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Every year since 2010, on September 23, Israel celebrates Haifa Day, honouring the Indian soldiers who fought in the 1918 Battle of Haifa during the First World War.

The Palestinian Embassy in New Delhi has written a letter to MPs on September 15 and screened a documentary at its premises on September 18. The crux of both, the letter and the documentary, is Israel’s characterisation of the British occupation of the Palestinian city of Haifa as its ‘liberation’ and its attempts to embed this characterisation in Indian discourse as part of ‘shared history’.

The Battle of Haifa was fought on September 23, 1918, towards the end of World War I, as part of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign in which the British, French and Italy fought alongside the Arab Revolt in opposition to the Ottomans, Germans, and Austro-Hungarians. Ottoman troops were supported by German and Austro-Hungarian artillery. The British command, under General Allenby, deployed the 15th Imperial Service Cavalry Brigade which was a military force largely drawn from Indian princely states, Jodhpur, Mysore, and Hyderabad. 

The Jodhpur Lancers were tasked with the main frontal charge while the Mysore Lancers moved to attack from the east and north, first climbing the steep slopes of Mount Carmel to silence Austrian artillery that would otherwise have cut the advancing cavalry apart. Command of the Jodhpur Lancers on the day fell to Major Dalpat Singh Shekhawat who was killed during the charge. The Ottoman troops broke, fled toward the town square, and surrendered. 

Liberation or occupation

The central question of the Embassy’s letter to the Parliament is: if the Battle of Haifa........

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