February 24 in History

Huneric, Hunneric or Honeric (died December 23, 484 AD) was king of the Vandals and Alans and the second king of the North African Vandal Kingdom, ruling from 477–484 AD, and the oldest son of his predecessor Gaiseric. He abandoned the imperial politics of his father and concentrated mainly on internal affairs. He was married to Eudocia, daughter of western Roman Emperor Valentinian III (ruled 425–455 AD) and his wife Licinia Eudoxia. The couple had one child, the future king Hilderic. Huneric was the first Vandal king to use the title King of the Vandals and Alans (Latin: Regnum Vandalorum et Alanorum). Despite adopting this title and the Vandals maintaining their sea-power and their hold on the islands of the western Mediterranean, Huneric did not have the prestige that his father Gaiseric had enjoyed with other states.

The Battle of Roslin on 24 February 1303 was a Scottish victory in the First War of Scottish Independence. It took place near the village of Roslin, where a force led by the Scots John Comyn and Sir Simon Fraser ambushed and defeated an English reconnaissance party under Lord John Segrave.

Charles III, also called Charles the Small or Charles of Durazzo (1345 – 24 February 1386), was king of Naples from 1382 to 1386 and also king of Hungary from 1385 to 1386 as Charles II. In 1381, Charles created the chivalric Order of the Ship. In 1383, he succeeded to the Principality of Achaea on the death of James of Baux.

The House of Habsburg, also known as the House of Austria, was one of the most powerful dynasties in the history of Western civilization. They were best known for ruling vast realms throughout Europe and the Americas during the Middle Ages and early modern period, including the Holy Roman Empire, the Habsburg monarchy and Spain.

Ferdinand I (10 March 1503 – 25 July 1564) was Holy Roman Emperor from 1556, King of Bohemia, Hungary, and Croatia from 1526, and Archduke of Austria from 1521 until his death in 1564. Before his accession as emperor, he ruled the Austrian hereditary lands of the House of Habsburg in the name of his elder brother, Emperor Charles V, and often served as Charles' representative in developing encouraging relationships with German princes. In addition, Ferdinand also developed valuable relationships with the German banking house of Jakob Fugger and the Castillan bank of Palenzuela's Vienveniste Ha Levi Ha Kahana family. The key events during Ferdinand's reign were the conflict with the Ottoman Empire, which in the 1520s began a great advance into Central Europe, and the Protestant Reformation, which resulted in several wars of religion. Although not a military leader, Ferdinand was a capable organiser with institutional imagination, who focused on building a centralised government for Austria, Hungary, and Bohemia instead of striving for a universal monarchy. He reintroduced major innovations of his grandfather Maximilian I such as the Hofrat (court council) with a chancellery and a treasury attached to it (this time, the structure would last until the reform of Maria Theresa) and added innovations of his own such as the Raitkammer (collections office) and the Hofkriegsrat, conceived to counter the threat from the Ottoman Empire, while also successfully subduing the most radical of his rebellious Austrian subjects and turning the political class in Bohemia and Hungary into Habsburg partners. While he was able to introduce uniform models of administration, the governments of Austria, Bohemia, and Hungary remained distinct. His approach to Imperial problems, including governance, human relations and religious matters, was generally flexible, moderate and tolerant. Ferdinand's motto was Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus: "Let justice be done, though the world perish".

A papal bull is a type of public decree, letters patent, or charter issued by the pope of the Catholic Church. It is named after the leaden seal (bulla) traditionally appended to authenticate it.

The Cudgel War was a 1596–1597 peasant uprising in Finland, which was then part of the Kingdom of Sweden. The name of the uprising derives from the fact that the peasants armed themselves with various blunt weapons, such as cudgels, flails, and maces, since they were seen as the most efficient weapons against their heavily armoured enemies. The yeomen also had swords, some firearms, and two cannons at their disposal. Their opponents, the troops of Clas Eriksson Fleming, were professional, heavily armed and armoured men-at-arms.

