Events on July 22 in history

King David Hotel bombing: A Zionist underground organisation, the Irgun, bombs the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, site of the civil administration and military headquarters for Mandatory Palestine, resulting in 91 deaths.

The King David Hotel bombing was a terrorist attack carried out on Monday, July 22, 1946, by the militant right-wing Zionist underground organization the Irgun on the British administrative headquarters for Mandatory Palestine, which was housed in the southern wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem during the Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine. 91 people of various nationalities were killed, and 46 were injured.The hotel was the site of the central offices of the British Mandatory authorities of Palestine, principally the Secretariat of the Government of Palestine and the Headquarters of the British Armed Forces in Palestine and Transjordan. When planned, the attack had the approval of the Haganah, the principal Jewish paramilitary group in Palestine, though, unbeknownst to the Irgun, this had been cancelled by the time the operation was carried out. It was conceived as part of a response to Operation Agatha (a series of widespread raids, including one on the Jewish Agency, conducted by the British authorities) and was the deadliest directed at the British during the Mandate era (1920–1948).Disguised as Arab workmen and as hotel waiters, members of the Irgun planted a bomb in the basement of the main building of the hotel, whose southern wing housed the Mandate Secretariat and a few offices of the British military headquarters. The resulting explosion caused the collapse of the western half of the southern wing of the hotel. Some of the inflicted deaths and injuries occurred in the road outside the hotel and in adjacent buildings.Controversy has arisen over the timing and adequacy of the warnings. The Irgun stated subsequently that warnings were delivered by telephone; Thurston Clarke states that the first warning was delivered by a 16-year-old recruit to the hotel switchboard 15 minutes before the explosion. The British Government said after the inquest that no warning had been received by anyone at the Secretariat "in an official position with any power to take action."