Complex sentence: On January 7, he and his division left Birüssebi (present day: Beersheba) for the desert and arrived at the front of the Suez Canal, but the Ottoman forces couldn't pass the canal and retreated.
Split into simpler sentences: On January 7, he and his division left Birüssebi (present day: Beersheba) for the desert and arrived at the front of the Suez Canal. But the Ottoman forces couldn't pass the canal and retreated.