Although the strategic priorities of Enver Pasha and the Ottoman general staff, were to push the EEF back to the Suez Canal and retake Baghdad, Mesopotamia, and Persia, the EEF was fortunate that the victorious Ottoman forces, were not in a position in April 1917, to launch a large-scale counterattack immediately after their second victory at Gaza. Such an attack against rudimentary EEF defences on the northern edge of the Negev could have been disastrous for the EEF. Instead, both sides constructed permanent defences stretching from the sea west of Gaza to Shellal on the Wadi Ghazzeh. From Shellal, the lightly-entrenched EEF line extended to El Gamli before continuing south to Tel el Fara. The western sector (stretching from Gaza to Tel el Jemmi) was strongly entrenched, wired and defended by EEF and Ottoman infantry. The eastern sector, stretching east and south across the open plain, was patrolled by Desert Column's mounted infantry and yeomanry. At every opportunity patrols and outposts harassed opposing forces, while wells and cisterns were mapped.