DAVID MARK BERGER

OLYMPIC WEIGHTLIFTER
 

COMPETED IN THE LIGHTHEAVY WEIGHTLIFTING DIVISION
  SEPTEMBER 2, 1972
 

David Berger's brother and sister made the trip to Munich to watch their brother compete in the Olympics. They visited
David and his Israeli teammates in the Olympic Village. David did not expect to would win a medal, and he did not.
He simply wanted to participate in the Olympics representing Israel in an environment where peace superseded all else.  

David Berger competed as a weightlifter in the Lightheavy Division for Israeli on September 2, 1972. His Olympic dream
was realized.

Early on September 5, 1972, at about 4:30 am, terrorists entered the Olympic Village grounds at Munich and took Israeli
Olympic team members hostage. David attempted to stop the intruders, urging his teammates in Hebrew to jump the
terrorists together, because they had nothing to lose. David was one of the athletes who died.

David’s brother and sister were backpacking through Europe. The U.S. government placed a special radio alert to locate
the Berger siblings, who were flown back to Cleveland aboard a military plane in time for the funeral and to be reunited
with their parents.

U.S. president Richard Nixon telephoned the Berger family to ask what he could do to help. On request from his father,
David’s body was returned to Ohio, aboard an Air Force jet personally ordered by the president.

A United States Air Force C-141A StarLifter jet was dispatched to bring his body home for burial before the Shabbat, as
required by Jewish Orthodox law. During the funeral procession, the streets were lined with people paying tribute, many
with their hats off, many crying. Rabbi Lelyveld presided at the funeral, which took place Friday morning. He praised the
Berger family for “setting an example of restraint for all of us.” All Ohio state flags were at half-staff for a week, in
honor of David's memory.

President Richard Nixon, in a telegram to the IOC, asked that the remainder of the Olympic Games be called off. The
International Olympic Committee (IOC) responded by declaring a half-day halt to the games, and held a memorial
service in the Munich stadium.

David’s father never viewed the tragedy as an end - either of his son's memory or of the Olympic Games - but as what
he hoped was a beginning of peace and understanding. For Dr. Berger, there is one consolation: “He [David] considered
competing in the Olympics as a weightlifter the absolute ultimate that he could achieve.…if David knew, that things
would end the same way, he would have followed the same path.”

David’s niece, speaking at the rededication of the David Berger National Memorial, said her uncle believed that sports
are more about peace and camaraderie than about beating the other guy. Sports are "where people come together to
find a common playing field and break down social barriers. That's why David went to Munich.”

The International Olympic Committee (the IOC) still has not publicly recognized the slain athletes, and Dr. Berger
continues to write them every year, asking simply for a moment of commemorative silence.

"There should be a moment of silence,
not just for those athletes, but for all victims of terrorism."