page_title: Operation Ben-Ami
section_title: The operation
hierarchical_section_title: Operation Ben-Ami / The operation
caption_attribution_description: English: Sherut Avir RWD-13 VQ-PAL dropping supplies at Kibbutz Yehiam, January 1948 עברית: ר.וו.ד-13 של שירות האוויר מטיל אספקה לקיבוץ יחיעם הנצור, ינואר 1948
context_page_description: Operation Ben-Ami was one of the last operations launched by the Haganah before the end of the British Mandate. The first phase of this operation was the capture of Acre. A week later four villages east and north of Acre were captured.
context_section_description: The operation was carried out by the Carmeli Brigade, commanded by Moshe Carmel. It took place in territory allocated to the Arab State in the 1947 United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, which was rejected by the Arab leaders and governments  that indicated an unwillingness to accept any form of territorial division. The Plan was accepted by the Yishuv, except for its fringes. The operation was launched on 13 May 1948 with the capture of villages east of Acre cutting the town off from the interior. On the night of 16/17 May, a mortar barrage was unleashed on the town and the following night it surrendered. The second phase was launched on 20 May. Carmel's operational order of 19 May read: "To attack in order to conquer, to kill among the men, to destroy and burn the villages...". One of the villages captured, al-Kabri, was singled out for particularly harsh treatment because of the villagers' involvement in the destruction of a convoy two months earlier. The Carmeli Brigade was involved in one further operation in the area on 11 June when they captured the village of al-Birwa. Ten days later a group of around 200 villagers re-took the village and remained there for two days until, on advice from the Arab Liberation Army, they withdrew and the village was retaken by newly established Israeli Army.
caption: Air dropping supplies to Yehiam, 1948
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