L'Orfeo (SV 318) (Italian pronunciation: [lorˈfɛːo]), or La favola d'Orfeo [la ˈfaːvola dorˈfɛːo], is a late Renaissance/early Baroque favola in musica, or opera, by Claudio Monteverdi, with a libretto by Alessandro Striggio. It is based on the Greek legend of Orpheus, and tells the story of his descent to Hades and his fruitless attempt to bring his dead bride Eurydice back to the living world. It was written in 1607 for a court performance during the annual Carnival at Mantua. While Jacopo Peri's Dafne is generally recognised as the first work in the opera genre, and the earliest surviving opera is Peri's Euridice, L'Orfeo is the earliest that is still regularly performed. By the early 17th century the traditional intermedio—a musical sequence between the acts of a straight play—was evolving into the form of a complete musical drama or "opera". Monteverdi's L'Orfeo moved this process out of its experimental era and provided the first fully developed example of the new genre. After its initial performance the work was staged again in Mantua, and possibly in other Italian centres in the next few years. Its score was published by Monteverdi in 1609 and again in 1615. After the composer's death in 1643 the opera went unperformed for many years, and was largely forgotten until a revival of interest in the late 19th century led to a spate of modern editions and performances. At first these performances tended to be concert (unstaged) versions within institutes and music societies, but following the first modern dramatised performance in Paris, in 1911, the work began to be seen in theatres. After the Second World War many recordings were issued, and the opera was increasingly staged in opera houses, although some leading venues resisted it. In 2007, the quatercentenary of the premiere was celebrated by performances throughout the world. In his published score Monteverdi lists around 41 instruments to be deployed, with distinct groups of instruments used to depict particular scenes and characters. Thus strings, harpsichords, and recorders represent the pastoral fields of Thrace with their nymphs and shepherds, while heavy brass illustrates the underworld and its denizens. Composed at the point of transition from the Renaissance era to the Baroque, L'Orfeo employs all the resources then known within the art of music, with particularly daring use of polyphony. The work is not orchestrated as such; in the Renaissance tradition instrumentalists followed the composer's general instructions but were given considerable freedom to improvise.

Rinaldo (HWV 7) is an opera by George Frideric Handel, composed in 1711, and was the first Italian-language opera written specifically for the London stage. The libretto was prepared by Giacomo Rossi from a scenario provided by Aaron Hill, and the work was first performed at the Queen's Theatre in London's Haymarket on 24 February 1711. The story of love, war and redemption, set at the time of the First Crusade, is loosely based on Torquato Tasso's epic poem Gerusalemme liberata ("Jerusalem Delivered"), and its staging involved many original and vivid effects. It was a great success with the public, despite negative reactions from literary critics hostile to the contemporary trend towards Italian entertainment in English theatres. Handel composed Rinaldo quickly, borrowing and adapting music from operas and other works that he had composed during a long stay in Italy in the years 1706–10, during which he established a considerable reputation. In the years following the premiere, he made numerous amendments to the score. Rinaldo is regarded by critics as one of Handel's greatest operas. Of its individual numbers, the soprano aria "Lascia ch'io pianga" has become a particular favourite, and is a popular concert piece. Handel went on to dominate opera in England for several decades. Rinaldo was revived in London regularly up to 1717, and in a revised version in 1731; of all Handel's operas, Rinaldo was the most frequently performed during his lifetime. After 1731, however, the opera was not staged for more than 200 years. Renewed interest in baroque opera during the 20th century led to the first modern professional production in Handel's birthplace, Halle, Germany, in 1954. The opera was mounted sporadically over the following thirty years; after a successful run at New York's Metropolitan Opera in 1984, performances and recordings of the work have become more frequent worldwide. Rinaldo was the first Handel opera to have found its way to the Metropolitan. The opera's tercentenary in 2011 brought a modernized production at the Glyndebourne Festival.

The Battle of Karnal (Persian: نبرد کرنال) (24 February 1739) was a decisive victory for Nader Shah, the founder of the Afsharid dynasty of Iran, during his invasion of India. Nader's forces defeated the army of Mughal emperor Muhammad Shah within three hours, paving the way for the Iranian sack of Delhi. The engagement is considered the crowning jewel in Nader's military career as well as a tactical masterpiece. The battle took place near Karnal in Haryana, 110 kilometres (68 mi) north of Delhi, India. As a result of the overwhelming defeat of the Mughal Empire at Karnal, the already-declining Mughal dynasty was critically weakened to such an extent as to hasten its demise. According to Axworthy, it is also possible that without the ruinous effects of Nader's invasion of India, European colonial takeover of the Indian subcontinent would have come in a different form or perhaps not at all.

