Battle of Karameh

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The Battle of Karameh (Arabic: معركة الكرامة‎‎) was a 15-hour military engagement between the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and combined forces of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and the Jordanian Armed Forces (JAF) in the Jordanian town of Karameh on 21 March 1968, during the War of Attrition.[1] It was planned by Israel as two concurrent raids on PLO camps, one in Karameh and one in the distant village of Safi — codenamed Operation Inferno (Hebrew: מבצע תופת‎) and Operation Asuta (מבצע אסותא), respectively — but the former turned into a full-scale battle.[2]

After the Six-Day War in 1967, the PLO and Fatah started to step up their guerrilla attacks against Israel from Jordanian soil taking the border town of Karameh as their headquarters.[1] The goal of the invasion was to destroy Karameh camp and capture Yasser Arafat in reprisal for the attacks by the PLO, which culminated in an Israeli school bus hitting a mine in the Negev.[3] However, plans for the two operations were prepared in 1967, one year before the bus incident. Files released by the IDF revealed that their army had practiced crossing the Jordan River in 1966 during the Jordanian occupation of the West Bank.[4] It is also believed that Israel wanted to punish Jordan for its support to the PLO.[5] When Jordan saw the size of the raiding forces entering the battle it was lead to the assumption that Israel had another goal of capturing Balqa Governorate to create a Golan Heights similar situation.[6][7] Israel assumed that the Jordanian Army would ignore the invasion, but the latter fought alongside the Palestinians and opened heavy fire that inflicted losses upon the Israeli forces.[8] This engagement marked the first known deployment of suicide bombers by Palestinian forces.[9] The Israelis were repelled at the end of a day's battle, having destroyed most of the Karameh camp and taken around 141 PLO prisoners.[10] The battle resulted in the issuance of the United Nations Security Council Resolution 248, which condemned Israel for violating the cease-fire line.[11]

Both sides declared victory. On a tactical level, the battle went in Israel's favor[12] and the destruction of the Karameh camp was achieved.[13] However, the relatively high casualties were a considerable surprise for the Israel Defense Forces and was stunning to the Israelis.[1] Although the Palestinians were not victorious on their own, King Hussein let the Palestinians take credit.[1][14][15] The Palestinians used this to establish their national claims.[16] King Hussein after the battle proclaimed, "I think we may reach a position where we are all fedayeen." However, afterwards the PLO's strength began to grow, and Palestinians spoke openly of taking over Jordan as part of Palestine. This situation eventually led to Black September in Jordan, in 1970.[8]

Background

File:South jordan valley.png
Bridges over the Jordan River.

Following the seizure of the West Bank from Jordan in the June 1967 Six-Day War, Israel destroyed the existing Fatah networks there. In early 1968, however, Fatah guerrillas began raiding Israel from bases on the Jordanian side of the river. Most of these attacks were blocked by the IDF. At times, Jordanian Army infantry and artillery units gave the Fatah squads covering fire, leading to frequent direct skirmishes between the IDF and the Jordanian Army.[1] On 14–15 February, Jordanian mortars hit several Israeli settlements in the Beit Shean Valley and Jordan Valley. Israeli artillery and air forces retaliated against Jordanian bases and artillery batteries, as well as the American-financed East Ghor Canal (now known as the King Abdullah Canal). As a result, thousands of Jordanian farmers fled eastwards, and fedayeen moved into the valley. An American-sponsored ceasefire was arranged, and King Hussein declared he would prevent these groups from using Jordan as a base for attack.[17]

In February, he sent twenty carloads of troops and police to order a Fatah unit to leave Karameh. When it arrived, the column found itself surrounded by men wielding machine guns; their commander said "You have three minutes to decide whether you leave or die". They withdrew.[18] By March, several hundred civilians lived in the camp, along with about 900 guerrillas, mostly from Fatah, and PLO leader Yasser Arafat, who had his headquarters there.[19]

