Day 231 of 599 of מלחמת העצמאות MILḤEMET HAʾAẒMAʾUT (War of Independence)

דוד בן-גוריון DAVID BEN-GURION blocked the instruction to uproot the Arab residents after resistance within the command. The July 18 diary describes the intervention as occurring yesterday. The disagreement concerns responsibility for an order, not evidence that the entire population was expelled. Expulsion of Arab residents of נצרת NAẒRAT was blocked. follows the command chain and the earlier surrender undertaking. ¹

Operation קדם KEDEM did not breach the walls. A 06:30 command telegram described shelling from 21:30 on July 16 and retreat at approximately 05:30 on July 17. הארגון HAʾIRGUN and לח״י LEḤI cooperated with עציוני ʿEẒYONI troops. The four killed, twenty wounded and eighteen missing in the diary’s Qula passage are not this assault’s losses. Operation קדם KEDEM failed. separates the overnight assault from nearby fighting. ²

Ben-Ze’ev’s scholarly reconstruction identifies another air attack on إجزم IJZIM on July 17, citing IDF Archives file 922/1975/1176. It preceded the countrywide truce. The original sortie record and civilian casualty list remain unexamined; the attack is part of the documented sequence rather than a newly invented beginning of Operation שוטר ŜOTER. ³

TJD uses the fixed Hebrew calendar for Gregorian civil-date conversion. This is Day 231 of the 599-day civil-date series: 1948-07-17. Its daytime public route is י׳ בתמוז ה׳תש״ח 10th 𝑜𝑓 Tamuz, AM 5708; after local sunset the Hebrew date is י״א בתמוז ה׳תש״ח 11th 𝑜𝑓 Tamuz, AM 5708. The route identifies the recap, not the occurrence date of every component. The sections distinguish occurrence from dispatch, issue date, retrospective diary report and later investigation. ⁴ Operation קדם KEDEM began after sunset on July 16 and ended before dawn July 17, within 10 תמוז TAMUZ; the July 18 diary supplies July 17 for the נצרת NAẒRAT intervention.

• How did the same day reveal both restraint and disagreement within ישראלי YISRAʾELI command?
• Why must the unsuccessful assault and Qula’s reported losses remain distinct?