Reunification of Jerusalem

On the morning of 7 June 1967, the third day of the Six-Day War, paratroopers of the 55th Brigade under Colonel Mordechai (Motta) Gur broke into the Old City of Jerusalem through the Lions' Gate. Gur radioed the words that became famous: "Har HaBayit beyadeinu", "The Temple Mount is in our hands." The soldiers reached the Western Wall, many of them weeping, and the IDF's chief chaplain, Rabbi Shlomo Goren, blew the shofar there and led the prayers. For nineteen years, under Jordanian rule, Jews had been barred from the Wall, and the synagogues of the Jewish Quarter had been destroyed.

Within days the narrow alley before the Wall was opened into the plaza of today, and on Shavuot, a week later, some 200,000 people came to pray there. On 28 June Israel joined the two halves of the city under one municipality. In 1968 the government proclaimed 28 Iyar as Jerusalem Day, and in 1998 the Knesset made it a national holiday, marked with Hallel and the march of flags through the city.