Andre Spitzer
| Andre Spitzer | |
|---|---|
| Born |
July 4, 1945 Timișoara, Romania |
| Died | September 6, 1972 (aged 27) Munich, Germany |
| Spouse(s) | Ankie |
| Children | Anouk Spitzer |
Andre Spitzer (4 July 1945 – 6 September 1972), was a fencing master and coach of Israel's 1972 Summer Olympics team. He was one of 11 athletes and coaches taken hostage and subsequently killed by Palestinian terrorists in the Munich massacre.
Spitzer was born in Timișoara in Romania. After his father died in 1956 when he was 11, Andre and his mother moved to Israel. He served in the Israeli Air Force and attended Israel's National Sport Academy, where he studied fencing. In 1968, he was sent to the Netherlands for further instruction in fencing for further training in The Hague with fencing master Abraham. Most of his first year in the Netherlands he stayed with the Smitsloo family in Scheveningen. In 1971, he married one of his students, Ankie. Andre returned to Israel with his wife soon afterward, where at age 27, he became the country's top fencing instructor. He helped found the National Fencing Academy, and became chief fencing instructor at the Wingate Institute.
The couple's daughter Anouk was born a few months before the Olympic Games.
The Spitzers went to Munich with the rest of the Israeli team, but young Anouk was left in the Netherlands, in the care of her grandparents.
Ankie Spitzer recalled her husband's idealism and attitude towards the Olympics:
(While strolling in the Olympic Village)... he spotted members of the Lebanese team, and told (me) he was going to go and say hello to them... I said to him, "Are you out of your mind? They're from Lebanon!" Israel was in a state of war with Lebanon at the time. "Ankie," Andre said calmly, "that's exactly what the Olympics are all about. Here I can go to them, I can talk to them, I can ask them how they are. That's exactly what the Olympics are all about." So he went... towards this Lebanese team, and... he asked them "How were your results? I'm from Israel and how did it go?" And to my amazement, I saw that the (Lebanese) responded and they shook hands with him and they talked to him and they asked him about his results. I'll never forget, when he turned around and came back towards me with this huge smile on his face. "You see!" said Andre excitedly. "This is what I was dreaming about. I knew it was going to happen!" (Reeve 2001, pp. 52-53)
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