November 10 in History

The United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 3379, declaring Zionism a form of racism, in a deeply divisive vote that split the international community along Cold War lines. The resolution was repealed sixteen years later in 1991, but its passage poisoned Arab-Israeli diplomacy for a generation and remains one of the most contested acts in UN history.

Seventy-two countries voted yes. That number stunned diplomats worldwide. The UN General Assembly's Resolution 3379 didn't just criticize Israeli policy — it targeted the foundational ideology of a nation's existence. Ambassador Chaim Herzog refused to accept it quietly. He tore his copy of the resolution apart at the podium. The vote fractured Cold War alliances in new ways, with the Soviet bloc and Arab states aligned against Western democracies. But sixteen years later, in 1991, the UN quietly repealed it — the only resolution in UN history ever rescinded.

Emperor Leo II died after just ten months on the throne, compelling his father Zeno to reclaim sole rule over the Byzantine Empire. This sudden succession stabilized an empire teetering on civil war and allowed Zeno to consolidate power against rival factions threatening Constantinople's fragile peace.

Li Bian seizes power from Emperor Yang Pu, dissolving the Wu State to establish Southern Tang under his new name Xu Zhigao. This usurpation ends a fragile dynasty and launches a regime that will dominate southern China for decades, shifting the balance of power during the chaotic Five Dynasties period.

Catholics besieging Catholics. Pope Innocent III had written directly, threatening to cut every soldier off from the Church — and they did it anyway. The Venetians, led by the blind 90-year-old Doge Enrico Dandolo, needed payment for their fleet. Zara was the price. Five days. The city fell. Innocent fumed, excommunicated them, then quietly lifted the ban because he still needed the army. And that army would go on to sack Constantinople instead of Jerusalem — meaning a pope's ignored letter helped fracture Christianity itself.

A man who'd been hunted, nearly killed, and forced to hide in a jungle village now sat on the throne of what would become Southeast Asia's most powerful empire. Raden Wijaya didn't just survive — he outmaneuvered Mongol invaders, used their own army against his enemies, then turned on them too. Three moves. One crown. His throne name, Kertarajasa Jayawardhana, meant "he who increases victory." And Majapahit eventually stretched across modern Indonesia, Malaysia, and beyond. The empire began as a desperate man's last gamble.

Vladislaus was nineteen years old. He'd broken a peace treaty to launch this crusade, gambling everything on a decisive blow against the Ottomans near the Black Sea coast. Sultan Murad II crushed him completely. The king's head ended up on a pike, displayed in Bursa. And that broken treaty mattered — it convinced many Christian rulers that crusading promises couldn't be trusted. The Ottomans held southeastern Europe for centuries afterward. One teenager's reckless charge didn't just lose a battle. It ended the last real chance to push the Turks back.

Ninety-two people executed in three days. Christian II had promised amnesty — then broke it spectacularly, massacring Swedish nobles, clergy, and burghers across Stockholm's cobblestones in November 1520. He thought crushing the opposition would secure his Swedish crown forever. But one nobleman's son escaped the slaughter. Gustav Vasa rallied Sweden, drove the Danes out, and founded a dynasty that lasted centuries. Christian's calculated brutality didn't end Swedish resistance. It created it. The Stockholm Bloodbath didn't destroy Sweden's future king — it made him.

Six hundred people. Three days. Lord Grey de Wilton ordered the slaughter after the garrison surrendered — no trial, no mercy, no hesitation. Spanish and Italian soldiers had landed at Dún an Óir to support an Irish rebellion backed by the Pope himself. England couldn't allow that foothold to survive. Edmund Spenser, the poet who'd later write *The Faerie Queene*, was there as Grey's secretary. He watched it happen and defended it afterward. The man who wrote about chivalry witnessed one of its ugliest betrayals.