Page:Harry Charles Luke and Edward Keith-Roach - The Handbook of Palestine (1922).djvu/21

2 estimated population (1922) of about 754,500. Of these about 583,000 are Moslems, 84,500 Christians, and 79,300 Jews. These figures do not include the garrison.

General.—'Within the limits of a province,' it is stated in the High Commissioner's interim report on Palestine for 1920–21, Palestine 'offers the varieties of soil and climate of a continent. It is a country of mountain and plain, of desert and pleasant valleys, of lake and sea-board, of barren hills, desolate to the last degree of desolation, and of broad stretches of deep, fruitful soil.' The most important geographical fact in Palestine is the deep fissure of the Jordan Valley, which divides Palestine proper so distinctly from Trans-jordania. Palestine is, generally speaking, a mountainous plateau which forms an extension of the Lebanon chain and runs southwards till it loses itself in the desert or is linked up with the mountainous part of the Sinai Peninsula. More than two-thirds of the country lie on the western side of the watershed, and on the western side the slopes are gradual; on the east they are precipitous and are broken by valleys of great depth.

The country may be divided into three sub-regions, the coastal plain, the mountainous plateau, and the desert.

The Coastal Plain.—The coastal plain varies considerably in width between Acre, its northern, and Gaza, its southern extremity. At Acre its width is about 4 miles; farther south, at Haifa, it widens out into the Plain of Esdraelon, which intersects the whole country; south of Haifa, as it rounds the buttress of Mount Carmel, it is reduced to a bare 200 yards. Southwards from Athlit it expands to a width of about 20 miles, its breadth at Ascalon. The coastal plain, the northern portion of which is known as the Plain of Sharon, is on the whole extremely fertile, although covered in parts with a shallow layer of sand; of proverbial fertility, too, is the Plain of Esdraelon, also known in Hebrew times as Armageddon.