The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, commonly known as Drury Lane, is a West End theatre and Grade I listed building in Covent Garden, London, England. The building faces Catherine Street and backs onto Drury Lane. The present building, opened in 1812, is the most recent of four theatres that have stood at the location since 1663, making it the oldest theatre site in London still in use. According to the author Peter Thomson, for its first two centuries, Drury Lane could "reasonably have claimed to be London's leading theatre". For most of that time, it was one of a handful of patent London theatres, granted monopoly rights to the production of "legitimate" drama.

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was established by the Acts of Union in 1801 that united the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Ireland into one unitary and sovereign state. It continued in this form until 1922, after the Irish Free State gained independence, with the remainder continuing as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

The sinking of HMS Peacock was a naval action fought off the mouth of the Demerara River, Guyana on 24 February 1813, between the sloop of war USS Hornet and the Cruizer-class brig-sloop HMS Peacock. After an exchange of broadsides, Hornet was able to rake Peacock, forcing her to strike. Peacock was so badly damaged that she sank shortly after surrendering.

The Mexican War of Independence (Spanish: Guerra de Independencia de México, 16 September 1810 – 27 September 1821) was an armed conflict and political process resulting in Mexico's independence from the Spanish Empire. It was not a single, coherent event, but local and regional struggles that occurred within the same period, and can be considered a revolutionary civil war. It culminated with the drafting of the Declaration of Independence of the Mexican Empire in Mexico City on September 28, 1821, following the collapse of royal government and the military triumph of forces for independence. Mexican independence from Spain was not an inevitable outcome of the relationship between the Spanish Empire and its most valuable overseas possession, but events in Spain had a direct impact on the outbreak of the armed insurgency in 1810 and the course of warfare through the end of the conflict. Napoleon Bonaparte's invasion of Spain in 1808 touched off a crisis of legitimacy of crown rule, since he had placed his brother Joseph on the Spanish throne after forcing the abdication of the Spanish monarch Charles IV. In Spain and many of its overseas possessions, the local response was to set up juntas, ruling in the name of the Bourbon monarchy. Delegates in Spain and overseas territories met in Cádiz—a small corner of the Iberian Peninsula still under Spanish control—as the Cortes of Cádiz, and drafted the Spanish Constitution of 1812. That constitution sought to create a new governing framework in the absence of the legitimate Spanish monarch. It tried to accommodate the aspirations of American-born Spaniards (criollos) for more local control and equal standing with Peninsular-born Spaniards, known locally as peninsulares. This political process had far-reaching impacts in New Spain during the independence war and beyond. Pre-existing cultural, religious, and racial divides in Mexico played a major role in not only the development of the independence movement but also the development of the conflict as it progressed. The conflict had several phases. The first uprising for independence was led by parish priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, who issued the Cry of Dolores on 16 September 1810. The revolt was massive and not well organized. Hidalgo was captured by royalist forces, defrocked from the priesthood, and executed in July 1811. The second phase of the insurgency was led by Father José María Morelos, who was captured by royalist forces and executed in 1815. The insurgency devolved into guerrilla warfare, with Vicente Guerrero emerging as a leader. Neither royalists nor insurgents gained the upper hand, with military stalemate continuing until 1821, when former royalist commander Agustín de Iturbide made an alliance with Guerrero under the Plan of Iguala in 1821. They formed a unified military force rapidly bringing about the collapse of royal government and the establishment of independent Mexico. The unexpected turn of events in Mexico was prompted by events in Spain. When Spanish liberals overthrew the autocratic rule of Ferdinand VII in 1820, conservatives in New Spain saw political independence as a way to maintain their position. The unified military force entered Mexico City in triumph in September 1821 and the Spanish viceroy Juan O'Donojú signed the Treaty of Córdoba, ending Spanish rule. Indigenous resistance in Mexico predates the War of Independence, including the 1761 Peasant Revolt in Puebla in response to colonial policies. Though suppressed, these movements sustained opposition traditions. Besides, Afro-Mexicans like Vicente Guerrero and José María Morelos also played crucial roles in Mexico's independence movement in the early 19th century. Following independence, the mainland of New Spain was organized as the First Mexican Empire, led by Agustín de Iturbide. This ephemeral constitutional monarchy was overthrown and a federal republic was declared in 1823 and codified in the Constitution of 1824. After some Spanish reconquest attempts, including the expedition of Isidro Barradas in 1829, Spain under the rule of Isabella II recognized the independence of Mexico in 1836.

The Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek was a treaty which was signed on September 27, 1830, and proclaimed on February 24, 1831, between the Choctaw American Indian tribe and the United States government. This treaty was the first removal treaty which was carried into effect under the Indian Removal Act. The treaty ceded about 11 million acres (45,000 km2) of the Choctaw Nation primarily in the state of Mississippi, which had been admitted to the Union in 1817, in exchange for about 15 million acres (61,000 km2) in the Indian Territory, in a territory, which became the state of Oklahoma. The principal Choctaw negotiators were Chief Greenwood LeFlore, Mosholatubbee, and Nittucachee; the U.S. negotiators were Colonel John Coffee and Secretary of War John Eaton. The site of the signing of this treaty is in the southwest corner of Noxubee County; the site was known to the Choctaw as Bok Chukfi Ahilha (creek "bok" rabbit "chukfi" place to dance "a+hilha" or Dancing Rabbit Creek). The Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek was the last major land cession treaty which was signed by the Choctaw. With ratification by the U.S. Congress in 1831, the treaty allowed those Choctaw who chose to remain in Mississippi to become the first major non-European ethnic group to gain recognition as U.S. citizens.

France was ruled by monarchs from the establishment of the kingdom of West Francia in 843 until the end of the Second French Empire in 1870, with several interruptions.

The Penny Red was a British postage stamp, issued in 1841. It succeeded the Penny Black and continued as the main type of postage stamp in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until 1879, with only minor changes to the design during that time. The colour was changed from black to red because of difficulty in seeing a cancellation mark on the Penny Black; a black cancellation mark was readily visible on a Penny Red.

Arizona is a landlocked state in the Southwestern United States, sharing the Four Corners region with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the northwest and California to the west, and shares an international border with the Mexican states of Sonora and Baja California to the south and southwest. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix, which is the most populous state capital and fifth-most populous city in the United States. Arizona is divided into 15 counties.

Andrew Johnson (December 29, 1808 – July 31, 1875) was the 17th president of the United States, serving from 1865 to 1869. The 16th vice president, he assumed the presidency following the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Johnson was a War Democrat who ran with Lincoln on the National Union Party ticket in the 1864 presidential election, coming to office as the American Civil War concluded. Johnson favored quick restoration of the seceded states to the Union without protection for the newly freed people who were formerly enslaved, as well as pardoning ex-Confederates. This led to conflict with the Republican Party-dominated U.S. Congress, culminating in his impeachment by the House of Representatives in 1868. He was acquitted in the Senate by one vote. Johnson was born into poverty and never attended school. He was apprenticed as a tailor and worked in several frontier towns before settling in Greeneville, Tennessee, serving as an alderman and mayor before being elected to the Tennessee House of Representatives in 1835. After briefly serving in the Tennessee Senate, Johnson was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1843, where he served five two-year terms. He was the governor of Tennessee for four years, and was elected by the legislature to the U.S. Senate in 1857. During his congressional service, he sought passage of the Homestead Bill, which was enacted soon after he left his Senate seat. In February 1861, Slave states in the Southern U.S., including Tennessee, seceded to form the Confederate States of America, but Johnson remained firmly with the Union. He was the only senator from a Confederate state who did not promptly resign his seat upon learning of his state's secession. In 1862, Lincoln appointed him as Military Governor of Tennessee after most of it had been retaken. Johnson was a logical choice as Lincoln's running mate in 1864 because Lincoln wanted to send a message of national unity in his re-election campaign. Following their victory, Johnson became vice president. Johnson implemented his own form of Presidential Reconstruction, a series of proclamations directing the seceded states to hold conventions and elections to reform their civil governments. Southern states returned many of their old leaders and passed Black Codes to deprive the freedmen of many civil liberties, but Congressional Republicans refused to seat legislators from those states and advanced legislation to overrule the Southern actions. Johnson vetoed their bills, and Congressional Republicans overrode him, setting a pattern for the remainder of his presidency. Johnson opposed the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which gave citizenship to former slaves. In 1866, he went on an unprecedented national tour promoting his executive policies, seeking to break Republican opposition. As the conflict grew between the branches of government, Congress passed the Tenure of Office Act (1867), restricting Johnson's ability to fire Cabinet officials. He persisted in trying to dismiss the Secretary of War, Edwin Stanton, but ended up being impeached by the House of Representatives and narrowly avoided conviction in the Senate. He did not win the 1868 Democratic presidential nomination and left office the following year. Johnson returned to Tennessee after his presidency and gained some vindication when he was elected to the Senate in 1875, making him the only former president to serve in the Senate. He died five months into his term. Johnson's strong opposition to federally guaranteed rights for African Americans is widely criticized, and historians have consistently ranked him as one of the worst U.S. presidents.

