Explore significant historical events on this day with BBC News.

May 6, 2008 · The State of Israel was proclaimed on 14 May 1948, the culmination of nearly 2,000 years of hopes by Jewish people that they would one day return to the land from which the Romans expelled them. The Holocaust of European Jewry in the Second World War strengthened their determination. The Balfour Declaration by the British government in 1917, enshrined in a League of Nations mandate in 1920 ...

Jul 4, 2008 · The final mystery of 9/11 will soon be solved, according to US experts investigating the collapse of the third tower at the World Trade Center. The 47-storey third tower, known as Tower Seven, collapsed seven hours after the twin towers. Investigators are expected to say ordinary fires on several different floors caused the collapse. Conspiracy theorists have argued that the third tower was ...

Nov 12, 2007 · In the wake of a series of high-profile shootings, an observer might assume that guns are suddenly pouring into the UK for the first time. But gun control is a relatively recent phenomenon in Britain, where ownership of firearms was relatively common a century ago. The contrast between UK legislation on gun ownership - among the strictest in the world, and that in the United States - among the ...

Mar 2, 2006 · Actor Jack Wild, who played The Artful Dodger in 1968 film Oliver!, has died at the age of 53. Wild was nominated for an Oscar when he was just 16 for the role. He also starred in late-1960s US children's fantasy TV series HR Pufnstuf. He suffered from mouth cancer after years of heavy drinking and smoking and had his voice box and tongue removed. Wild's agent Alex Jay said the actor "died ...

Diana, Princess of Wales, has died after a car crash in Paris. She was taken to hospital in the early hours of Sunday morning where surgeons tried for two hours to save her life but she died at 0300 BST. In a statement Buckingham Palace said the Queen and the Prince of Wales were "deeply shocked and distressed". Prince Charles broke the news of their mother's death to Princes William and Harry ...

Sunday, January 31, 1999 Published at 06:07 GMT UK Lockerbie pair 'could have survived' Wreckage: 259 on board and 11 on the ground died New research has suggested that two victims of the Lockerbie airliner bombing could have survived the six-mile fall to earth only to die of exposure later, a newspaper has reported.

Jan 13, 2004 · Harold Shipman, who has died after being found hanging in his prison cell, was a conundrum to police, friends and colleagues.

Apr 11, 2005 · The massacre by Japanese troops of the Chinese population of Nanjing was one of the worst atrocities of modern times.

Mar 16, 2009 · See how your finances would be affected by changes in the property market with our mortgage and equity calculators.