The Corps was formed in Palestine in June 1917 under Lieutenant General Philip Chetwode.

[1] Following the British failure in the Second Battle of Gaza, the Egyptian Expeditionary Force underwent a major rearrangement with the appointment of General Edmund Allenby as the new Commander-in-Chief.

The corps initially comprised four infantry divisions:[2] The XX Corps first saw action in the Beersheba phase of the Third Battle of Gaza on 31 October 1917.

[2] The 60th and 74th Divisions captured Turkish outposts west of the town but were not involved in the final assault.

Following Beersheba on 6 November, the corps made a frontal assault against the Turkish fortifications in the vicinity of Sheria where the 10th, 60th and 74th Divisions succeeded in breaking through.