Afif was the chief negotiator on behalf of the Palestinians, who were members of the Black September offshoot of Yassir Arafat's Palestine Liberation Organization.

He called the operation Iqrit and Kafr Bir'im, after two Christian Palestinian villages whose inhabitants were expelled by Israel during the 1948 Palestine war.

He was described by Manfred Schreiber, chief of the Munich police and one of the German negotiators, as "very cool and determined, clearly fanatical in his convictions"; someone who expressed his demands in a forceful manner and at times "sounded like [one of] those people who aren't completely anchored in reality."

Various photos of the hostage crisis show Afif wearing a white beach hat and a linen safari suit, with his face covered in charcoal or shoe polish.

[11] Afif spent most of his time in front of 31 Connollystraße, chatting with either the German delegation or the young police officer Anneliese Graes.

[15] The bodies of Afif and his four compatriots were turned over to Libya, and after a procession from Martyrs' Square, Tripoli, they were buried at the Sidi Munaidess Cemetery.

[16] In Serge Groussard's The Blood of Israel, Afif was misidentified as Mohammed Safady, one of the terrorists who actually survived the Fürstenfeldbruck gunfight.