Battle of Tel Hai
| Battle of Tel Hai | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of The Franco-Syrian War and the Sectarian conflict in Mandatory Palestine | |||||||
 The Lion of Judah, Joseph Trumpeldor's memorial in Tel Hai |
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| Belligerents | |||||||
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| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Joseph Trumpeldor † | Kamal Al Hussein | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| Dozens | Hundreds | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 8 killed | 5 killed | ||||||
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The Battle of Tel Hai was fought in March 1920 during the Franco-Syrian War between Arab irregulars under the banner of the Arab Kingdom of Syria and a Jewish defensive paramilitary force protecting the village of Tel Hai in Northern Galilee. In the course of the event, a Shiite Arab militia, accompanied by Bedouin from a nearby village, attacked the Jewish agricultural locality of Tel Hai. In the aftermath of the battle eight Jews and five Arabs were killed. Joseph Trumpeldor, the commander of Jewish defenders of Tel Hai, was shot in the hand and stomach, and died while being evacuated to Kfar Giladi that evening. Tel Hai was eventually abandoned by the Jews and burned by the Arab militia.
The event is perceived by some scholars as the first significant outbreak of violence, eventually leading to the Arab–Israeli conflict three decades later.
Tel Hai had been intermittently inhabited since 1905 and was permanently settled as a border outpost in 1918, following the defeat of the Ottoman Empire in World War I.
The area was subsequently subject to intermittent border adjustments between the British and the French. The Franco-Syrian War took place in early 1920 between Syrian Arab nationalists, under the Hashemite King, and France. Gangs ('isabat) of clan-based border peasants, combining politics and banditry, were active in the area of the loosely defined border between the soon to be established Mandatory Palestine, French Mandate of Lebanon and Syria.
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