Palestine Canal. Feasible?

Philip

Donor
Forget the Suez Canal. Don't bother reviving the Pharaonic Canal. Let's use the Jordan Rift Valley to connect the Mediterranean and Red Seas. Look at the map. I am thinking about a sea-level canal like the Suez, so much of valley will be flooded. The Dead Sea and Sea of Galilee will both be absorbed.

Is it feasible? When could it be done? Do you need modern industry (steam shovels and such) to do it as in Panama? Or, can it be done with massed human labor like the old Pharaonic Canal? Other questions like that.



(The base map comes from the Wiki)

palestineCanal.jpg
 

Valdemar II

Banned
Israel_Topography.png


Are it possible, but if it happens the least change are the canal. Let imagine a insane crusader kingdom does this, while they have just floooded the most fertile part of the country they have also created a giant moat to the east, which even help cutting Egypt of from Syria. Of course while it has lost much of the fertile parts the dry parts are going to be more fertile, it may even end up better off. Beside that Transjordan turn much more fertile and give the Crusader better access, so we may very well see a drive to the east with a new kingdom establish on the eastside of the new Jordan Gulf.
 
Seems a little impractical since you've got a much shorter (and cheaper!) route not too far off in the Suez... The Labor requirements for such a project (not to mention cost!) would be astronomical!

Also keep in mind that by making the canal you'd be getting rid of some of the best arable land in Palestine (not to mention flooding areas used for centuries!

Furthermore the Jordan River, an extremely important source of fresh-water in the region would be effectively gone ruining the agricultural productivity of the region.

A Palestine Canal would be a disaster from start to finish.
 

Philip

Donor
The Labor requirements for such a project (not to mention cost!) would be astronomical!

Are they? The actual parts that have to be dug aren't that long, and the terrain doesn't look that rough. Gravity will take care of much of the work.

I can't imagine that it would require more labor than Panama.

Also keep in mind that by making the canal you'd be getting rid of some of the best arable land in Palestine (not to mention flooding areas used for centuries!

Bhah! We can't let that stand in the way of progress!

A Palestine Canal would be a disaster from start to finish.

That is half the fun.
 
Looking at the map, it looks like you'd have to excavate through some 200m of solid rock to get from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Aqaba, if you wanted a sea level canal.

If you want a locked canal, then you need to pump water uphill, because, unlike Panama or Nicaragua, you don't have convenient water to supply the locks.

So, ja, I'd say 20th, 21st century tech needed. And, as others have said: WHY!?! The Suez is SO much better and easier.
 

Giladis

Banned
Not a good idea because of the plate tectonics. You would have one end of the canal on the African plate and the other on the Arabian plate. Any dams would be really stressed after a few years and just basically flooding the area could result in a climatic disaster due to the way water circulates in the Mediteranium.
 

Philip

Donor
So, ja, I'd say 20th, 21st century tech needed.
Thanks

And, as others have said: WHY!?! The Suez is SO much better and easier.

Perhaps. Country A holds the Nile and Western Sinai. Country B holds Palestine, but care little for it. Country B wants connection between Med and Red, but Country A is not cooperative.


Oh, and you're probably going to drown several Christian holy sites, so I doubt any European group would do it.

Agreed. Of course, the builder might not care much for those sites.

Not a good idea because of the plate tectonics. You would have one end of the canal on the African plate and the other on the Arabian plate.

But that's not going to be recognized until when? Mid 20th Century OTL?

just basically flooding the area could result in a climatic disaster due to the way water circulates in the Mediteranium.

Again, this assumes some rather recent knowledge, doesn't it?
 
just basically flooding the area could result in a climatic disaster due to the way water circulates in the Mediterranean.
I can't see forming the enlarged Jordan Sea having any affect on the Med.

I plan to have Maxwell Smart [Great Israel TL] build the Aqaba half in the 1930's, with a major power station at the Dead Sea end.
While it will be promoted as Power, & keeping the Dead Sea from evaporating, He will also be looking at the Canal as a long established Border/Moat, for post Mandate times.
 
Why not use one of the existing wadis as the basis for the canal, like the one under the 32nd parallel? (Though it could change the composition of the Dead Sea, regardless.)
 
If you really need to supplant the Suez Canal, wouldn't an Aqaba Canal be a better idea? The sheer fact of touching the River Jordan would make every Christian, Muslim, and (not that anyone cares) Jew revolt.
 
If you really need to supplant the Suez Canal, wouldn't an Aqaba Canal be a better idea? The sheer fact of touching the River Jordan would make every Christian, Muslim, and (not that anyone cares) Jew revolt.

Well, wouldn't a canal using the River Jordan make it easier for fish to survive in the Dead Sea?
 

Giladis

Banned
I wasn't talking about people of that time to actually be aware of it but more of a fact that should they build damns, these will become very stressed over a few years due to the continental drift.

The same is if you just reduce everything to sea level with no damns. The speed of the current between Mediteran and the Red Sea would be hazardus to shiping.

Who ever decides to build such a project will be in a lot of trouble one way or another.
 
seems that this would be a salt water canal...can't see how that would be a good thing. You might be able to divert the jordan into a series of reservoirs, but still i think the entire endeavour would be a fiasco.
but what a glorious fiasco!
:cool:

although it just might bring more moisture and humidity into the interior deserts, maybe even greening them up enough to make the whole project worth the astronomical cost in money and men
 
Plowshare resurfaces!

Basically, a series of underground nuclear detonations to collapse the surface on the Egypt/Israel border. Fallout kept deep underground and a moat/canal between the Med west of Gaza (or through Gaza, if you're really moody) to the Gulf of Aquaba. Israel and Gaza have a massive entrepot trade and the Suez Canal can be left to silt up.

Simples!:D
 
That creates an interesting geopolitical situation in the future;

With Palestine only connecting to land via the Sinai, might it eventually be seen as part of Africa?
 

Cook

Banned
As an open canal like the Suez it’s not feasible.

As a canal with locks like Panama it may be possible but it would never be competitive with Suez so why would you?
And a locked canal between Gaza and Aqaba would be shorter, requiring less digging, less raising and lowering of water and therefore less locks.
 
Are it possible, but if it happens the least change are the canal. Let imagine a insane crusader kingdom does this, while they have just floooded the most fertile part of the country they have also created a giant moat to the east, which even help cutting Egypt of from Syria. Of course while it has lost much of the fertile parts the dry parts are going to be more fertile, it may even end up better off. Beside that Transjordan turn much more fertile and give the Crusader better access, so we may very well see a drive to the east with a new kingdom establish on the eastside of the new Jordan Gulf.

Transjordan would become totally uninhabitable, not more fertile - you've just dumped sea water into the river system!

But this is definitely a feasible project - it was studied in the 19th c by the British, who were considering it.

Technically feasible, but probably not economically. It would be much more expensive than Suez, with a much smaller workforce available, and the section from the sea to the Jordan would be really difficult.

I don't think it would be technologically possible before the 19th c.
 
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