page_title: Capture of Afulah and Beisan
section_title: Aftermath
hierarchical_section_title: Capture of Afulah and Beisan / Aftermath
caption_attribution_description: English: Photograph of first British train arriving at Beisan 25 September 1918. Train and engine captured at El Afule by 12th Brigade, 4th Cavalry Division on 20th September.
context_page_description: The Capture of Afula and Beisan occurred on 20 September 1918, during the Battle of Sharon which together with the Nablus, formed the set piece Battle of Megiddo fought during the last months of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign of the First World War. During the cavalry phase of the Battle of Sharon, the 4th Cavalry Division of the Desert Mounted Corps attacked and captured the main communications hub at Afula, located in the centre of the Esdraelon Plain, and Beisan on the plain's eastern edge near the Jordan River, some 40–50 miles behind the front line in the Judean Hills.
  Infantry attacks by the British Empires XXI Corps had begun the Battle of Sharon on 19 September, along an almost continuous trench line from the Mediterranean across the Plain of Sharon and into the foothills of the Judean Hills. These attacks captured the Ottoman front line at Tulkarm, Tabsor, and Arara, in the process outflanking and decimating the Ottoman Eighth Army on the coast. During the attack on Tulkarm, the infantry created a gap in the Ottoman front line defences, through which cavalry from General Edmund Allenby's Egyptian Expeditionary Force rode north.
context_section_description: Allenby described the successful advance:
  ... my infantry ... have driven the enemy into the arms of the Desert Mounted Corps operating from Beisan and Jenin. Cavalry have occupied Nazareth. I cannot estimate total number of prisoners, but 18,000 have been counted. I motored to Lejjun, today; 65 miles N. of here, overlooking the plain of Esdraelon. A beautiful view across the flat vale. Nazareth, high in hills, to the N.; Mount Tabor opposite; Mount Gilboa to the E., overlooking Jezreel. Some of the Indian cavalry got into Turks with the lance, in the plain yesterday, and killed many. I ... passed through thousands of prisoners today ... 
  — Allenby letters to King Hussein of the Hedjaz and Lady Allenby 21 September 1918
  During the first 36 hours of battle, from 04:30 on 19 September until 17:00 on 20 September, the German and Ottoman front line had been cut by infantry, and the cavalry had passed through the gap to reach their objectives at Afula, Nazareth, and Beisan. The continuing British Empire infantry attack in the Judean Hills had forced the Ottoman Seventh and Eighth Armies to withdraw northwards towards the waiting Desert Mounted Corps.
  By dusk on 19 September, 4,000 prisoners had been captured and brigade transport following the cavalry divisions was 20 miles (32 km) behind enemy lines in what had been Ottoman Empire territory.
  On 22 September the 4th Cavalry Division's motor ambulances, which had been working in the Judean Hills transporting wounded infantry, rejoined their division at Beisan.
caption: The first British train (captured engine and carriages) arrived at Beisan on 25 September
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