SS Gothenburg was an iron-hulled sail- and steamship that was built in England in 1854 and sailed between England and Sweden until 1862. She then moved to Australia, where she operated across the Tasman Sea to and from New Zealand until 1873, when she was rebuilt. After her rebuild, she operated in the Australian coastal trade. In February 1875 Gothenburg was wrecked in a storm on the Great Barrier Reef off the north coast of Queensland. Twenty-two people survived in three lifeboats. Between 98 and 112 people were killed, including a number of civil servants and dignitaries.

Peer Gynt is a five-act play in verse written in 1867 by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen. It is one of Ibsen's best known and most widely performed plays.

The Qing dynasty, officially the Great Qing, also known as the Qing Empire or Qing China, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia which existed from 1636/1644 to 1912. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the Ming dynasty and succeeded by the Republic of China. At the height of its power, the empire stretched from the Sea of Japan in the east to the Pamir Mountains in the west, and from the Mongolian Plateau in the north to the South China Sea in the south. Originally emerging from the Later Jin dynasty founded in 1616 and proclaimed in Shenyang in 1636, the dynasty seized control of the Ming capital Beijing and North China in 1644, traditionally considered the start of the dynasty's rule. The dynasty lasted until the Xinhai Revolution of October 1911 led to the abdication of the last emperor in February 1912. The multi-ethnic Qing dynasty assembled the territorial base for modern China. The Qing controlled the most territory of any dynasty in Chinese history, and in 1790 was the fourth-largest empire in world history to that point. It was also the most populous state at the time, with over 426 million citizens in 1907.

In political science, a revolution is a rapid, fundamental transformation of a society's class, state, ethnic, or religious structures. According to the sociologist Jack Goldstone, all revolutions contain "a common set of elements at their core: (a) efforts to change the political regime that draw on a competing vision of a just order, (b) a notable degree of informal or formal mass mobilization, and (c) efforts to force change through noninstitutionalized actions such as mass demonstrations, protests, strikes, or violence."

The Governor-General of Chōsen was the chief administrator of the Government-General of Chōsen, a part of an administrative organ established by the Imperial government of Japan. The position existed from 1910 to 1945.

World War I, or the First World War, also known as the Great War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Central Powers. One of the deadliest conflicts in history, World War I resulted in an estimated 15 to 22 million deaths, including those in war crimes and genocides. The war also helped spread the Spanish flu pandemic. The conflict saw important developments in weaponry, including the first large-scale use of machine guns, artillery, aircraft, chemical weapons, and tanks.

The Estonian Declaration of Independence, also known as the Manifesto to the Peoples of Estonia (Estonian: Manifest Eestimaa rahvastele), is the founding act which established the independent democratic Republic of Estonia on 24 February 1918. Since then, 24 February has been celebrated as Estonian Independence Day, the national day of Estonia.

