{
 "slug": "jerusalem-1917",
 "title": "Battle of Jerusalem (1917)",
 "status": "draft",
 "era": "1900–1918",
 "date_text": "13 November – 9 December 1917",
 "start": "1917-11-13",
 "end": "1917-12-09",
 "war": "World War I",
 "cdb90_war": "WORLD WAR I (TURKISH FRONTS 1917)",
 "place": {
  "name": "Maritime plain, Judean hills and Jerusalem, Ottoman Palestine (now Israel and the West Bank): Mughar Ridge, Junction Station, Nebi Samwil and Jerusalem",
  "lat": 31.777,
  "lon": 35.227,
  "wikidata": "Q1378270"
 },
 "lede": "In November 1917 Allenby's army broke the Ottoman line at Mughar Ridge and Junction Station, then fought up into the Judean hills. The Ottoman Seventh Army abandoned Jerusalem, which surrendered on 9 December.",
 "result": "British Empire victory; Jerusalem surrendered on 9 December 1917",
 "result_cdb90": "attacker win",
 "belligerents": [
  {
   "role": "attacker",
   "name": "British Empire Egyptian Expeditionary Force (XX Corps, XXI Corps, Desert Mounted Corps)",
   "commanders": [
    "Edmund Allenby",
    "Philip Chetwode (XX Corps)",
    "Edward Bulfin (XXI Corps)",
    "Harry Chauvel (Desert Mounted Corps)"
   ],
   "strength": null,
   "casualties": null
  },
  {
   "role": "defender",
   "name": "Ottoman Seventh and Eighth Armies (Yildirim Army Group)",
   "commanders": [
    "Erich von Falkenhayn (Yildirim Army Group)",
    "Fevzi Pasha (Seventh Army)",
    "Friedrich Kress von Kressenstein (Eighth Army, relieved late November)",
    "Djevad Pasha (Eighth Army from late November)"
   ],
   "strength": {
    "value": 46500,
    "low": 20000,
    "high": 46500,
    "source": "s2"
   },
   "casualties": {
    "value": null,
    "low": 12000,
    "high": 28443,
    "source": "s1"
   }
  }
 ],
 "sections": {
  "background": "In October 1917 General Sir Edmund Allenby broke the Ottoman Gaza–Beersheba line with the Southern Palestine offensive, taking Beersheba on 31 October. The Ottoman Seventh and Eighth Armies, grouped with the German-led Yildirim Army Group under Erich von Falkenhayn, fell back north-west across the maritime plain and the hills behind it. Allenby chose to follow them closely rather than give them time to dig in, even though the British War Cabinet urged caution about whether a force could be supplied so far forward.\n\nThis page covers the pursuit and the drive on the city. CDB90's only engagement under this title is Junction Station, the action at Mughar Ridge on 13–15 November, when the Ottoman line on the plain was broken and the railway to Jerusalem cut. British sources name the fighting that followed the Battle of Nebi Samwil (17–24 November) and treat the whole as the Jerusalem operations, which ended with the city's surrender on 9 December.\n\nJerusalem mattered for sentiment more than for strategy. It was a holy city of three religions, and Allenby's entry on foot on 11 December gave the British public what Lloyd George called a Christmas present. The fighting itself was hard going: stretched supply lines, rain, and steep, terraced hills where the Ottoman rearguards, reinforced as the line shortened, could make an advance very costly.",
  "forces": "The Egyptian Expeditionary Force was a British Empire army: XX Corps under Philip Chetwode, XXI Corps under Edward Bulfin, and the Desert Mounted Corps under the Australian Harry Chauvel, with Australian, New Zealand, British yeomanry and Indian troops. Infantry divisions named in the sources include the 52nd (Lowland), 75th, 53rd (Welsh), 60th (London), 74th (Yeomanry), 10th (Irish) and 54th (East Anglian). Supply decided how far they could go. Everything moved on a single narrow road by lorry and camel, and the Desert Mounted Corps' 25,000 horses needed over 100 tons of grain a day.\n\nThe Ottoman side was Falkenhayn's Yildirim Army Group. Fevzi Pasha's Seventh Army held the Hebron and Judean hills, and Friedrich Kress von Kressenstein's Eighth Army the coast. Kress was relieved in late November and replaced by Djevad Pasha. The two armies were estimated at about 45,000 rifles, 1,500 sabres and 300 guns in mid-November, though the force actually in front of the British at Mughar Ridge was put at about 20,000 men, and divisions were thin after three weeks of retreat. For the final weeks sources give only unit counts: Zeitun Ridge was held by about 3,000 men, and about 2,000 attacked at Sheikh Muannis on 25 November. No source I could read gives a reliable total for the EEF in the Jerusalem phase.",
