Omdurman, Palestine.. A Jerusalemite town in which Sudanese lived and wrote historical steadfast stories

Occupied Jerusalem -

Before the outbreak of the 1948 war and the Palestinian catastrophe, a number of Sudanese families lived in the Al-Afriqih neighborhood in the Old City of Jerusalem.

In March 1948, a group of volunteer fighters arrived in the town of Beit Safafa, south of Jerusalem, and included in their ranks Sudanese coming from the African neighborhood adjacent to Al-Aqsa Mosque after they had been recruited into the ranks of the “Holy Jihad” forces that were organized and supervised by the martyr Abdul Qader Al-Husseini. Commander of the Battle of Qastal.

This information was contained in the memoirs of Ibn Beit Safafa Hassan Ibrahim Othman, entitled "The Mountain and the Snow: Memories of Childhood, Youth and Youth in Historical Palestine 1940-1959".

In addition to these, the leadership of the Egyptian soldiers was stationed in the city of Bethlehem, and was accompanied by some Sudanese, Saudi, Yemeni and Libyan units, the majority of whom were volunteers to defend Palestine, and light forces.

The people of Beit Safafa do not forget that their town was at that time a station for the Sudanese forces, until it was called "Omdurman" Palestine.

In his memoirs, Hassan Ibrahim Othman says, "I will never forget how the masses came out welcoming these soldiers, cheering, arrogance, ululating and chanting, imagining that the liberation of Jerusalem is coming inevitably because these young people came to save Palestine, but the problem was more complex than they imagined in this pure spot and the cradle of the monotheistic religions. ".

They are known for their safety

While the battles were taking place in the vicinity of Beit Safafa, life went on in a normal routine, and the people practiced their work, and alongside the fighting soldiers, Sudanese worked as guards in several places in the town and were known for their honesty.

Among them is the guard of the "Al-Asali Factory for the Production of Ice and Ice Cream", which was supposed to start production in 1948, but the outbreak of war and displacement prevented this project from coming into existence.

In his book, Othman describes this Sudanese guard's long hours of wandering around the factory building before taking a rest in his small hut on the left side of the factory entrance.

Another Sudanese guard was famous for his honesty during his work on the Beit Safafa buses (No. 44). After the end of their daily trips to Bab Al-Khalil (one of the gates of the Old City in Jerusalem), this guard used to wash the new buses from the dust of the dirt road that connected Beit Safafa to Jerusalem. .

Al-Maqdisi Muhammad Jadallah at his home in the town of Tire Baher, south of Jerusalem, recounts his memories of receiving Sudanese fighters (Al-Jazeera)

Dedication to the defense of Jerusalem

Muammar al-Maqdisi Muhammad Jadallah from the town of Sur Baher, a neighbor of Beit Safafa, who joined the ranks of the "Holy Jihad" within the Fourth Company, "The Third Regiment" at the rank of first lieutenant, recounts his memories with the Sudanese units.

He says that dozens of Sudanese have already gone to fight in the town of Beit Safafa, and that only 7 of them have come to fight in the town of Sur Baher with the Egyptian army.

He continued, "I met them for the first time at Jacir Palace, which was the headquarters of the Egyptian army command in Bethlehem, then I returned to Sur Baher and we received them at the entrance to the town, and as soon as they entered the Sudanese chanted (Your Majesty, Maulana, we are your servants, do not forget us), and the dedication of these people to defend the land of Jerusalem. Some of them refused to return to Sudan after orders were issued to withdraw the Arab armies.

This was also confirmed by the daughter of the town of Beit Safafa, Magda Sobhi, whose family reconciled a friendship with a Sudanese, as a volunteer in the Sudanese units frequented the family home for many years after refusing to leave the town during the withdrawal of the Arab armies, and decided to stay in Jerusalem "until it is liberated," according to Magda, who It is likely that the name "Omdurman" was given to the town because most of the Sudanese who came to defend it came from this particular city.

The Jerusalemite lady mentions that a Sudanese named "Hamayel" frequented her family's home to sit with her parents until the seventies of the last century, constantly wearing the Sudanese "galabiya and aunt", and her mother would call out to her daughters to prepare food or coffee for "Al-Tayeb Hamayel" as soon as he saw him approaching the house.

Magda Sobhi does not know what happened to this man later, as she heard from some elderly people in Beit Safafa that he married in Jerusalem and lived in the town until his death and was buried in its cemetery.

Al-Yuzbashi, leader of the Beit Safafa campaign

The story of "Hamayel" brings to mind the tales of the courage of other Sudanese in defending the town's lands during the year of the Nakba (1948) and beyond, as the Sudanese units that accompanied the Egyptian forces were assigned the task of defending the area of ​​the Chest Diseases Hospital.

As for the militant forces of the "Holy Jihad", which included a large number of Sudanese and Palestinians, they were tasked with confronting the attacks of the Israeli forces on 4 axes: the El Alamein camp, the Makur Haim settlement (south of Jerusalem) and the Qatamon and Malha neighborhoods, according to the memoirs of "The Mountain and the Snow."

Among the most prominent leaders of these units of volunteers in Beit Safafa was Al-Yuzbashi - an Ottoman rank equivalent to the current captain - Muhammad Ali Mustafa, a Sudanese of origin who lived in the Al-Afariqa neighborhood in Jerusalem. His soldiers were in Beit Safafa until the arrival of the Egyptian forces, who raised him to the rank of Al-Yuzbashi, in appreciation and reward for his steadfastness and response to the repeated attacks of the Zionist Haganah gang on Beit Safafa.

As for the memories of the spring of 1949, Hassan Ibrahim Othman recounts them in his memoirs, saying that after the signing of the “Rhodes Agreement” in mid-April, which stipulated a ceasefire, the Egyptian forces and the Sudanese, Libyan and Yemeni units began evacuating their barracks and bases in preparation for the departure from the southern Jerusalem front. Including Beit Safafa.

The Sudanese Yuzbashi Muhammad Ali Mustafa, "and was called the leader of the Beit Safafa garrison", refused to sign the document dividing the town, which was brought by the United Nations observers, and recorded a heroic stance in the face of the new Israeli occupation authority, before the pages of the Arab struggle were folded in Jerusalem.

More than 7 decades after the Palestinian catastrophe, Jerusalemites are still to this day singing what the Sudanese fighters did for their city, which many of them left but did not leave.