FRANKFURT, Germany, June 13 (UPI) -- A German journalist says that Menachim Begin, who later served as prime minister of Israel, tried to assassinate Chancellor Konrad Adenauer in 1952.
Henning Sietz, who wrote a 2003 book on the case, said that Begin wanted to sabotage negotiations for a reparations agreement between Israel and Germany. the Frankfurt Allgemeine Zeitung reports. At the time, Begin opposed the agreement because he viewed it as giving Germany a pass on the Holocaust.
Sietz told the Allgemeine Zeitung that when he wrote "Assassination Attempt on Adenauer: The Secret History of a Political Attack," he had a list of suspects. Now he claims he has narrowed it down, saying that Begin financed and organized the letter-bomb sent to Adenauer.
A privately published book by Eliezer Sudit, one of Begin's colleagues, says that Begin planned the attack on Adenauer, Sietz said. The bomb exploded at a police station, killing a postal worker.
