's personal security squad. Salameh was also behind the 1972hijacking of Sabena Flight 572 fromVienna toLod. He was killed by a car bomb inBeirut on 22 January 1979. Duringa raid in Lebanon in April 1973, Israeli commandos killed three senior members of Black September in Beirut. In July 1973, in what became known as theLillehammer affair, Ahmed Bouchiki, an innocent Moroccan waiter who was mistaken for Ali Hassan Salameh was killed in Norway. Six Israeli operatives were arrested for the murder.
Remarks in 2010 byAbu Daoud, the alleged mastermind of the Munich kidnappings, deny that any of the Palestinians assassinated by Mossad had any relation to the Munich operation,[9] despite the fact that the list includes two of the three surviving members of the kidnap squad arrested at the airport.[10]
Other actions attributed to Black September include:
The 1977 filmBlack Sunday centers on a fictional Black September plot to attack the Super Bowl. The 2005 filmMunich depicts the Munich massacre and subsequent Israeli campaign of retaliation.
Black September is both the name of Jordan's ruthless war on the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in September 1970 and of a Palestinian commando and terrorist movement created in the aftermath of the war to avenge the Palestinians' losses in Jordan.
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