Born on December 25

Rosa Luxemburg was a Polish-born revolutionary activist and Marxist theorist who became a naturalized German citizen. Co-founder of the Communist Party of Germany (KPD), she championed a socialist revolution rooted in the mass consciousness of the working class. Arrested during the Spartacist uprising of January 1919, she was murdered by paramilitary soldiers.

Humphrey Bogart was an American actor and a major figure of Hollywood's Golden Age. He embodied the tough hero—cynical yet upright—in film noir and classics such as Casablanca. He is regarded as one of the greatest legends of American cinema.

Ahmed Ben Bella (1916-2012) was an Algerian statesman and a leading figure in the struggle for Algerian independence. A co-founder of the FLN, in 1963 he became the first president of the Algerian Republic, before being overthrown by a coup d'état in 1965.

Anwar Sadat was President of Egypt from 1970 to 1981. The architect of the Yom Kippur War and then of peace with Israel, he signed the Camp David Accords and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1978. He was assassinated in 1981 by Islamists opposed to this peace.