Today in History: June 10, Six-Day War ends
File - This June 10, 1967 file photo shows jubilant Israeli troops in Sinai, Egypt, during the Six-Day War. It may well be remembered as a pyrrhic victory for Israel: a six-day war in which it vanquished several Arab armies, only to be saddled with a 50-year fight with the Palestinians for the Holy Land. A half century after the watershed 1967 Mideast war, many in Israel think the lighting victory planted the seeds of doom. (AP Photo, File)
Today’s Highlight in History:
On June 10, 1967, six days of war in the Mideast involving Israel, Syria, Egypt, Jordan and Iraq ended as Israel and Syria accepted a United Nations-mediated cease-fire.
On this date:
In 1692, the first execution resulting from the Salem witch trials in Massachusetts took place as Bridget Bishop was hanged.
In 1907, eleven men in five cars set out from the French embassy in Beijing on a race to Paris. (Prince Scipione Borghese of Italy was the first to arrive in the French capital two months later.)
In 1935, Alcoholics Anonymous was founded in Akron, Ohio, by Dr. Robert Holbrook Smith and William Griffith Wilson.
In 1963, President John F. Kennedy signed into law the Equal Pay Act of 1963, aimed at eliminating wage disparities based on gender.
In 1971, President Richard M. Nixon lifted a two-decades-old trade embargo on China.
In 1977, James Earl Ray, the convicted assassin of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., escaped from Brushy Mountain State Prison in Tennessee with six others; he was recaptured June 13.
In 1978, Affirmed, ridden by Steve Cauthen, won the 110th Belmont Stakes to claim horse racing’s 11th Triple Crown.
In 1991, 11-year-old Jaycee Dugard of South Lake Tahoe, California, was abducted by Phillip and Nancy Garrido; Jaycee was held by the couple for 18 years before she was found by authorities.
In 2009, James von Brunn, an 88-year-old white supremacist, opened fire in the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., killing security guard Stephen T. Johns. (Von Brunn died at a North Carolina hospital in January 2010 while awaiting trial.) Donald Trump fired Miss California USA Carrie Prejean, who’d sparked controversy when she said gays shouldn’t be allowed to marry.
In 2012, parts of northern Colorado and southern New Mexico battled wildfires that were spreading rapidly through mountainous forest land, forcing hundreds of evacuations. Shanshan Feng won the LPGA Championship to become the first Chinese player to win an LPGA Tour title and a major event, closing with a 5-under 67 for a two-stroke victory at Locust Hill Country Club in Pittsford, New York. The bittersweet “Once” won eight Tony Awards, including best musical; “Clybourne Park” won best play.
In 2013, jury selection began in Sanford, Florida, in the trial of neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, charged with second-degree murder in the fatal shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. (Zimmerman was acquitted.)
In 2016, Muhammad Ali was laid to rest in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, after an all-day send-off. “Mr. Hockey” Gordie Howe, who set scoring records that stood for decades, died in Sylvania, Ohio, at 88.
In 2017, British Prime Minister Theresa May struck a deal in principle with Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party to prop up the Conservative government, which had been stripped of its majority in a disastrous election. Unseeded Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia stunned No. 3 Simona Halep 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the French Open final for the first title of her career.
In 2020, protesters pulled down a century-old statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy. NASCAR announced that it was banning the Confederate flag at all of its races and venues; the flag had been a common sight at those events for more than 70 years.
In 2021, Republican lawmakers voted with majority Democrats in the Oregon House of Representatives to expel a Republican member, Mike Nearman, who had let violent, far-right protesters into the state Capitol in December 2020. The wife of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman pleaded guilty in Washington to charges that she helped her husband run his multibillion-dollar criminal empire. (Emma Coronel Aispuro would be sentenced to three years in prison.)
In 2022, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine entered its fourth month, officials in Kyiv expressed fears that the specter of “war fatigue” could erode the West’s resolve to help the country push back Moscow’s aggression. The Washington Post fired reporter Felicia Sonmez, who triggered a vigorous online debate over social media policy and public treatment of colleagues after she criticized a fellow reporter for retweeting an offensive joke. Britney Spears married her longtime partner Sam Asghari at a Southern California ceremony that came months after the pop superstar won her freedom from a court conservatorship.