Israel has an ambitious proposal to construct a 160-mile canal which would connect the Red Sea to the Mediterranean, traversing the Negev Desert and the south end of the Gulf of Aqaba.
Such a waterway, tentatively named the Ben-Gurion Canal, would bypass the Suez Canal and challenge Egypt’s long-standing monopoly of the crucial shipping route between Europe and Asia.
The proposed canal would begin at the Israeli port city of Eilat on the Red Sea, cross the Jordanian border, flow through the Arabah Valley and enter the Dead Sea before heading northward around the Gaza Strip, eventually reaching the Mediterranean.
The canals’ dimensions would dwarf the depth of the Suez Canal by 10 metres, facilitating the smooth passage of the world’s largest ships – which measure up to 110 metres in width and 300 in length.
The estimated cost of this undertaking is a staggering $100 billion, or £77 billion.
Supporters of the project predict that the canal would generate annual revenues of £7.7 billion through trade, as well as acting as a powerful tool in curtailing China’s growing economic power and its ambitious Belt and Road Initiative.
The fact that the canal’s walls would be made of rock instead of sand, like in the Suez Canal, would also mean less maintenance would be required.
There are, however, significant security concerns due to the ongoing conflicts in the region.
The project is named after Israel’s founding father and prominent Zionist leader from Poland, David Ben-Gurion. It was first conceived in the late 1960s. Ben-Gurion served as the country’s first prime minister in 1948.
Egypt blocked Israeli vessels from accessing the Suez Canal from 1948 to 1950, affecting its ability to trade with East Africa and Asia and hampered its ability to import oil from the Gulf region.
There were periods where the canal was closed to all international shipping, including eight years starting in 1967 at the beginning of the Six-Day War, fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab states, including Egypt.
An Israeli alternative, the country believes, would eliminate the potential use of the Suez Canal and the Straits of Tiran.
Some optimistically believe the canal could also catalyse regional cooperation and peace. If Israel and Palestine were to reach a mutually agreeable solution, such as a two-state model or a union of independent states, the canal could transverse both territories and foster economic interdependence.
“As the global economy continues to evolve and power dynamics shift, the Ben-Gurion Canal could emerge as a game-changer, reshaping trade routes, bolstering regional economies, and potentially redefining geopolitical alliances in the Middle East and beyond,” the Israeli national newspaper Israel Haymon argued.