Gibraltar measures about 2.5-sq. miles (6.5 Sq. km).
26000BC Experts in 2006 reported that charcoal evidence indicated that small bands of Neanderthals took refuge in Gorham's Cave in Gibraltar about this time.
711 Jul 19, The Muslim troops crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and defeated the Visigoth king Rodrigo at the battle of Guadalete. Berbers under Tarik-ibn Ziyad occupied Northern Spain. The Umayyads with the help of the Berbers in North Africa moved across the Strait of Gibraltar and began the conquest of Spain and Portugal. The word Gibraltar comes from the term Jabal-al-Tarik, which means the hill of Tarik. Gebel-al-Tarik means "Rock of Tarik."
(www.sispain.org/english/history/visigoth.html)(ATC, p.79)(SFEC, 9/29/96, Z1 p.2)
711-1309 The Moorish occupation of Gibraltar covered this period, and then again from 1350 to 1462, a total of 710 years.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moorish_Castle)
1350 Mar 27, Alfonso XI of Castile (38) died of the black death while besieging Gibraltar.
(HN, 3/27/99)(PCh, 1992, p.130)
1462 Aug 20, Castilian forces captured Gibraltar (Eighth Siege of Gibraltar).
(SSFC, 5/30/10, p.M4)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Gibraltar)
1704 Aug 4, In the War of Spanish Succession, an Anglo-Dutch fleet captured Gibraltar.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Gibraltar)(AP, 9/19/06)
1713 Apr 11, Spain ceded Gibraltar in perpetuity to Britain under the Treaty of Utrecht.
(WSJ, 11/29/99, p.A29)
1779 Jul 24, The Siege of Gibraltar by the Spanish and French was begun. British Gen. George Eliott led the 5,000 man Gibraltar garrison. The siege was finally lifted on Feb 7, 1783. In 1965 T.H. McGuffie authored "The Siege of Gibraltar, 1779-1783).
(HN, 2/7/99)(ON, 7/01, p.8)
1782 Sep 13, The British fortress at Gibraltar, under siege by French and Spanish forces since 1789, held off a heavy attack of battering ships.
(HN, 9/13/98)(ON, 7/01, p.9)
1783 Feb 7, The Siege of Gibraltar, pursued by the Spanish and the French since July 24, 1779, was finally lifted. [see Sep 13, 1782]
(HN, 2/7/99)(ON, 7/01, p.10)
1828 Feb 18, More than 100 vessels were destroyed in a storm at Gibraltar.
1942 Nov 2, Lt. General Dwight D. Eisenhower arrived in Gibraltar to set up an American command post for the invasion of North Africa.
(HN, 11/2/98)
1943 Jul 4, A Liberator II aircraft carrying Gen. Wladyslaw Sikorski, Poland's prime minister and chief army commander, crashed into the sea just 16 seconds after taking off from Gibraltar. In 2008 Poland began an investigation into the crash.
1954 Gen. Franco closed the Spanish consulate on Gibraltar in a fit of rage over a visit by Queen Elizabeth II.
1967 Sep 10, Gibraltar voted 12,138 to 44 to remain British and not Spanish.
1968 May 6, Spain closed the border to Gibraltar, except to Spaniards.
(MC, 5/6/02)
1969 Mar 20, John Lennon married Yoko Ono in Gibraltar.
1969 Jun 6, Gen. Franco closed the Gibraltar border with Spain. It stayed closed for 16 years. This effectively starved Gibraltar of workers while depriving some 9,000 former workers of much-needed jobs and of a right to claim pensions. The frontier was not fully reopened until 1985.
(http://web.mit.edu/cascon/cases/case_gib.html)(WSJ, 4/8/02, p.A8)(AP, 9/19/06)
1988 Mar 6, British SAS officers killed 3 IRA suspects in Gibraltar.
(http://tinyurl.com/2xbne)
1996 May 17, Conservative Social Democrats were sworn in as the British colony's new government. The new chief minister is Peter Caruana.
(SFC, 5/18/96, p.A-10)
1999 Nov, It was reported that Gibraltar wished to seek status as a self-governing territory under the British crown, but the move was opposed by Spain.
2002 Jul 25, The Spanish government welcomed a British proposal to turn its military base in Gibraltar into a NATO facility, a move that would open it to all alliance members including Spain. Spain and Britain came up with the idea of sharing sovereignty over the Rock. This was rejected resoundingly in a nonbinding referendum in Gibraltar.
2002 Nov 7, Nearly 99 percent of voters on Gibraltar rejected the idea of Britain sharing its colony with Spain in a stinging rebuff to any plans for joint sovereignty.
2002 Gibraltar's 2.5-sq. mile area was home to some 23,000 people.
2004 Apr, Spain's Socialist PM Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero agreed to a three-way format with regards to Gibraltar when he came to power.
2006 Sep 18, Britain and Spain reached a historic deal to resolve side issues stemming from their 300-year-old dispute over Gibraltar, but sidestepped the main one, their claims to the Rock's sovereignty.
2007 Sep 7, The government of Gibraltar called a general election and dissolved the British colony's parliament. Chief Minister Peter Caruana set the elections for Oct. 11.
2008 Apr 17, A renegade group of Gibraltar's Barbary apes has annoyed residents so much that authorities announced plans to kill them.
2009 Jul 21, Spain's foreign minister, Miguel Angel Moratinos, drove across the border to Gibraltar to meet with British foreign secretary, David Miliband, and Gibraltar chief minister, Pater Caruana. This was the first time in over 300 years that a Spanish government minister had visited the British territory.
2009 Dec 12, In South Africa drums and traditional dancers kicked off the Miss World pageant in Johannesburg. The glitzy night began in the shadow of reports that one contestant was linked to a religious cult. Kaiane Aldorino from Gibraltar was named the new Miss World.
2010 Jun 3, The European Commission announced it has sent a final warning to Britain over its failure to comply with EU air quality rules, due to the levels of dangerous airborne particles in London and Gibraltar.
(AFP, 6/3/10)
2010 Aug 21, Laura Dekker, a 14-year-old Dutch sailor, departed in secrecy from Gibraltar on her quest to become the youngest person to sail solo around the world, avoiding the media because her manager said she didn't want the attention.
2011 Nov 15, Europe's top court barred Britain from enacting a corporate tax reform in its tiny territory of Gibraltar, ruling the scheme would amount to illegal state aid for offshore companies.
2013 Jun 15, Britain clinched a deal with its major offshore tax havens on Saturday that will see 10 British overseas territories and crown dependencies sign up to international protocols on information sharing. Those included were Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Gibraltar, Anguilla, Montserrat, Turks and Caicos Islands, Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man.
2013 Aug 16, British PM David Cameron asked European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso to "urgently" send monitors to Gibraltar's border with Spain where tightened security checks are fuelling a row between the two countries.
2013 Aug 18, Spanish fishermen in some 60 fishing boats protested the building of an artificial reef near the disputed British territory of Gibraltar.
2013 Nov 15, The EU executive said it had found no proof of British claims that Spain had violated European Union rules on border and customs checks at Gibraltar's border.
Subject = Gibraltar
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