Two Israeli paratrooper platoons made up of approximately fifty IDF soldiers storm an Egyptian army camp in Gaza. The raid is a reprisal for continued fedayeen (Palestinian militants) attacks against Israeli civilians.
December 7, 1953 Israel’s founding prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, who declared Israel’s independence as the head of a provisional government May 14, 1948, announces his resignation and his plan to retire to Kibbutz Sde Boker…
Ben-Gurion’s trip, the first visit by an Israeli Prime Minister to the US, includes a tour of hydroelectric and water projects in Tennessee and Alabama.
March 8, 1949 David Ben-Gurion’s Knesset-leading Mapai party joins the United Religious Front, the Progressive Party, the Sephardi and Mizrahi Communities, and the Arab-led Democratic List of Nazareth to form a government after Israel’s first…
Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion summons dozens of Palmach commanders for a conference. There he announces a plan to dismantle the elite, underground fighting unit and integrate it into the newly established Israel Defense Forces.
On Friday afternoon in the Tel Aviv Museum, David Ben-Gurion, chairman of the Provisional State Council, declares Israel’s independence. The United States is the first country to recognize the new and already besieged state of Israel.
Ariel Sharon, Israel’s 11th Prime Minister, is born in K’far Malal (near Hod Hasharon). Born Ariel Scheinerman to political, socialist parents who had come to Eretz Yisrael during the Second Aliyah, Sharon joined the Haganah in 1945, serving in the War of Independence.
The only politician in Israeli history to hold the positions of both President and Prime Minister, Shimon Peres is born in Belorussia to Yitzchak and Sara Perski.
Yitzhak Rabin, Israel’s 5th Prime Minister, is born in Jerusalem to parents who came to Israel during the Third Aliyah. He is the first Israeli Prime Minister to be born in Eretz Yisrael.
Moshe Sharett is born as Moshe Shertok in Kherson, Ukraine. Sharett’s parents were early Zionists, having been involved in the BILU movement in the early 1880’s.