Nancy Witcher Langhorne Astor, Viscountess Astor was an American-born British politician who was the first woman seated as a Member of Parliament (MP), serving from 1919 to 1945. Astor was born in Danville, Virginia, and raised in Greenwood, Virginia. Her first marriage, to socialite Robert Gould Shaw II, was unhappy and ended in divorce. She then moved to England and married American-born Englishman Waldorf Astor in 1906.

The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party, was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor, the German Workers' Party, existed from 1919 to 1920. The Nazi Party emerged from the extremist German nationalist, racist, and populist Freikorps paramilitary culture, which fought against communist uprisings in post–World War I Germany. The party was created to draw workers away from communism and into völkisch nationalism. Hitler stated while on trial for his role in the Beer Hall Putsch in February 1924 that "I have resolved to be the destroyer of Marxism", a statement which he later applied to those opposed to the Nazi Party in 1926, claiming "They tried to paralyze the one party that would have been able to give opposition to this Red pest." Initially, Nazi political strategy used socialist rhetoric to gain the support of the lower middle class whilst maintaining other views; that was later downplayed to gain the support of business leaders. By the 1930s, the antisemitic and anti-Marxist themes of the party became even further emphasized. The party had little popular support until the Great Depression, when worsening living standards and widespread unemployment drove Germans into political extremism.

The history of the Jews in Romania concerns the Jews both of Romania and of Romanian origins, from their first mention on what is present-day Romanian territory. Minimal until the 18th century, the size of the Jewish population increased after around 1850, and more especially after the establishment of Greater Romania in the aftermath of World War I. A diverse community, albeit an overwhelmingly urban one, Jews were a target of religious persecution and racism in Romanian society from the late-19th century debate over the "Jewish Question" and the Jewish residents' right to citizenship, leading to the genocide carried out in the lands of Romania as part of the Holocaust. The latter, coupled with successive waves of emigration, including aliyah to Israel, has accounted for a dramatic decrease in the overall size of Romania's present-day Jewish community.

Voice of America is an international broadcaster, funded by the United States federal government and established in 1942. It is the largest and oldest of the US's existing international broadcasters, producing digital, TV, and radio content in 48 languages for affiliate stations around the world. Its targeted and primary audience is non-Americans outside the American borders, especially those living in countries without press freedom or independent journalism. Since 2025, State Media Monitor has classified the United States Agency for Global Media (USAGM) and its outlets, including VOA, Radio Free Asia, and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, as state-controlled media, describing the agency as operating "under direct White House political direction".

The Battle of Los Angeles, also known as the Great Los Angeles Air Raid, is the name given by contemporary sources to a rumored attack on the continental United States by Imperial Japan and the subsequent anti-aircraft artillery barrage which took place from late February 24, to early February 25, 1942, over Los Angeles, California. Five civilians died during the barrage and four Japanese aircraft were erroneously reported shot down. The incident occurred less than three months after the U.S. entered World War II in response to the Imperial Japanese Navy's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, and one day after the bombardment of Ellwood near Santa Barbara on 23 February. Initially, the target of the aerial barrage was thought to be an attacking force from Japan, but speaking at a press conference shortly afterward, Secretary of the Navy Frank Knox called the purported attack a "false alarm". Newspapers of the time published a number of reports and speculations of a cover-up to conceal an actual invasion by enemy airplanes.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated, with many engaging in total war on an unprecedented scale. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, causing the deaths of 60 to 75 million people, a majority of whom were civilians. Millions died as a result of massacres, starvation, disease, and genocides including the Holocaust. After the Allied victory, Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea were occupied, and German and Japanese leaders were tried for war crimes.

Egypt, officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Palestine and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan and the Sahara to the south, and Libya to the west. The Gulf of Aqaba in the northeast separates Egypt from Jordan and Saudi Arabia. Cairo is the capital, largest city, and leading cultural centre, while Alexandria is the second-largest city and an important hub of industry and tourism. With over 107 million inhabitants, Egypt is the most populous country in the Arab world, third-most populous country in Africa, and 15th-most populated in the world.