In Israel, Chief of the Military Intelligence Directorate Aharon Yariv stated that a raid would damage Fatah's prestige. On the other hand, Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban and his chief of bureau Gideon Rafael — mindful of an adverse American reaction — worried a raid could result in innocent civilian deaths and be a political disservice to Israel. Chief of Staff (Ramatkal) Haim Bar-Lev promised a "clean action". Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Dayan asked for a "principal approval" for a raid, but this was denied by the cabinet. On December 13, Operation Karameh was scheduled for the next night , it was placed in the hands of both Brigade 35 of the Paratroop Corps and the Sayeret Matkal special-operations force. The operation was called off, rescheduled for March 12 and then called off again.[4] Dayan warned the other ministers that a bus might strike a mine.[20] On 18 March, an Israeli school bus was blown up by a mine near Be'er Ora in the Arava, killing two adults and wounding ten children.[19] This was the 38th Fatah operation in little more than three months.[8] That night, the cabinet approved the attack. The U.S. tried to prevent it by forwarding Israel a message from King Hussein. Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol called in the cabinet for further counseling; only the National Religious Party leader Haim-Moshe Shapira vocally opposed it, while Education Minister Zalman Aran opposed it but remained silent.[20] There was an intelligence informant who was a former Fatah member, code-named "Grotius". He was "familiar with the base in Karameh and its surroundings." Grotius is said to have arrived in Jordan as a member of the 421st commando battalion of the Palestine Liberation Army, on the eve of the Six-Day War . After deserting his battalion, he trained in Syria at the Hama camp and later slipped into the West Bank.[4]

Prelude

View of Damia Bridge.

On March 4, Jordanian intelligence began to detect Israeli activity near the border, as IDF troops began to concentrate near the Allenby Bridge (King Hussein Bridge) and Damia Bridge (Adam Bridge). Jordan ordered the 1st Infantry Division to take up positions near those bridges and around Karameh.[21] On March 17, Dayan warned that the Arabs were preparing for a "new wave of terror," which Israel would take steps to contain if King Hussein of Jordan could not. Eshkol repeated that message to the Knesset, and on the same day, Israeli Ambassador Yosef Tekoah filed two complaints with the United Nations against what he termed the Arabs' "repeated acts of aggression."[22]

Yasser Arafat

By March 20, Jordan had identified parts of the Israeli 7th Armored Brigade, 60th Armored Brigade, 35th Paratroop Brigade, 80th Infantry Brigade, a combat engineer battalion and five artillery battalions between those bridges. The Jordanians assumed the Israelis were planning an attack with a drive on Amman, and the army took up positions near the bridges, with the 60th Armored Brigade joining the 1st Infantry Division. Jordan also added most of its armored car, antitank and artillery units to the 1st Infantry Division. The total firepower was 105 Patton tanks and 88 artillery pieces. The infantry divisions were deployed near the bridges, each with a tank company. The artillery was mostly deployed on the higher Jordan Valley ridges overlooking Karameh for topological advantage.[21]

The Israeli forces amounted to less than a brigade of armor, an infantry brigade, a paratroop battalion, an engineering battalion and five battalions of artillery. The units were divided into four task forces. The largest of these was to cross the Allenby Bridge and reach Karameh from the south; a second one was to cross the Damiyah Bridge, and reach Karameh from the north, thus completing a pincer move. Meanwhile, paratroopers were to be lifted by helicopters into the town while the fourth force would make a diversionary attack at King Abdullah Bridge to draw the Jordanian forces from Karameh and to cover the main attack.[21]

Prior to the attack, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) dropped leaflets telling the Jordanian army that Israel had no intention to hurt them, and that they should not intervene;[23] the leaflets went unheeded. Time magazine reported the fedayeen had been warned in advance by Egyptian intelligence, and most of the 2,000 Arab commandos who used Karameh as a training base had pulled back into the surrounding hills to snipe at the Israelis. Some 200 guerrillas stayed inside to defend the town.[22] Later, Arafat's deputy, Abu Iyad, claimed in his memoirs that he and Arafat had been tipped off about the Israeli attack by Jordanian officers, who learned it from the CIA.[24]

Battle

File:Karame battle.png
Map showing the Jordanian positions (green) and the Israeli advance (blue)

At 5:30 AM on March 21, the Israeli forces attacked simultaneously on the three bridges.[25] Combat engineers built a pontoon bridge in the north and the troops crossed the river.[26] The Israeli spearheads pushed across the Allenby Bridge and advanced towards Shunat Nimreen.

At 6:30 AM, Israeli helicopters started landing the bulk of the paratrooper battalion north of Karameh.[27] An Israeli aircraft was supposed to drop leaflets addressed to Fatah, after the paratroopers had surrounded the town; however, due to difficult weather conditions, the helicopters flying the paratroopers arrived twenty minutes too late.[28] Met with resistance by Fatah commandos and Jordanian regulars supported by Jordanian artillery, the paratroopers suffered heavy losses.

