December 24 is the 358th day of the year (359th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are seven days remaining until the end of the year.

• 1914 – World War I: The "Christmas truce" begins.
• 1924 – Albania becomes a republic.
• 1929 – Assassination attempt on Argentine President Hipólito Yrigoyen.
• 1939 – World War II: Pope Pius XII makes a Christmas Eve appeal for peace.
• 1941 – World War II: Kuching is conquered by Japanese forces.
• 1942 – World War II: French monarchist, Fernand Bonnier de La Chapelle, assassinates Vichy French Admiral François Darlan in Algiers.
• 1943 – World War II: U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower becomes the Supreme Allied Commander.
• 1951 – Libya becomes independent from Italy. Idris I is proclaimed King of Libya.
• 1953 – Tangiwai disaster: A railway bridge is destroyed by a lahar at Tangiwai, in the Central North Island of New Zealand, sending a fully loaded passenger train into the Whangaehu River, and killing 153 people.
• 1955 – NORAD Tracks Santa for the first time in what will become an annual Christmas Eve tradition.
• 1964 – Vietnam War: Viet Cong operatives bomb the Brinks Hotel in Saigon to demonstrate they can strike an American installation in the heavily guarded capital.
• 1966 – A Canadair CL-44 chartered by the United States military crashes into a small village in South Vietnam, killing 129.
• 1968 – The crew of the USS Pueblo is released by North Korea after being held for 11 months on suspicion of spying.
• 1968 – Apollo Program: The crew of Apollo 8 enters into orbit around the Moon, becoming the first humans to do so. They performed 10 lunar orbits and broadcast live TV pictures that became the famous Christmas Eve Broadcast, one of the most watched programs in history.
• 1973 – District of Columbia Home Rule Act is passed, allowing residents of Washington, D.C. to elect their own local government.
• 1974 – Cyclone Tracy devastates Darwin, Australia.
• 1979 – The first European Ariane rocket is launched.
• 1980 – Witnesses report the first of several sightings of unexplained lights near RAF Woodbridge, in Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk, England, an incident called "Britain's Roswell".
• 1997 – The Sid El-Antri massacre (or Sidi Lamri) in Algeria kills 50-100 people.
• 2000 – The Texas 7 hold up a sports store in Irving, Texas. Police officer Aubrey Hawkins is murdered during the robbery.
• 2003 – The Spanish police thwart an attempt by ETA to detonate 50 kg of explosives at 3:55 p.m. inside Madrid's busy Chamartín Station.
• 2005 – Chad–Sudan relations: Chad declares a state of war against Sudan following a December 18 attack on Adré, which left about 100 people dead.
• 2008 – Lord's Resistance Army, a Ugandan rebel group, begins a series of attacks on Democratic Republic of the Congo, massacring more than 400.