High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Battle of Rafa (officially referred to by the British as the "Action of Rafah,") took place on 9 January 1917 at el Magruntein to the south of Rafa, close to the frontier between the Sultanate of Egypt`s Sinai Peninsula and the Ottoman Empire, and in the area to the north and east of Sheikh Zowaiid. This was to be the third and final battle in the Sinai theatre of the Sinai and Palestine Campaign during the First World War. A British Empire attacking force defeated an Ottoman Empire garrison entrenched in a series of strategically strong redoubts.