Juan Domingo Perón was an Argentine military officer and politician who was the 29th and 40th president of Argentina, serving from 1946 to his overthrow in 1955, and from 1973 until his death in 1974. He was the only Argentine president elected three times and holds the highest percentage of votes in clean elections. Perón was one of the most important, and controversial, Argentine politicians of the 20th century; his influence extends to today. Perón's ideas, policies and movement are known as Peronism, which continues to be a force in Argentine politics.

The 1949 Armistice Agreements were signed between Israel and Egypt, Lebanon, Transjordan, and Syria. They formally ended the hostilities of the 1948 Palestine War and also demarcated the Green Line, which separated Arab-controlled territory from Israel until the latter's victory in the 1967 Six-Day War.

The 1966 Ghanaian coup d'état was a military overthrow of President Kwame Nkrumah on February 24, 1966, while he was visiting China. The swift coup led to the establishment of an eight-member National Liberation Council (NLC), comprising four army and four police officers. The NLC dissolved Nkrumah's Convention People's Party and the Parliament, and suspended the constitution.

The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong, chairman of the Chinese Communist Party, in 1966 and lasted until his death in 1976. Its stated goal was to advance Chinese communism by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society and government.

The Vietnam War was an armed conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia fought between North Vietnam and South Vietnam and their allies. North Vietnam was supported by the Soviet Union and China, while South Vietnam was supported by the United States and other anti-communist nations. The conflict was the second of the Indochina wars and a proxy war of the Cold War. The Vietnam War was one of the postcolonial wars of national liberation, a theater in the Cold War, and a civil war, with civil warfare a defining feature from the outset. Direct US military involvement escalated from 1965 until US forces were withdrawn in 1973. The fighting spilled into the Laotian and Cambodian civil wars, which ended with all three countries becoming communist in 1975.

The All India Forward Bloc (AIFB) is a left-wing nationalist political party in India. It emerged as a faction within the Indian National Congress in 1939, led by Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, and was strongest in West Bengal. The party re-established as an independent political party after the independence of India. During the 1951–1952 and 1957 Indian general election, the party was known as Forward Bloc. The party's current Secretary-General is G. Devarajan. Veteran Indian politicians Sarat Chandra Bose and Chitta Basu had been the stalwarts of the party in independent India.

Even before attaining its independence from Spain, Cuba had several constitutions either proposed or adopted by insurgents as governing documents for territory they controlled during their war against Spain. Cuba has had several constitutions since winning its independence. The first constitution since the Cuban Revolution was drafted in 1976 and has since been amended. In 2018, Cuba became engaged in a major revision of its constitution. The current communist state constitution was then enacted in 2019.

The Yuba County Five were young men from Yuba County, California, United States, each with mild intellectual disabilities or psychiatric conditions, who were reported missing after attending a college basketball game at California State University, Chico, on the night of February 24, 1978. Four of them—Bill Sterling, 29; Jack Huett, 24; Ted Weiher, 32; and Jack Madruga, 30—were later found dead; the fifth, Gary Mathias, 25, has never been found.

The United States Congress is the legislative branch of the federal government of the United States. It is a bicameral legislature, including a lower body, the U.S. House of Representatives, and an upper body, the U.S. Senate. They both meet in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C.

United Airlines Flight 811 was a regularly scheduled international flight from Los Angeles to Sydney, with intermediate stops at Honolulu and Auckland. On February 24, 1989, the Boeing 747 serving the flight experienced a cargo-door failure in flight shortly after leaving Honolulu. The resulting explosive decompression blew out several rows of seats, killing nine passengers. The aircraft returned to Honolulu and landed without further incident.

The Gulf War was an armed conflict between Iraq and a 42-country coalition led by the United States in response to Saddam Hussein invading neighboring Kuwait on 2 August 1990. The coalition's efforts were in two phases: Operation Desert Shield, which marked the military buildup from August 1990 to January 1991; and Operation Desert Storm, from the bombing campaign against Iraq on 17 January until the American-led liberation of Kuwait on 28 February.

