Word: djebel
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...which had been assigned the job of clearing the rim of the plain of Tunis and running out on to the plain itself. The First had done most of this job. The height known as Long Stop Hill (TIME, May 3) was firmly in its hands. One last hill, Djebel bou Aoukaz, known to the troops as The Bou, remained before the open plain. The hill was British one day and German the next. At week's end the hill was German...
...strongest areas lie on the flanks. From Sedjenane to Djebel el Ang on the northeast, and from Enfidaville to Djebel Sefsouf on the southwest (see map), the mountain chains are steep, and provide a natural defense in depth. But in the center there are two areas where the fortress walls are weak. These are the broad valleys of Tunisia's two main rivers: the Medjerda and the Miliana...
...Fahs - and last week Field Marshal Kesselring could see that his adversaries were aware of the logic. They seemed to be clearing the way, patiently and fiercely, for drives up Tunisia's center alleys. They spent the week clearing the outer walls of the alleys. French troops took Djebel Sefsouf on the one hand. British troops took Djebel el Ang on the other-a hill from which, on clear days, Tunis is visible 35 miles away. Kesselring, seeing the danger, took the hill back; the Allies retook it and held...
Field Marshal Kesselring could and probably did expect the Allies to take other commanding heights (such as the beachhead's highest hill, 4,250-ft. Djebel Zaghouan) and then, when artillery and lookouts commanded the lesser places, to drive up the broad valleys. Doubtless he had concentrated in those valleys the things which General Eisenhower last week said had become, not just an obstacle, but a weapon in Tunisia-the land mine. On the hills Kesselring was deeply dug in, with plenty of the 81-mm. mortars which have always been a weapon but are especially an obstacle...
...louder noise came. It was an artillery barrage-the heaviest since El Alamein. It concentrated on Djebel Roumana, and when it had walked back & forth across the hill for a couple of hours, British infantry rose up from the wild barley growing in the sand and stormed the height...