Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 25, 2025
Lorries could supply the troops in the neighbourhood of the Nablus road, though the highway was getting into bad condition, but in the right centre of the line the difficulties of terrain were appalling. The enemy had had a painful experience of it and was not likely to wish to fight in that country again; consequently it was decided to hold this part of the line with light forces.
As far as any military forecast could be made we were now in an impenetrable position whatever force the Turk, with his poor communications, could employ against us either from the direction of Nablus or from the east of the Jordan.
Shortly before midnight the Turks began their operations against the line held by the 60th Division across the Nablus road precisely where it had been expected. They attacked in considerable strength at Ras et Tawil and about the quarries held by our outposts north of that hill, and the outposts were driven in.
The wind was strong, but defying treacherous eddies, the pilots came through the valleys between steep-sloped hills and caught the Turks on the Nablus road, emptying their bomb racks at a height of a few hundred feet, and giving the scattered troops machine-gun fire on the return journey.
They began as heathen, though in lapse of years they came to be pure monotheists, even more rigid than the Jews themselves, and today, if you went to Nablus, you would find the small remnant of their descendants adhering to Moses and the law, guarding their sacred copy of the Pentateuch with unintelligent awe, and eating the Paschal Lamb with wild rites.
The battalion on our right had to attack up the exposed ridge along which ran the Nablus road, while we were lucky enough to have the frontage just east of the Wadi Hannina, where our objective, the steep and massive feature of Bab-el-Muallek covered us from artillery observation.
But before our position in the Plain could be considered secure, it was essential to push forward into the hills, and to obtain a hold of the one good road which traverses the Judæan range from north to south, from Nablus to Jerusalem."
But how modern, how very far from being ancient, the oldest of our English books, printed in the most primitive black letter, appears, when it is laid side by side with that curious old book which travellers, visiting the little village of Nablus, are shown this very day.
The spectators who watch us from a distance while we dine are numerous; and no doubt they are passing unfavourable criticisms on our table manners, and on the Frankish custom of permitting one unveiled lady to travel with three husbands. The population of Nablûs is about twenty-five thousand. It has a Turkish governor, a garrison, several soap factories, and a million dogs which howl all night.
But the better road from Jenin and El Afule leads across the Plain of Esdraelon to Nazareth and Tiberias and round the northern side of the Sea of Galilee to Damascus. Another road from Nablus leads eastwards, and, dropping steeply down along the Wadi Fara, leads to the Jordan, which it crosses by a ford at Jisr ed Damie.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking