New Zealand in the Middle East

New Zealand in the Middle East

Learn about the men who fought in the Sinai and Palestine Campaigns between 1916 and 1918.

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Sinai and Palestine Campaigns

In April 1916, following the withdrawal from Gallipoli, the men of the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade crossed the Suez Canal into the Sinai Desert. For the next 2½ years the New Zealanders fought against Ottoman forces, helping to push them across Sinai and into Ottoman Palestine, eventually launching raids across the Jordan River. By the end of October 1918, the Ottoman Empire had been forced out of the war.

Sinai-Palestine Map