Gaza Strip, February 1, 1958: A Danish sentry from the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) stands guard near a tattered U.N. flag at the Israeli-Egyptian border on the Gaza Strip. The force, representing eight nations and more than 5,600 troops, was established in November 1956, as part of the U.N.’s response to the Suez crisis which saw hostilities between Egypt and Israel, the latter backed by British and French armed forces.

According to the U.N. Peacekeeping website, “The creation of UNEF, the first United Nations peacekeeping force, represented a significant innovation within the United Nations. It was not a peace-enforcement operation, as envisaged in Article 42 of the United Nations Charter, but a peacekeeping operation to be carried out with the consent and the cooperation of the parties to the conflict. It was armed, but the units were to use their weapons only in self-defence and even then with utmost restraint. Its main functions were to supervise the withdrawal of the three occupying forces and, after the withdrawal was completed, to act as a buffer between the Egyptian and Israeli forces and to provide impartial supervision of the ceasefire.”

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