  "course": "**Mughar Ridge and Junction Station (13–15 November; CDB90 engagement 329).** On 13 November the 75th and 52nd (Lowland) Divisions attacked in the centre after an hour's bombardment from 08:00. By 10:00 the villages of Tall al-Turmus, Qastina and Yazur were taken without resistance, and the 75th Division took Mesmiye after a stiffer fight, with about 300 prisoners. On the right the Australian Mounted Division advanced past Qazaza; on the left the 8th Mounted Brigade took Yibna. At Qatra and El Mughar, machine guns pinned the leading battalions of the 155th Brigade in the Wadi Jamus. At about 14:30 it was agreed that the 6th Mounted Brigade would attack the ridge. The Buckinghamshire and Dorset Yeomanry advanced in column across about 3,000 yards, trotting and then galloping onto the crest. The charge cost 16 killed, 114 wounded and 265 horses, and the Berkshire Yeomanry, fighting dismounted with two infantry battalions, finished clearing Qatra and El Mughar by 17:00.\n\nOn 14 November the 75th Division, with armoured cars, occupied Junction Station, cutting the Jaffa–Jerusalem railway and capturing two locomotives and 60 trucks. The same day the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade beat an entrenched rearguard at Ayun Kara. At midnight Falkenhayn ordered a general withdrawal. The New Zealanders entered Jaffa unopposed on 16 November, and Latron was taken the same day.\n\n**Up to the hills (17–24 November).** The advance paused on 17 November for supplies, then resumed. The 75th Division took Amwas on 18–19 November and reached the heights above Bab el-Wad, while the Yeomanry Mounted Division struggled through rough country towards Beit Ur el Tahta. On 21 November Saris fell in the afternoon and the 234th Brigade took Nebi Samwil late in the evening after heavy fighting, but the Yeomanry were thrown back from Zeitun Ridge by a counterattack. Three British divisions faced three Ottoman divisions here, and British losses were well over 2,000. On 24 November Allenby ordered three divisions relieved. On 24–25 November the Eighth Army's 3rd and 7th Divisions drove back the bridgeheads over the Nahr el Auja.\n\n**Relief and counterattack (late November).** Fresh divisions came up: the 60th on 23 November, the 74th on 28 November and the 10th (Irish) on 30 November. Ottoman counterattacks on the plain on 27–29 November, including Wilhelma and Bald Hill, achieved little.\n\n**The final advance (7–9 December).** Mott's Detachment of the 53rd Division reached Solomon's Pools on the evening of 7 December, and on 8 December attacked Beit Jala, which the Ottoman troops had already left. On 8 December, in almost continuous rain, Chetwode's XX Corps launched the final advance on the heights west of Jerusalem, and the Seventh Army withdrew that evening. On 9 December the mayor, Hussein Salim al-Husseini, tried to hand the governor's surrender letter to two sergeants of the 2/19th London Regiment, who refused it; Brigadier General C. F. Watson of the 180th Brigade accepted it. Ottoman troops briefly held the Mount of Olives, and the 60th Division overcame them the next afternoon.",
  "aftermath": "Allenby entered the Old City on foot through the Jaffa Gate on 11 December, two days after the surrender, with a mounted guard of honour from the 10th Light Horse and a New Zealand troop. The British then built a fortified line from north of Jaffa across the Hebron Hills to Bireh and east of the Mount of Olives.\n\nThe Ottoman Seventh Army tried to take the city back. Its attack began at 01:30 on 27 December against the 179th Brigade on the Nablus road, focused on Tell el Ful, and failed within two days. A British advance on 29–30 December on a 12-mile front pushed the line past Ramallah and Bireh, at a cost to the Ottomans of over 1,000 casualties and 750 prisoners.\n\nFigures are hard to pin to this page's scope. British Empire losses for the whole advance from Beersheba and Gaza were about 18,000 and Ottoman losses about 25,000. Eleven Ottoman infantry divisions that retreated suffered 28,443 casualties, of whom about 12,000 were captured, along with 100 guns. British Empire casualties between 25 November and 10 December were 1,667, with 1,800 Ottoman prisoners taken. Jerusalem passed out of Ottoman control for good, and the date is remembered in British accounts chiefly as the capture of the Holy City.",
