The 1973 Israeli raid in Lebanon (known as Operation Spring of Youth, Hebrew: מבצע אביב נעורים, Mivtsa Aviv Ne'urim) took place on the night of April 9 and early morning of April 10, 1973, when Israeli army special forces units attacked several Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) targets in Beirut and Sidon, Lebanon. The operation is generally considered to have been part of Operation Wrath of God, Israel's retaliation for the Munich massacre at the Summer Olympics in 1972. The Israeli troops arrived at the Lebanese beaches on speedboats launched from missile boats offshore. Mossad agents awaited the forces on the beaches with cars rented the previous day, and then drove them to their targets and later back to the beaches for extraction. During the operation, three of the highest-level PLO leaders, surprised at home, were killed, along with other PLO members. Several Lebanese security people and civilian neighbors were also killed, as were two of the Israeli soldiers. Background In October 1972, Israel obtained intelligence on the home addresses of three top PLO officials in Beirut: Muhammad Youssef al-Najjar (Abu Youssef) – an operations leader in Black September, the group responsible for the 1972 Munich massacre. He was also a PLO veteran, previously head of the Lebanese Fatah branches, head of Fatah internal intelligence organization. His latest duties were head of the PLO's political department and one of Yasser Arafat's deputies (third in line of Fatah's leadership). Kamal Adwan – a PLO chief of operations, responsible for armed attacks against Israeli targets. Kamal Nasser – PLO spokesman and member of the PLO Executive Committee. Najjar, Adwan, and Nasser lived near one another in a pair of seven-story buildings on Verdun Street in a fashionable area of West Beirut. These buildings were residential housing for both British and Italian families along with Arab families. One building housed Al-Najjar, and a building across the street housed Adwan and Nasser. Intelligence had also been obtained on the address of Khalil al-Wazir, the PLO's second-in-command, but he lived further away from the three others. In addition to information about their residences, high-grade intelligence had also been amassed on other PLO targets in Lebanon such as weapons workshops, command posts, and offices. It was decided to assassinate Najjar, Adwan, and Nasser. The Mossad subsequently deployed a female agent codenamed Nielsen to Beirut in January 1973 to amass further intelligence so that an assassination operation could