Curtain falls on Gaza occupation
2005 - The last remaining Jewish colonists were pulled out of the Gaza Strip as Israel brought down the curtain on its 38-year occupation of the Palestinian territory. “All the Jewish residents of the Gaza Strip have been evacuated,” national police spokesman Avi Zelba said at the end of an operation. Residents of the last remaining colony, Netzarim, are driven out for the final time after the local rabbi brought out the sacred Torah scrolls at the end of a farewell ceremony in the synagogue that left colonists and soldiers alike in tears. While bulldozers were demolishing empty colony homes in other parts of Gaza, thousands of soldiers were taking up positions around two hardline colonies in the West Bank for the next phase of the historic operation.
August 22
1485 - England’s King Richard III is killed at the Battle of Bosworth, ending War of the Roses.
1717 - Spain attacks Sardinia under pretext that some Spanish subjects have been arrested in Italy.
1846 - United States annexes New Mexico.
1864 - 12 nations sign the First Geneva Convention.
1922 - Michael Collins, the Irish Sinn Fein leader, is gunned down near Cork by militant nationalists.
1978 - Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta dies.
1981 - A Taiwanese domestic jetliner explodes in mid-air and bursts into flames, killing all 110 people on board.
1985 - A British Airtours Boeing 737 bursts into flames at Manchester Airport, killing 54 tourists.
1993 - Former Algerian prime minister Kasdi Merbah is assassinated.
1999 - A Taiwanese airliner crashes at Hong Kong airport. Only two of the 315 passengers and crew die.
1999 - Ayoub Salem becomes a hero for the UAE by winning the first swimming gold medal in the country’s 23 years of participation.
2008 - Columns of Russian tanks roll out of key positions deep inside Georgia as a promised pullback begins.
2009 - Unification Minister of South Korea Hyun In-taek holds talks with North Korea’s spy chief Kim Yang Gon on inter-Korea matters in Seoul for the first time in two years.
2010 - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad unveils Karar, the country’s first domestically made long-range bomb designed to operate at high speed.
2013 - Robert Mugabe is sworn in as Zimbabwe’s president for another five-year term.