When the southern task force began their drive north towards Karameh, they encountered a Jordanian infantry brigade supported by armor, artillery and antitank weapons. The Israeli Air Force launched airstrikes, but was only able to inflict minor damage on the dug-in Jordanians. Fighting from their entrenched positions, the Jordanians repelled several Israeli assaults.[26]

In the south, Jordanian artillery shelling prevented the Israelis from erecting another pontoon bridge on the site of the Abdullah bridge, halting the Israeli advance there.[29] (Israeli Colonel Gonen of the 7th Armored later claimed the action on the Abdullah bridge was merely a diversion.)

After crossing the Allenby Bridge, the 7th Armored Brigade spread in three directions from Shuna: One or more companies drove north to Karameh. An infantry battalion and a tank battalion moved east to block the Salt road. And another infantry battalion moved south to assist the force trying to break across the Abdullah Bridge.

Meanwhile, the force that crossed the Damia Bridge established itself on the east bank. Engineers began constructing a new bridge, and the force advanced east to the Musri junction. After taking Musri, their intended advance south to Karameh was repulsed by the northern brigade of the Jordanian 1st Division.

The force driving on Karameh via the Allenby bridge broke through and proceeded to the town, arriving shortly before 7:00.[30] By 8:00 the Israeli forces had taken control of the town, which turned out to be a bigger PLO base than the Israelis expected.[31] Combined with the paratroopers, this Israeli force engaged in heavy fighting against the central brigade of the 1st division and a number of Fatah fighters. Some of the paratroopers and armor drove north to operate in the Fatah camp. The paratroopers destroyed most of the camp; many of the Palestinians, including Arafat, fled eastward.[32]

The rest of the Allenby Bridge force was blocked to the east and south of Shuna, by elements of the 1st Division's central and southern brigades, and by a tank battalion from Salt.[27]

File:Karama Battle 4.jpg
Jordanian artillery battery at Karameh, 21 March 1968

A small force of Israeli infantry and armor, on the right flank of Israeli forces invading from the south, tried to protect it from attacks by the Jordanian forces deployed near the King Abdullah bridge. The Jordanians attacked with some armor, but the Israelis put up resistance, and the battle turned into a stalemate.

A large force of Israeli infantry and armor went east to block the road from Salt to the Allenby bridge, and they encountered the Jordanian 60th Armored Brigade trying to join the defense of Karameh. In the resulting battle, the Jordanians lost eight Patton tanks without destroying any Israeli tanks, then withdrew to the hills to dig in and continue firing down on the Israelis.

The Israeli Air Force launched airstrikes against Jordanian armor and artillery positions, but was unable to stop the firing.[32] Within the next two hours, Israeli artillery fire and airstrikes were launched against Jordanian defenses on the Musri-Karameh road, the Salt road, and east of Abdullah Bridge. The Israelis also consolidated their hold on Karameh with airstrikes and artillery, and began demolishing the camp.[33] A total of 175 houses were blown up.[30]

Meanwhile, Operation Asuta was mounted against a few smaller guerrilla bases south of the Dead Sea, near Safi, where the school bus had struck the mine. The bases were raided by Israeli ground forces with close air support. About 20 Jordanian soldiers and policemen and 20 Fatah fighters were killed, and 27 were taken prisoner. The Israelis suffered no casualties.[30]

Frustrated in their hope to entrap the entire PLO force, the Israelis soon pulled out, but had to fight their way back to Israeli territory.[22] At 11:00 the Israelis began to withdraw, with Sikorsky H-34 helicopters evacuating the troops.[23] Because orders came down to recover as many vehicles as possible, they only completed their withdrawal by 20:40.[29]

Casualties

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See also: Israeli casualties of war and Palestinian casualties of war

Jordanian soldiers surrounding Israeli abandoned or destroyed trucks and tanks which were later put on display in Amman at the Hashemite Plaza.

