General Allenby began on the Wednesday night by attacking the
Turkish left, strongly posted in the wild hills round Shiloh, west of the Jordan. Our infantry made slow but steady progress, and gained command of all but one of the roads leading from the Turkish headquarters at Shechem (Nablus) to the Jordan crossing at Jisr ed Damieh. At dawn on Thursday week General Allenby delivered his main attack on the Turkish right, on the fifteen-mile stretch from Rafat, on Mount Ephraim, across the Plain of Sharon to the sea at Arsuf. The Turks resisted stubbornly in successive lines of fortified works, but nothing could stop our astonishing infantry, with the French in the post of honour on our right. In three hours they had broken through and opened a road for the cavalry. Within twelve hours some Indian battalions had marched forward twenty-two miles and seized Tul Keram Junction, to the north-west of Shechem, while the Australian Light Horse, in front of them, cut the railway further east at Anebta, in the Turkish rear. The infantry, having shattered the Turkish right, then turned and, marching due east upon Sheehan, rolled up the Turkish centre.
