The Algerian War was a major armed conflict between France and the Algerian National Liberation Front (FLN) from 1954 to 1962, which led to Algeria winning its independence from France. An important decolonization war, it was a complex conflict characterized by guerrilla warfare and war crimes. The conflict also became a civil war between the different communities and within the communities. The war took place mainly on the territory of Algeria, with repercussions in metropolitan France.
The national flag of Algeria consists of two equal vertical bars, green and white, charged in the center with a red star and crescent, a symbol of Islam as the nation's prominent faith. The flag was adopted on 3 July 1962. A similar version was used by the Algerian government in exile from 1958 to 1962. The Western blazon is per pale vert and argent; a crescent and star gules.
Harki is the generic term for native Muslim Algerians who served as auxiliaries in the French Army during the Algerian War from 1954 to 1962. The word sometimes applies to all Algerian Muslims who supported French Algeria during the war. The motives for enlisting were mixed. They are regarded as traitors in independent Algeria and tens of thousands of them were killed after the war in reprisals despite the Évian Accords ceasefire and amnesty stipulations. President Charles de Gaulle controversially made the decision to not give the Harkis sanctuary in France, viewing them as "soldiers of fortune" who should be gotten rid of as soon as possible.
The Café Wars took place during the Algerian War, as a part of the internal fighting in France between two rival Algerian nationalist movements, the Mouvement National Algérien and the Front de Libération National.
The Oran massacre of 1962 was the mass killing of Pied-Noir and European expatriates living in Algeria. It took place in Oran beginning on the date of Algerian independence, and ended on 7 July 1962. Estimates of the casualties vary from a low of 95 to 365 deaths in a report by a group of historians sent to the French government in 2006, and have been utilised by right-wing parties.
Elements from the French Armed Forces used deliberate torture during the Algerian War (1954–1962), creating an ongoing public controversy. Pierre Vidal-Naquet, a renowned French historian, estimated that there were "hundreds of thousands of instances of torture" by the French military in Algeria.
Danièle Minne was one of the few European women convicted of assisting the FLN during the Algerian War. Her mother Jacqueline Netter-Minne-Guerroudj and her stepfather Abdelkader Guerroudj, were both condemned to death as accomplices of Fernand Iveton, the only European who was guillotined for his part in the Algerian revolt. Her mother was never executed, partly due to a campaign on her behalf conducted by Simone de Beauvoir; her stepfather was also freed.
Bougara is a town in the Mitidja plain in Algeria, about 20 kilometers due south of Algiers. Located on the N29, the main road between Blida and Larbaâ, it is the capital of Bougara District, in Blida Province. In 1998 it had a population of 34,100.
Benjamin Stora is a French historian, expert on North Africa, who is widely considered one of the world's leading authorities on Algerian history. He was born in a Jewish family that left the country following its War of Independence in 1962. Stora holds two PhDs and a Doctorate of the State (1991).
TV2, formerly Canal Algérie, in English means The Algerian channel, is the second Algerian general public national television channel. The channel is part of the EPTV Group which also includes TV1, TV3, TV4, TV5, TV6, TV7, TV8 and TV9. The channel broadcasts its programs 24/7 via different platforms and all over the world.
The Battle of Philippeville, also known as the Philippeville massacre or the August Offensive was a series of raids launched on 20 August 1955 on various cities and towns of the Constantine region by FLN insurgents and armed mobs during the Algerian War between France and Algerian rebels. The raids, which mostly took the form of ethnic riots, resulted in the massacre of several dozens of European settlers known as Pieds-Noirs. These massacres were then followed by reprisals by the French army and Pieds-Noirs vigilantes, which resulted in the death of several thousand Muslim Algerians. The events of late August 1955 in the Constantinois region are considered to be a major turning point of the Algerian War.
The Battle of Bab el Oued was a violent confrontation which occurred during the latter stages of the Algerian War (1954–1962) between the French Army and the Organisation armée secrète (OAS) which opposed Algerian independence. It took place in Bab El Oued, then a working-class European quarter of Algiers, from 23 March to 6 April 1962.
Maurice Failevic was a French film director. A communist, he directed 50+ films about class struggles, depicting the lives of members of the French working class, from peasants during the French Revolution to the unemployed, factory workers and banlieue dwellers in the 20th century. He directed films for cinema and television as well as documentaries.
Yves Courrière, real name Gérard Bon was a French writer, biographer and journalist.
Benali Dghine Boudghene, commonly known as Colonel Lotfi, was born on 5 May 1934 in Tlemcen in Algeria. Benali was an Algerian leader in the Algerian War, organising the Wilaya V from 1958 to 1960. He first worked as a Political leader with the National Liberation Front then moved to fighting in battlefield; he was killed in Béchar by French troops in 1960
The Battle of Bouzegza took place during the Algerian War in the Berber-speaking region of the Adrar Azegzaw massif, at the far eastern end of the Mitidja Plain.
The Palestro ambush, or Djerrah ambush, took place on 18 May 1956, during the Algerian War, near the village of Djerrah in the region of Palestro in Kabylie. A section of about forty men from the National Liberation Army (ALN) under the command of Lieutenant Ali Khodja ambushed a unit of 21 men from the 9th Colonial Infantry Regiment of the French Army commanded by Second Lieutenant Hervé Artur.
The villa Sésini is a torture center established in El Biar during the Algerian war in the city of Algiers.
The Declaration of 1 November 1954 is the first independentist appeal addressed by the National Liberation Front (FLN) to the Algerian people, marking the start of the Algerian Revolution and the armed action of the National Liberation Army (ALN).
Lotfi Bouchouchi is an Algerian filmmaker and producer.