Miami is a coastal city in the southeast portion of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the second-most populous city proper in Florida, with a population of 442,241 at the 2020 census. The Miami metropolitan area in South Florida has an estimated 6.39 million residents, ranking as the fifth-largest metropolitan area in the Southeast and eighth-largest metropolitan area in the United States. Miami has the third-largest skyline in the U.S. with over 300 high-rises, 70 of which exceed 492 ft (150 m). It is the county seat of Miami-Dade County.

China Southwest Airlines Flight 4509 (SZ4509) was a domestic flight in China from Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport, Sichuan to Wenzhou Yongqiang Airport, Zhejiang. On February 24, 1999, the Tupolev Tu-154M operating the flight crashed while on approach to Wenzhou Airport, killing all 61 passengers and crew members on board.

Pope John Paul II was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City from 16 October 1978 until his death in 2005. He was the first non-Italian pope since Adrian VI in the 16th century, as well as the third longest-serving pope in history, after St. Peter and Pius IX. In addition to this, he was an important philosopher and theologian of the 20th century.

President of the Philippines is the title of the head of state, head of government and chief executive of the Philippines. The president leads the executive branch of the Philippine government and is the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines.

A reconnaissance satellite or intelligence satellite is an Earth observation satellite or communications satellite deployed for military or intelligence applications.

Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was a Cuban communist revolutionary and politician who was the leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2011. He served as prime minister from 1959 to 1976, president from 1976 to 2008, and first secretary of the Communist Party of Cuba from 1965 until 2011. Ideologically a Marxist–Leninist and Cuban nationalist, under his administration Cuba became a one-party communist state; industry and business were nationalized, and socialist reforms were implemented throughout society.

Space Shuttle Discovery is a retired American Space Shuttle orbiter. The spaceplane was one of the orbiters from NASA's Space Shuttle program and the third of five fully operational orbiters to be built. Its first mission, STS-41-D, flew from August 30 to September 5, 1984. Over 27 years of service it launched and landed 39 times, aggregating more spaceflights than any other spacecraft as of December 2024. The Space Shuttle launch vehicle had three main components: the Space Shuttle orbiter, a single-use central fuel tank, and two reusable solid rocket boosters. Nearly 25,000 heat-resistant tiles cover the orbiter to protect it from high temperatures on re-entry.

Metrolink is a commuter rail system in Southern California, serving Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and Ventura counties. The system consists of eight lines and 68 stations operating on 545.6 miles (878.1 km) of track. This includes Arrow, which Metrolink operates under a contract with the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority (SBCTA).

Tara Air Flight 193 was a scheduled domestic passenger flight from Pokhara to Jomsom, Nepal. On 24 February 2016, eight minutes after take-off, the aircraft serving the flight, a Viking Air DHC-6-400 Twin Otter went missing with 23 people on board. Hours later, the wreckage was found near the village of Dana, Myagdi District. There were no survivors. It was Tara Air's deadliest accident.

Mahathir bin Mohamad is a Malaysian politician, physician and author who served as the fourth and seventh prime minister of Malaysia from 1981 to 2003 and again from 2018 to 2020. He was the country's longest-serving prime minister, serving for a cumulative total of 24 years. His political career has spanned more than 75 years, from joining protests opposing citizenship policies for non-Malays in the Malayan Union in the 1940s to forming the Gerakan Tanah Air coalition in 2022. During his premiership, Mahathir was granted the title "Father of Modernisation" for his pivotal role in transforming the country's economy and infrastructure. At 101 years old, he is the second-oldest living former state leader in the world and the first Malaysian prime minister to reach that age.

The Russo-Ukrainian war began in February 2014 and is ongoing. Following Ukraine's Revolution of Dignity, Russia occupied Crimea and annexed it from Ukraine. It then supported Russian separatist armed groups who started a war in the eastern Donbas region against Ukraine's military. In 2018, Ukraine declared the region to be occupied by Russia. The first eight years of conflict also involved naval incidents and cyberwarfare. In February 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine and began occupying more of the country, starting the current phase of the war, the largest conflict in Europe since World War II. The war has resulted in a refugee crisis and hundreds of thousands of deaths.