page_title: Stalemate in Southern Palestine
section_title: Abasan el Kebir
hierarchical_section_title: Stalemate in Southern Palestine / Desert Column reorganisation / Rotations / Abasan el Kebir
caption_attribution_description: English: AWM caption&#160;: A SQUADRON COOKHOUSE OF THE 4TH AUSTRALIAN LIGHT HORSE REGIMENT AT ABBASAN EL KEBIR, IN 1917.
context_page_description: The Stalemate in Southern Palestine was a six month standoff between the British Egyptian Expeditionary Force and the Ottoman Army in World War I. The two hostile forces faced each other along the Gaza to Beersheba line during the Sinai and Palestine Campaign, with neither side able to force its opponent to withdraw. The stalemate began in April 1917 with the defeat of the EEF by the Ottoman Army at the Second Battle of Gaza and lasted until the EEF offensive began with the Battle of Beersheba on 31 October 1917.
  Previous to the stalemate, units of the Ottoman Fourth Army had been forced out of the Sinai Peninsula by a series of EEF victories: the Battle of Romani in August 1916, the Battle of Magdhaba in December and the Battle of Rafa in January 1917. The EEF followed up those victories by making two unsuccessful attempts to capture Gaza: the First Battle of Gaza in March, and the Second Battle of Gaza in April. These two Ottoman victories halted the attempted EEF invasion of southern Palestine, leading to the stalemate.
context_section_description: When the 3rd Light Horse Brigade returned from a strategic march to El Buqqar on 7 May, they moved to bivouac at Abasan el Kebir. Here khaki drill shorts were issued, and the horses were watered at troughs set up at the pipe head. The mounted divisions lived here in semi-permanent bivouacs constructed from light, wooden hurdles, covered with grass mats, erected over rectangular pits (funk holes) dug in the ground to give some protection from aerial bombing. The site of the 4th Light Horse Field Ambulance bivouac in May, which had "previously been occupied by a German machine gun company", was among almond trees and prickly pears. During May, the 1st Light Horse and the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigades (Anzac Mounted Division), along with the Imperial Mounted Division's headquarters, bivouacked near Abasan el Kebir, while the 2nd Light Horse and 22nd Mounted Brigades, with two batteries RHA and the Divisional Ammunition Column, bivouacked on the beach at Tel el Marakeb, to the west of Khan Yunis.
  On 17 June, the "original" horses still with the Anzac Mounted Division, which had been shipped from Australia and New Zealand, and had crossed the Suez Canal with the division in April 1916 were:
  671 horses in the 1st Light Horse Brigade
  742 horses in the 2nd Light Horse Brigade
  1056 horses in the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade
  The brigadiers of the division agreed that the ideal horse "should be from 15 to 15.3 and as near 15 hands as possible and should be stout and cobby and if possible with plenty of blood."
  During the second half of September, while the Anzac Mounted Division was at Abasan el Kebir, 600 donkeys were attached to the division. The donkeys arrived at the railway station, and after the "bored-looking quadrupeds with their comical expressions and long floppy ears" were unloaded, they were tied together in fives for the journey. With one dismounted man in front, leading their four horses, another three dismounted men followed, shepherding the donkeys, which "travelled mostly in circles." Instead of moving along the road, the donkeys toured the countryside to eventually arrive at divisional headquarters, where they were assigned to a number of units. Seven donkeys were attached to each squadron to be ridden or led by 'spare parts.' A form of polo was played by the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade riding donkeys, and swinging walking sticks at a football. In December when the advance had reached the Judean Hills, the donkeys carried supplies over rough tracks, up and down precipitous hills, to the front line troops.
  While the divisions were in reserve at Abasan el Kebir, training was conducted in musketry, tactical schemes, staff rides, practice concentrations, anti–gas methods, the handling and sending of messages by carrier pigeons, and getting quickly ready to move out on operations. Other activities carried on while at Abasan el Kebir, included cricket matches and, on 31 August, a boxing competition. On 16 October, Allenby presented medals to officers and men of the Anzac Mounted Division at Abasan el Kebir.
caption: A squadron cookhouse of the 4th Australian Light Horse Regiment at Abbasan el Kebir in 1917
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