  "wargaming": "The campaign supports several different games. Mughar Ridge works at battalion and squadron level: a bombardment, infantry held up in a wadi, then the choice between waiting and sending in the yeomanry. A map of 3,000 yards of open ground, one ridge and a handful of machine guns is enough, and the question of whether to charge at all is the scenario.\n\nThe hill fighting around Nebi Samwil and Zeitun Ridge suits a brigade-level game on a small table. Terraced slopes, stone walls and thin roads mean the attacker has little room to deploy and the defender can reinforce faster than the attacker can. The real limits were supply and exhaustion, so rules for ammunition, water and tired troops matter more than extra weapons. Allenby had to relieve three divisions and wait for fresh ones, and a campaign game can model that as a clock rather than losses.\n\nThe December finish is a good pursuit and bluff game: the Ottoman Seventh Army pulls out in the rain, and the attacker must decide whether to press on to the city's heights or go round. Possible what-ifs include a pause of a week for supplies, which gave the Ottomans time to bring up reserves, or Allenby halting at the hills. A game scale of one figure to 20 to 50 men for the larger actions, or individual troops and platoons for Mughar Ridge, would work."
 },
 "images": [
  {
   "file": "File:Allenby enters Jerusalem 1917.jpg",
   "kind": "photo",
   "caption": "General Allenby enters Jerusalem on foot through the Jaffa Gate, 11 December 1917.",
   "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Allenby_enters_Jerusalem_1917.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original",
   "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/a4/Allenby_enters_Jerusalem_1917.jpg/960px-Allenby_enters_Jerusalem_1917.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail",
   "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Allenby_enters_Jerusalem_1917.jpg",
   "licence": "Public domain",
   "licence_url": "",
   "artist": "Underwood & Underwood",
   "credit": "This image is available from the United States Library of Congress 's Prints and Photographs division under the digital ID cph.3b47734 . This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing .",
   "width": 1579
  },
  {
   "file": "File:Powles pp.160-1 16.11.17.jpg",
   "kind": "map",
   "caption": "Situation on the maritime plain, 16 November 1917, from the New Zealand official history.",
   "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/Powles_pp.160-1_16.11.17.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original",
   "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/b/b9/Powles_pp.160-1_16.11.17.jpg/960px-Powles_pp.160-1_16.11.17.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail",
   "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Powles_pp.160-1_16.11.17.jpg",
   "licence": "Public domain",
   "licence_url": "",
   "artist": "Powles, C. Guy",
   "credit": "The New Zealanders in Sinai and Palestine Volume III Official History New Zealand's Effort in the Great War Publisher: Whitcombe & Tombs Ltd, Auckland Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by User:Rcbutcher using CommonsHelper . Original uploader was RoslynSKP at en.wikipedia 8 December 2010 (original upload date)",
   "width": 2265
  },
  {
   "file": "File:Falls sketch 12.jpeg",
   "kind": "map",
   "caption": "Situation on 19 November 1917, from the British official history.",
   "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Falls_sketch_12.jpeg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original",
