page_title: 3rd Parachute Brigade (United Kingdom)
section_title: Palestine
hierarchical_section_title: 3rd Parachute Brigade (United Kingdom) / Operational history / Palestine
caption_attribution_description: English: A member of the Parachute Regiment stands guard over a group of Jewish civilians who wait in line to be interrogated by British army officers and members of the Palestine Police during a sweep in Tel Aviv for members of Jewish terrorist organisations such as the Irgun
context_page_description: The 3rd Parachute Brigade was an airborne forces brigade raised by the British Army during the Second World War. The brigade was initially part of the 1st Airborne Division, but remained in Britain when that division was sent overseas, and became part of the 6th Airborne Division, alongside 5th Parachute Brigade and 6th Airlanding Brigade.
  The brigade first went into action on 5 June 1944 during Operation Tonga, part of the Normandy landings. The objective was to destroy the Merville Gun Battery and the bridges over the River Dives. The brigade achieved all its objectives, and remained defending the left flank of the invasion zone until mid August. They then crossed the River Dives and advanced as far as the River Seine before they were withdrawn. While recovering in England, the brigade was moved to Belgium in December 1944, to counter the German attack in the Ardennes. The brigade remained on the border between Belgium and the Netherlands carrying out patrols until March 1945. Their next airborne mission was Operation Varsity, the assault crossing of the River Rhine in Germany. After this, the brigade advanced towards the Baltic Sea, arriving just ahead of the Red Army.
context_section_description: At the end of May 1945, the division was pulled out of Germany and returned to England. It was initially intended to send them to India to form an airborne corps with the 44th Indian Airborne Division. The division’s advance party, formed around the 5th Parachute Brigade, had already arrived in India. Following the Japanese surrender, all these plans changed. The post-war British Army only needed one airborne division, and the 6th Airborne was chosen to remain on strength. Reinforced by the 2nd Parachute Brigade, the division was sent to the Middle East as the Imperial Strategic Reserve.
  The 3rd Parachute Brigade was the first unit of the Airborne Division to arrive in Palestine, disembarking at Haifa on 3 October 1945. The brigade then moved to Gaza to acclimatise and regain their fitness after the voyage from England. On 21 October the brigade was deployed around the Lydda district, with responsibility for Tel Aviv and Jaffa. The first incident involving the brigade came on 14 November 1945, when the Jewish National Council called for a 12-hour strike, which resulted in rioting in Tel Aviv. By 18:15 the Palestine Police Force was unable to cope and sent for reinforcements from the 8th Parachute Battalion. The complete battalion was deployed and the riot was under control by 21:40 and a curfew imposed for the rest of the night. Early the following day the curfew was broken by large crowds gathering to loot and burn buildings, so the remainder of the brigade was deployed to the city under the codename Operation Bellicose. Night time curfews remained in place until 05:20 on 20 November, when all troops returned to their barracks. All was quiet in the brigade area until the night of 26/27 December, when police stations in Jaffa and Tel Aviv, the railway at Lydda and an armoury at Tel Aviv were attacked. The brigade again imposed a curfew around Tel Aviv. This was followed by cordon and search operations: Pintail on 29 December, Heron on 8 January, and Pigeon on 30 January.
  Over the night of 2/3 April 1946, there were several attacks on railway installations around the country. One at Yibna occurred at the same time as a patrol from the 9th Parachute Battalion was entering the village. The patrol's leading two vehicles exploded mines that had been laid on a bridge, wounding three men. At daylight the tracks of around 30 men were found, and a section from the 8th Parachute Battalion eventually cornered 24 armed men. In the firefight that followed, 14 of them were wounded and the remainder surrendered, with no British casualties. On 29 June Operation Agatha started; the brigade had been rotated to cover the south of Palestine, and were to search for arms and arrest any members of the Palmach in Givat Brenner and No'ar Oved. On 22 July the King David Hotel in Jerusalem was bombed, which was the catalyst for Operation Shark, the searching of every house and property in Tel Aviv. For this operation the brigade had all the divisional artillery and the 3rd The King's Own Hussars under their command. The brigade's next tasks were Operations Bream and Eel between 28 August and 4 September, which entailed the search of Dorot and Ruhama in the Negev. For the first time army dogs trained in metal detecting were used during the operations, and they located a large arms cache in both settlements.
  In January 1947, the 6th Airborne Division was moved to northern Palestine, swapping locations with the 1st Infantry Division. The 3rd Parachute Brigade took over responsibility for Haifa, which was considered a problem area. The brigade had to guard the docks and port of Haifa, which were the main entry point for immigrants arriving in the country. In addition, the many oil pipelines and installations in the region were a potential target for sabotage. The brigade's first operation was imposing a curfew on the Jewish quarter after the kidnapping of two Britons in retaliation for the death sentence imposed on Dov Gruner. The next major operation was in July, when an indefinite night time curfew was imposed, in response to several attacks in and 
caption: Parachute Regiment soldier standing guard over Jewish civilians waiting to be questioned during Operation Shark, July–August 1946
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