Today is the 21st anniversary of South Lebanon’s liberation from Israel’s brutal 22-year occupation. The unilateral withdrawal of Israeli forces from South Lebanon marked Israel’s first unconditional defeat in Arab history.
The historic victory over Israel was realized after a persistent armed struggle led by Hizbullah and other Lebanese resistance factions, including the Lebanese Communist Party and Arab nationalist parties.
Throughout the occupation, the Israeli military, along with their Lebanese collaborators— the South Lebanon Army— committed horrendous crimes against the Lebanese people, including the torture and execution of civilians.
These crimes were mostly seen in the Khiam prison—a detention center operated by Israeli-trained Lebanese collaborators. In Khiam, civilians were subjected to all forms of torture, including electrocution and being confined in small metal cages.
The height of the victory over Israel in 2000 was when 144 men, women and children who were imprisoned and tortured in the Khiam prison were liberated by the Lebanese Resistance.
The day is commemorated in Lebanon every year as Resistance and Liberation Day.
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Today in 1963, 32 African countries formed the Organization of African Unity (OAU) to promote decolonization, end white rule, and raise living standards on the continent. While the OAU became the African Union in 2002, May 25 is still known as #AfricaDay.
Today we remember the words of former President of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah, at the OAU inaugural ceremony May 25, 1963. He called attention to the limits of political independence, and argued that a new era of neocolonialism was replacing European colonialism in Africa.
"In independent Africa we are already re-experiencing the instability and frustration which existed under colonial rule. We are fast learning that political independence is not enough to rid us of the consequences of colonial rule."
On this day in 1942, Yugoslav antifascist partisan Stjepan Filipović was hanged by the Nazis in what is now known as Serbia. Filipović, then 26 years old, was a commander in the 1941 Partisan Uprising against the Nazi occupation forces and their collaborators.
May 22 1942, he was captured by the Nazis in Valjevo. While being dragged through the central streets of the city, Filipović shouted: ''Long live the liberators of the people! Down with the fascists and the quisling collaborators! Long live communism!''
Right before he was hanged, with the noose around his neck, Filipović thrusted his hands into the air and shouted: "Smrt fašizmu, sloboda narodu!"
On this day in Indonesian history, the US-backed right-wing dictator Suharto was overthrown by a student-led mass uprising in 1998.
In 1965, CIA-backed General Suharto took power & oversaw the political genocide of up to 2 million Indonesian communists, trade unionists and other leftists, the jailing of 1m more, the banning of Marxism and destroying the largest communist movement outside of the USSR & China.
Fearing a communist revolution, the US, UK and Australia supported Suharto in pushing aside the leftist nationalist Sukarno and establishing a 33-year repressive military dictatorship on the dead bodies of executed communists.
Meet the Night Witches, the communist female fighter pilots who bombed Nazis at night.
The all-female Soviet 588th Night Bomber Regiment, consisting of 80 women, flew over 23,000 missions in combat and dropped 3,000 tons of bombs on Nazi invaders in a span of four years, becoming a crucial asset in winning World War II.
They were seen as one of the greatest threats for Nazi soldiers and they were hated and feared so much that any Nazi airman who downed one was awarded the prestigious Iron Cross medal.
Photos of the Armenian Genocide in color, including photos of a collection smuggled out of Armenia a century ago, showing the horror of what happened 106 years ago today.
Today marks the anniversary of the start of what became known as the Armenian Genocide. The genocide was an attempt at crushing the growing movement for Armenian self-determination and pushing a policy of Turkification.
On the night of April 23-24, between 235 and 270 prominent Armenian intellectuals and leaders were rounded up in today's Istanbul and moved to holding centres across present-day Turkey and Syria. The event became known as Red Sunday.