Today In History September 22

September 22 is the 265th day of the year. There are 100 days remaining until the end of the year.

Iranian soldier with gas mask in the battlefield

 Today Highlight In History  1980 – Iraq invades Iran.

The Iran–Iraq War, also known as the First Persian Gulf War, was an armed conflict between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Republic of Iraq lasting from September 1980 to August 1988, making it the 20th century's longest conventional war.

The Iran–Iraq War began when Iraq invaded Iran via air and land on 22 September 1980,after a long history of border disputes. The war was motivated by fears that the Iranian Revolution in 1979 would inspire insurgency among Iraq's long-suppressed Shia majority as well as Iraq's desire to replace Iran as the dominant Persian Gulf state. Although Iraq hoped to take advantage of Iran's revolutionary chaos and attacked without formal warning, they made only limited progress into Iran and were quickly repelled; Iran regained virtually all lost territory by June 1982. For the next six years, Iran was on the offensive.

Despite calls for a ceasefire by the United Nations Security Council, hostilities continued until 20 August 1988. The war finally ended with Resolution 598, a U.N.-brokered ceasefire which was accepted by both sides.

 WORLD EVENTS

1789 – The office of United States Postmaster General is established.

1862 – Slavery in the United States: a preliminary version of the Emancipation Proclamation is released.

1888 – The first issue of National Geographic Magazine is published.

1896 – Queen Victoria surpasses her grandfather King George III as the longest reigning monarch in British history.

1908 – The Bulgarian Declaration of Independence is proclaimed.

1910 – The Duke of York's Picture House opens in Brighton, now the oldest continually operating cinema in Britain.

1919 – The steel strike of 1919, led by the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers, begins in Pennsylvania before spreading across the United States.

1934 – An explosion takes place at Gresford Colliery in Wales, leading to the deaths of 266 miners and rescuers.

1941 – World War II: On Jewish New Year Day, the German SS murder 6,000 Jews in Vinnytsya, Ukraine. Those are the survivors of the previous killings that took place a few days earlier in which about 24,000 Jews were executed.

1955 – In the United Kingdom, the television channel ITV goes live for the first time.

1960 – The Sudanese Republic is renamed Mali after the withdrawal of Senegal from the Mali Federation.

1980 – Iraq invades Iran.

1991 – The Dead Sea Scrolls are made available to the public for the first time by the Huntington Library.

1995 – Nagerkovil school bombing, is carried out by Sri Lankan Air Force in which at least 34 die, most of them ethnic Tamil school children.

2013 – At least 75 people are killed in a suicide bombing at a church in Peshawar, Pakistan.
         

                                          Today In African History

In 1828, the Zulu Chief Shaka, founder of the Zulu empire, was assassinated by his two half-brothers Dingane and Mhlanga

In 1861 Chief Sekhukhune became king of the Marota (or baPedi), stretching across what is now Mpumalanga, Limpopo, and G

In 1952 twenty black leaders were put on trial on charges under the Suppression of Communism Act. The accused included D

In 1968 a report was published by the Commission of the South African Council of Churches, condemning apartheid as a fal

In 1972 Idi Amin gave Uganda's 8 000 Asians 48 hours to leave the country.

2008 President Thabo Mbeki handed in his resignation, singling out the fight against crime as being a big challenge remaining for South Africa.