September 13, 1993 — PLO, Israel Sign Oslo Accords
President Bill Clinton holds a White House signing ceremony for the Oslo Accords, a set of agreements between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization, at the conclusion of which Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat famously shake hands. The agreement envisions a five-year process toward Palestinian self-rule and builds on the framework of the 1978 Camp David Accords.
September 14, 2014 — Ex-Justice Abdel Rahman Zuabi Dies
Abdel Rahman Zuabi, a secular Muslim and proud Israeli who was the first Arab to serve on Israel’s Supreme Court, dies at 82. Born in Sulam in 1932, Zuabi was the first Arab to graduate from the Tel Aviv School of Law and Economics, where Moshe Dayan was a classmate. He served as a Nazareth District Court judge for 20 years. In 1999 he was chosen to fill a nine-month vacancy on the Supreme Court.
September 15, 2009 — Goldstone Presents Gaza War Report
Judge Richard Goldstone, a South African Jew who prosecuted 1990s war crimes in Yugoslavia and Rwanda, presents his U.N.-sponsored report on the 2008-09 Gaza conflict. The report criticizes Israel and Hamas for their actions in the fighting. In April 2011 he recants parts of the report that suggest Israel intentionally killed civilians and acknowledges flawed investigative methods, though he does not exonerate Israel.
September 16, 1949 — Israel Joins UNESCO
Israel becomes a member of the Paris-based U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, known for recognizing cultural and historical sites. But Israel withdraws from the agency in 2018 after UNESCO repeatedly accuses Israel of ignoring Muslim and Christian connections to important sites and Israel repeatedly accuses UNESCO of trying to erase the Jewish connection to the Land of Israel.
September 17, 1978 — Egypt, Israel Sign Camp David Accords
Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin sign the Camp David Accords, brokered by President Jimmy Carter. The accords have two parts: an agreement on the future of relations between the two countries and a framework for implementing Palestinian self-rule. The first leads to the peace treaty signed in March 1979, but Palestinian autonomy awaits the 1993 Oslo Accords.
September 18, 1918 — Swimmer Judith Deutsch is Born
Champion swimmer Judith Deutsch is born in Vienna, Austria. She overcomes antisemitism to set every Austrian freestyle record at middle and long distances between 1933 and 1935. She joins fellow Austrian swimmers Ruth Langer and Lucie Goldner in refusing to go to the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. She makes aliyah after she is suspended from competing in Austria, which expunges her records but apologizes in 1995.
September 19, 2014 — Filmmaker Avraham Heffner Dies
Actor and filmmaker Avraham Heffner dies at 79 in Tel Aviv. A native of Haifa, he made his acting debut in 1964’s “Hole in the Moon” and wrote and directed the award-winning 1967 short “Slow Down.” Some scholars consider his “But Where is Daniel Wax?” Israel’s greatest move. As a lecturer at Tel Aviv University, he influenced filmmakers such as Eitan Green, Renen Shor, Ari Folman, Hagai Levi and Dover Kosashvili.
Items are provided by the Center for Israel Education (israeled.org), where you can find more details.