  • Karama aftermath 2.jpg
  • Karama aftermath 3.jpg
  • Karama aftermath 4.jpg
  • King Hussein - Battle of Karameh.jpg

Casualties estimates vary:

  • Israel: Chaim Herzog and Kenneth Pollack estimate 28 dead and 69 wounded;[31][34] Shabtai Teveth gives 32 killed and 70 wounded out of a force of 1,000 soldiers.[35] Benny Morris writes that Israel lost 33 dead and 161 wounded.[30] 27 Israeli tanks were damaged by Jordanian artillery, 4 of which were left behind, two half-tracks, six armored cars and 1 aircraft; 113 Squadron Dassault Ouragan,[34] although the pilot succeeded in parachuting to safety.[31] A Mirage had to crash land.[30]
  • Jordan: Zeev Maoz and Morris cite a figure of some 84 Jordanian soldiers killed and another 250 wounded. Four were captured. 30 tanks were damaged. Other estimates claim 40 dead and 108 wounded.[12]
  • PLO: Herzog: 200 dead, 150 captured; Morris: 156 dead, 141 captured;[30] Pollack: 100 dead, 100 wounded, 120–150 captured.[34] According to Morris, a further 20 PLO guerillas were killed and 27 captured during the corresponding Operation Asuta. Teveth states 170 killed and 130 taken prisoner.

Israeli command structure

Israel Defense Forces — Lieutenant General Haim Bar-Lev
Central Command — Major General (Aluf) Uzi Narkiss
80th Brigade (elements)[29] Colonel Rafael Eitan Tovia Force (reduced battalion)  
Uzi Force (reduced battalion)  
7th Armored Brigade[29] Colonel Shmuel Gonen Rotem Company  
Plada Company  
Shimshi Company  
Eitan Platoon  
35th Paratroop Brigade[36] Colonel Danny Mat 890th Battalion Lieutenant Colonel Dan Shomron
50th Battalion Lieutenant Colonel Tubi Shapira
202th Battalion (elements) Lieutenant Colonel Zvi Bar
Paratroopers Reconnaissance Unit Captain Matan Vilnai
Air Force (elements)[23] Major General (Aluf)
Mordechai Hod		 116 "Flying Wing" Squadron (leaflet drop)  
101 "First Fighter" Squadron  
105 "Scorpion" Squadron  
110 "Northern Knights" Squadron  
113 "Hornet" Squadron  
117 "First Jet" Squadron  
119 "Bat" Squadron  
124 "Rolling Sword" Squadron  
114 "Night Leaders/Super Frelon" Squadron  
Combat Engineering Corps (elements)  
Artillery Corps (elements)  

Aftermath

File:Karama aftermath 5.jpg
The destroyed Karameh camp after the battle

Israel accomplished its objective of destroying the Fatah camp,[32][31][37] and on a tactical level, the battle did indeed end in Israel's favor.[12] "The Karama operation exposed the vulnerability of PLO units deployed along the Jordan River and so they moved their concentrations up into the mountains. This imposed additional strains on them and made their operations into the West Bank even more involved and difficult than they had been hitherto."[13] Politically however, Israel was heavily condemned by the world opinion. U.S. Ambassador to the UN, Arthur Goldberg, said "We believe that the military counteractions such as those which have just taken place, on a scale out of proportion to the acts of violence that preceded it, are greatly to be deplored."[22] US Ambassador to Israel, Walworth Barbour, said that in twenty years time, a historian would write that day down as the beginning of the destruction of Israel. Eban reported the Ambassabor's statement to the cabinet, and Menachem Begin said such an utterance must not be cited in a cabinet meeting.[20]

King Hussein after checking an abandoned Israeli tank

The battle of Karameh did provide Fatah with a propaganda boost.[20] Gideon Rafael later said that "The operation gave an enormous lift to Yasser Arafat's Fatah organization and irrevocably implanted the Palestine problem onto the international agenda, no longer as a humanitarian issue of homeless refugees, but as a claim to Palestinian statehood".[16] Uzi Narkis, who commanded the operation, resigned as chief of the Central Command for a position in the Jewish Agency shortly after the battle.[2]

Jordan claimed to have won the battle and stopped an Israeli drive on Amman.[38] Hussein said on television after the battle, "I think we may reach a position where we are all fedayeen", while Arafat said "What we have done is to make the world ... realize that the Palestinian is no longer refugee number so and so, but the member of a people who hold the reins of their own destiny and are in a position to determine their own future".[16] Palestinians and Arabs generally considered the battle a psychological victory over the IDF, which had been seen as 'invincible' until then, and recruitment to guerilla units soared.[39] Fatah reported that 5,000 volunteers applied to join within 48 hours of the battle.[16] By late March, there were nearly 20,000 fedayeen in Jordan.[18]

File:Memorial to Jordanian soldiers (Karameh, Jordan).jpg
A monument in Karameh commemorating the Jordanian fighters.