   "thumb": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Falls_sketch_12.jpeg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled",
   "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Falls_sketch_12.jpeg",
   "licence": "Public domain",
   "licence_url": "",
   "artist": "Cyril Falls, G. MacMunn, A.F. Beck",
   "credit": "Military Operations Egypt & Palestine from June 1917 to the end of the War Volume 2 Part 1 of History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence Published in 1930 by HM Stationary Office, London Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by Rcbutcher using CommonsHelper . Original uploader was RoslynSKP at en.wikipedia 13 December 2010 (original upload date)",
   "width": 683
  },
  {
   "file": "File:Falls sketch 15.jpeg",
   "kind": "map",
   "caption": "The Ottoman attack on Wilhelma, 27 November 1917, from the British official history.",
   "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/Falls_sketch_15.jpeg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original",
   "thumb": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/Falls_sketch_15.jpeg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled",
   "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Falls_sketch_15.jpeg",
   "licence": "Public domain",
   "licence_url": "",
   "artist": "Cyril Falls, G. MacMunn, A.F. Beck",
   "credit": "Military Operations Egypt & Palestine from June 1917 to the end of the War Volume 2 Part 1 of History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence Published in 1930 by HM Stationary Office, London Transferred from en.wikipedia ; transferred to Commons by User:Rcbutcher using CommonsHelper . Original uploader was RoslynSKP at en.wikipedia 15 December 2010 (first version); 18 December 2010 (last version)",
   "width": 650
  },
  {
   "file": "File:Summit of Nebi Samwil..jpg",
   "kind": "photo",
   "caption": "The summit of Nebi Samwil, the high ground west of Jerusalem taken on 21 November 1917.",
   "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Summit_of_Nebi_Samwil..jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original",
   "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/da/Summit_of_Nebi_Samwil..jpg/960px-Summit_of_Nebi_Samwil..jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail",
   "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Summit_of_Nebi_Samwil..jpg",
   "licence": "Public domain",
   "licence_url": "",
   "artist": "Unknown author Unknown author",
   "credit": "This photograph Q 12641 comes from the collections of the Imperial War Museums . Transferred from en.wikipedia to Commons by User:Rcbutcher using CommonsHelper .",
   "width": 1300
  }
 ],
 "sources": [
  {
   "id": "s1",
   "title": "Battle of Jerusalem (1917), Wikipedia",
   "url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Jerusalem_(1917)",
   "kind": "web"
  },
  {
   "id": "s2",
   "title": "Battle of Mughar Ridge, Wikipedia",
   "url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mughar_Ridge",
   "kind": "web"
  },
  {
   "id": "s3",
   "title": "Battle of Beersheba (1917), Wikipedia",
   "url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Beersheba_(1917)",
   "kind": "web"
  },
  {
   "id": "s4",
   "title": "Falls, Cyril, MacMunn, G. and Beck, A. F., Military Operations Egypt & Palestine from June 1917 to the End of the War, vol. II part 1, HMSO, 1930 (seen only via s1 and s2)",
   "url": null,
   "kind": "book"
  },
  {
   "id": "s5",
   "title": "Grainger, John D., The Battle for Palestine, 1917, Boydell Press, 2006 (seen only via s1)",
   "url": null,
   "kind": "book"
  },
  {
   "id": "s6",
   "title": "Wavell, A., 'The Palestine Campaigns', 1933 (cited in s2 for the yeomanry charge losses; seen only via s2)",
   "url": null,
   "kind": "book"
  }
 ],
 "cdb90": [
  329
 ],
 "order": 180,
 "url": "https://battles.georgewyrd.com/jerusalem-1917/",
 "oob": [],
 "oob_lwtv": [],
 "scenarios": [],
 "orbat": null,
 "orbat_lwtv": null,
 "reading": {
  "prose": [],
  "history": [],
  "fiction": [],
  "poetry": []
 },
 "reading_lwtv": {
  "prose": [],
  "poetry": []
 },
 "photos": [],
 "photos_kind": "photographs",
 "newspapers": null
}