Haganah forces engaged in the occupation of eastern Galilee assaulted al-Qudayriyya on 4 May 1948, during Operation Yiftach (see Abil al-Qamh, Safad sub-disctrict). That attack resulted in the expulsion of the village's population by the occupying units, according to Israeli historian Benny Morris, who gives no further details. The occupation of the village was also reported at the time by the commander of the Arab Liberation Army (ALA), Fawzi al-Qawuqji. In a cable sent the following day, he indicated that the ALA's Second Yarmuk Battalion had defended the area. The assault on the village was part of a suboperation, Operation Matate (Broom), which was designed to 'sweep' Palestinians out of an area in the Jordan Valley between the Jordan River and the north-south road. Morris presents evidence that some of the other villages seized in the same operation were almost immediately laid to waste by occupying Haganah units who were ordered to blow up their houses. The offensive came roughly a week before the capture of Safad and was carried out, in part, to increase the pressure on the city before the final attack. The devastation of the villages occupied during Operation Matate had a 'tremendous psychological impact' on other communities in eastern Galilee, according to operational commander Yigal Allon. 