Iraq and Syria offered training programs for several thousand guerrillas. The Persian Gulf states, led by Kuwait, raised money for them through a 5% tax on the salaries of their tens of thousands of resident Palestinian workers, and a fund drive in Lebanon raised $500,000 from Beirut alone. The Palestinian organizations began to guarantee a lifetime support for the families of all guerrillas killed in action.[18] Within a year after the battle, Fatah had branches in about eighty countries.[40]

After the battle, Fatah began to engage in communal projects to achieve popular affiliation.[41] The battle of Karameh and the subsequent increase in the PLO's strength are considered to have been important catalysts for the 1970 events of Black September in Jordan.[8][42]

According to Lt. Col. Arik Regev, chief of Central Command's operations branch, <templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />

Maybe I'm making the mistake of my life, but if I am, I should do it now. I have a right to my opinion, and those who don't agree with me are simply hiding from the truth. We didn't expect the Jordanian army to fight the way it did. I don't believe that the commander of the 7th Brigade thought that so many of his tanks would be hit. I'm sure that no one thought that the enemy would respond with artillery fire. You're allowed to make a mistake in assessing a situation but, it seems to me, there was a moment when the assessment could have been altered - when we saw that things weren't turning out as we had thought and that the Jordanians weren't fleeing to Amman. Had we thought that the Jordanian army would act as it did, I'm convinced the air force would have struck first.[4]

Muki Betser, a commander in the Sayeret Matkal unit of the Israel Defense Forces wrote in his book, <templatestyles src="Template:Blockquote/styles.css" />

Both military and political decision makers responsible for the operation worked to make sure the public never knew of the debacle. Instead, in newspaper interviews and speeches, the politicians and generals made Karameh sound like a smashing success.[43]

Bibliography

File:Karameh Battle.jpg
"Karameh Battle" by Mustafa Al-Hallaj, 1969
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In Culture

The Battle of Karameh was the subject of many artworks, stamps and posters.[44]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named tuckerS
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  5. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  9. ↑ Saada, Tass & Merrill, Dean Once an Arafat Man: The True Story of How a PLO Sniper Found a New Life Illinois 2008 pp 4–6 ISBN 1-4143-2361-1
  10. ↑ Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named GUERRILLAS
  11. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 Zeev Maoz, Defending the Holy Land, A Critical Analysis of Israel's Security and Foreign Policy, University of Michigan Press, 2006, pages 244–246
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 Herzog, The Arab-Israeli Wars page 205
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.(subscription required)
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 16.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Morris (1999), pp. 367–368
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.(subscription required)
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 Morris (1999), p. 368
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 20.2 20.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 21.2 Pollack (2002), pp. 331–332
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 22.2 22.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.(subscription required)
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 23.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Morris (1999), pp. 368–369
  25. ↑ Dupuy (2002), p. 352
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 Pollack (2002), pp. 332–333
  27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 Dupuy (2002), p. 353
  28. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.[dead link] (Hebrew)
  29. ↑ 29.0 29.1 29.2 29.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  30. ↑ 30.0 30.1 30.2 30.3 30.4 30.5 Morris(1999), p. 369
  31. ↑ 31.0 31.1 31.2 31.3 Herzog (1982), p. 205
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 32.2 Pollack (2002), p. 333
  33. ↑ Dupuy (2002), p. 354
  34. ↑ 34.0 34.1 34.2 Pollack (2002), p. 334
  35. ↑ Teveth, Shabtai (1969/1970) The Cursed Blessing. The story of Israel's occupation of the West Bank. Weidenfield & Nicolson. SBN 297 00150 7. Translated from Hebrew by Myra Bank. Page 261.
  36. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  37. ↑ James Rothrock, Live by the sword: Israel's struggle for existence in the Holy Land, WestBow Press (2011) p.53
  38. ↑ Pollack (2002), pp. 333–334
  39. ↑ A.I.Dawisha, Arab Nationalism in the Twentieth Century: From Triumph to Despair, Princeton University Press, 2003 p.258
  40. ↑ Kurz (2006), p. 56.
  41. ↑ Kurz (2006), p. 55
  42. ↑ Pollack (2002), p. 335
  43. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  44. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

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