Daoud’s Career-a Trail of Bloodshed

Mouhammed Daoud Auda, alias Abu Daoud, the Palestinian terrorist arrested in Paris Friday, confessed on a Jordanian radio broadcast from Amman in 1973 that he was one of the masterminds of the assault on the 1972 Olympic Games at Munich in which 11 Israelis athletes were massacred. At the time of his confession, Daoud was serving a life sentence in Jordan which he had entered in February, 1973 on a terrorist mission.

These and other facts about Daoud’s bloody career were recalled today as extradition requests were expected to be submitted by the governments of Israel and West Germany, each of which wants the terrorist to stand trial for the mass murders at Munich.

Daoud worked as a teacher in Jordan between 1956-60 and taught in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait from 1960-65. He returned to Jordan in 1968 where he finished his law studies. Subsequently he became connected with the “Black September,” an offshoot of E1 Fatah formed after King Hussein’s successful campaign against terrorist gangs in 1970.

When he returned to Jordan secretly in 1973 he headed a terrorist group that was planning to kidnap Jordanian government officials as hostages for the release of terrorists jailed in that country. He was captured and sentenced to death. But while in the gaol, Arab terrorists perpetrated new outrages intended to force his release. They occupied the Saudi Arabian Embassy in Khartoum, Sudan, killing three Western diplomats, including an American, who were attending a reception at the time. Later, terrorists occupied the Saudian Embassy in Paris.

King Hussein yielded to pressure and commuted Daoud’s sentence to life imprisonment. But in September, 1973, Daoud was one of 750 terrorists freed by Jordan as a good will gesture. He immediately resumed his activities with the “Black September.”