צה״ל ẒAHAL entered جنين JENIN.

The existing institutional battle account dates entry to around noon on 3 June. The 2 June diary instead discusses progress through villages and positions north of the town; it cannot establish that those reports already meant possession of the urban center. The urban battle and approach operations require separate treatment.^{1 2}

Historian Mustafa Kabha’s Arabic reconstruction places fighting on 2 June and describes control of most surrounding hills and much of the town during the following fighting. His account shows why the beginning of the wider battle and the date of the urban entry can differ:

ᴏʀɪɢɪɴᴀʟ:

استطاعت القوات الإسرائيلية السيطرة على معظم التلال المحيطة بمدينة جنين³

ᴛʀᴀɴꜱʟᴀᴛɪᴏɴ:

Israeli forces gained control of most of the hills surrounding Jenin.⁴

That is a later scholarly reconstruction, not a same-day dispatch or proof that all neighborhoods were held simultaneously.

Kabha describes Iraqi command and local armed participation in recovering positions. The 4 June diary independently records a decision to retreat and evacuation at dawn. The withdrawal is dated and studied separately in צה״ל ẒAHAL withdrew from جنين JENIN.. A battlefield entry is not a completed liberation if the invading and local enemy forces regain it.⁵

The diary combines killed, wounded and missing in a 150-person estimate. Kabha supplies larger estimates with different scope and categories. None is a final shared nominal roll; they cannot be summed. Kabha also describes residents leaving during combat and returning after recovery of the town. That sequence does not establish a permanent expulsion of all its inhabitants.

3 June 1948 is the supported civil date. Its daytime Hebrew conversion is כ״ה באייר ה׳תש״ח 25th 𝑜𝑓 Iyar, AM 5708; an event after local sunset belongs to כ״ו באייר ה׳תש״ח 26th 𝑜𝑓 Iyar, AM 5708. The existing institutional source dates urban entry to 3 June around noon. Kabha dates the wider fighting from 2 June. Approach operations and town entry are distinguished; original unit logs remain needed to settle the sequence. The 4 June diary dates the subsequent retreat. ⁶

• Why does taking surrounding hills not establish possession of every neighborhood?
• How does the next morning’s withdrawal change the meaning of entry into the town?