Germany has appointed an eight-person commission to re-appraise the attack on Israeli athletes and team members at the 1972 Munich Olympics to answer unresolved questions, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said in a statement.
"For too many years, there was a lack of understanding or reappraisal of the events, transparency about them or acceptance of responsibility for them," she said.
The project is part of a larger government approach to seek reconciliation with the families affected, including a compensation offer of €28m.
Palestinians from the Black September militant group took members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage on 5 September 1972.
Eleven Israelis, a German policeman and five of the Palestinian gunmen died after a stand-off at the Olympic village and the nearby Fuerstenfeldbruck airfield.
The games continued in 1972 after the attacks and the IOC took almost half a century to comply with families' requests for an official act of remembrance at an Olympic event.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier last September asked for "forgiveness" from families of victims after a long, bitter fight for appropriate compensation and for Berlin to own up to mistakes made that led to the massacre.
Mr Steinmeier summarised the episode as a triple failing.
After families threatened to boycott last year's 50th anniversary ceremonies, a deal was finally agreed for Berlin to provide €28 million in compensation and appoint an investigating commission.
Ankie Spitzer, whose husband Andre was killed in the hostage-taking, said in the ministry statement that the bereaved families were "very pleased that our request to open the archives and establish a commission of historians has been honoured".
The findings by the eight-member panel are to be made public, with the first meeting of the research team planned close to the 51st anniversary of the attack.
