GEOGRAPHY
Physical Geography of the Middle East
*The Middle East is an unusual geographic area because it is not easily
defined as a continent or a part of a continent: it stretches
across Northern Africa, much of Southwest Asia, and even parts of
Europe. Consequently, it touches many bodies of water, and
contains a wide range of physical features, although almost all the
region is characterised by dry climates, principally deserts and
steppes.
*To the north and west of the region lies the Mediterranean Sea, which
links the Middle East with Europe while keeping it separate. For
centuries, the Middle East, especially the Sinai and Arabian
Peninsulas, prevented water travel from Europe to Asia, but this has
been fixed.
*Between 1858 and 1869, a French company built the Suez Canal, linking
the Mediterranean Sea) and the Red Sea. Later the British took
control of the canal, and in 1954 the Egyptian government nationalised
it.
*The Arabian Peninsula is surrounded by the Red Sea, the Arabian Sea,
and the Persian Gulf, named for Persia, the ancient name for Iran.
*Another major peninsula is Anatolia, once known as Asia Minor.
This is the region occupied by Turkey today, and once the heart of the
Eastern Roman Empire. North of Anatolia lies the Black Sea.
*There are also three major landlocked bodies of salt water (known as
seas, although they are technically lakes) in the Middle East.
*The Dead Sea, on the Israeli-Jordanian border, is the lowest point on
the Earth’s surface (at the shoreline it is 1,369 feet below sea
level), and it is the deepest salt lake in the world. It is known
as the Dead Sea because it is so salty that nothing (except a few
microscopic algae and fungi) can live in it).
*The Caspian Sea is the largest lake in the world.
*The Aral Sea, in Uzbekistan, was once the 4th largest lake in the
world, but today is barely the 8th, and it is still shrinking.
Under Soviet rule, the major rivers that fed the Aral Sea were mostly
diverted to provided water for irrigation of many different types of
crops (including cotton, which remains one of Uzbekistan’s major
exports). As the Aral Sea dries up, it leaves salt flats behind,
which poison the land, and the lack of a major body of water removes
the maritime effect which once moderated the temperatures of the
region. Although efforts have been made to save the lake (which
has, in fact, split into two smaller lakes), chances are that most of
it will eventually evaporate. The Soviets expected this, and had
no concerns. Uzbekistan is not so lucky, but cannot afford to
save the Aral Sea.
*Because the region is so dry, the Middle East’s rivers are extremely
important where they do exist.
*The Nile, in Egypt (and Sudan, and farther south) is the longest river
in the world, measuring 4,160 miles in length. Traditionally, it
flooded every year, damaging homes and other property, but depositing
rich soil that made Egypt one of the most valuable agricultural regions
in the world, and site of one of the world’s oldest major
civilisations. These deposits also created the Nile Delta, the
vast fan of depositional soil at the river’s mouth. Even today,
97% of Egypt’s people live in the Delta or the flood plain.
However, the flood cycle has been interrupted by the construction of
the Aswan High Dam between 1960 and 1970, which created Lake Nasser and
stopped the floods, while also providing cheap electricity. At
first this seemed good, but the loss of flood deposition has hurt
Egypt’s fertility, and the vast area of stagnant water has actually
increased diseases carried by water and water-based insects and snails.
*The Tigris and the Euphrates both flow out of Turkey, through Syria
and Iraq, much of which was historically known as Mesopotamia, or the
‘Land Between the Rivers.’ They empty into the Persian
Gulf. Traditionally, this made what is now Iraq one of the most
fertile regions in the Middle East, and it is where some of the oldest
empires in history began—Sumer, Assyria, and Babylon all Mesopotamian
empires at one time.
*The Jordan River is also significant, not for its length or breadth,
but for its position as the border between Israel and Jordan today, and
sometimes the site of conflict between Israelis and Arabs.
*In addition to its river valleys, the Middle East’s coastal plains
tend to be fairly fertile as well, and these, along with the river
valleys, are where most Middle Easterners live.
*There are also many highland regions in the Middle East, and some of
them create vast deserts in their rain shadows.
*The Atlas Mountains are in North Africa, and, at least in Morocco,
they benefit from the orographic effect and are fairly fertile.
Behind them, though, lies the Sahara Desert in a vast rain shadow.
*The Arabian Peninsula also suffers from the rain shadow cast by the
Hejaz and Asir Mountains along its Red Sea coast. The southern
interior of the Arabian Peninsula is so dry and barren that it has not
even been fully charted—it is known as the Empty Quarter, or Rub’ al
Khali.
*The Anatolian Plateau is in Turkey. Turkey also contains Mount
Ararat, one of the most famous mountains in the region.
*The Caucasus Mountains rise between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea,
and are home to many small ethnic groups known for their fierce
independence.
*The Zagros Mountains are in Southwestern Iran.
*Many of the mountains in this region are tectonic, created by the
movement of the plates in the Earth’s crust, and earthquakes are a
serious problem in the region, particularly in Turkey.
*Two major deserts in the region are the Sahara and the Arabian
Desert. Despite the popular image, ergs (areas covered by sand
dunes) are much less common than regs (stony plains or flat sandstone
plateaus). Some deserts are relieved by oases, however. An
oasis is simply a place where underground water comes to the surface in
an otherwise dry area, and a major oasis can often support a large
settlement or town.
*Much of the rest of the region has a steppe climate, which fosters
pastoralism, a nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle based on moving herds
of cattle or other livestock around as they feed on the natural
vegetation of the region. The term usually used for pastoralist
nomads of the Middle East is Bedouin, from an Arab word for
desert-dweller.
*Of course, the most important physical feature of the entire region is
underground—the Middle East derives much of its modern wealth and
worldwide influence from the oil found beneath its land and waters.