IOC refuses to mark Munich anniversary

In 1996, then-International Olympic Committee President Juan Antonio Samaranch discussed the recent war in the Balkans, and the need to rebuild Sarajevo. What he didn’t commemorate, or even mention—and what, the IOC announced today, won’t be commemorated, or even mentioned, in any official capacity at this summer’s Games in London on the 40th anniversary—is the massacre of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Despite an official Israeli request, the IOC will not do, well, anything, except, in the words of President Jacques Rogge, to offer the following thoughts: “What happened in Munich in 1972 strengthened the determination of the Olympic Movement to contribute more than ever to building a peaceful and better world by educating young people through sport practiced without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit.”...