On this day, 22 July 1946, the Zionist Irgun militia bombed the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, killing 91 people and wounding 46.
At the time, two thirds of the hotel was occupied by the headquarters of the British colonial administration of Palestine. The plan for the bombing was devised by Irgun leader Menachem Begin, who later became Prime Minister of Israel, and with the collaboration of the Haganah militia.
A warning was phoned in a few minutes beforehand, but not in time to evacuate the building. The Haganah had vetoed two previous plans, and was concerned that given enough time, the British could remove files Zionists believed they held at the building, which they intended to destroy. It turned out, however, that the files were never there.
Irgun and its successor political party, Herut, were described by prominent Jewish thinkers like Albert Einstein and Hannah Arendt as "terrorist, right-wing, chauvinist", "closely akin… to the Nazi and Fascist parties".
Irgun and Haganah later transformed into the bulk of the Israeli military, the IDF. Herut was succeeded by Likud, the party which has led governments in Israel many times since 1977.
Learn more about Palestinian history under British colonial rule in our podcast episodes 86-87: https://workingclasshistory.com/podcast/e86-87-class-struggle-in-palestine/
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