chapter 21 slides: GEO

1. Southwest Asia
Physical Geography

2. Section 1: Landformsand Resources
 1967 Syria and Israel fought over control of the Golan Heights - overlooks Jordan
River and Sea of Galilee - strategic landform for water supply
 Landforms - range from green coastal plains to snow-peaked mountains - not
what people always think
 Region is land bridge connecting Africa, Asia, and Europe; mountains are still
growing because of tectonic plates - collisions of plates
 Peninsulas and waterways
 Arabian peninsula - separated from Africa by Red Sea and from Asia by Persian
Gulf
 Anatolian peninsula - part of Turkey, marks beginning of Asian continent
 Peninsulas are strategic for waterways - Mediterranean Sea, Suez Canal, Red
Sea, Black Sea, Bosporus Strait, Dardenelles Strait, Straits of Hormuz - trade
with surrounding regions, transporting oil

3.  Plains and Highlands
 Arabian peninsula is covered by plains; barren land with wadis (riverbeds dry except for
during wet season); people live nomadic lives
 Iran is plateau surrounded by mountains - highlands, land is stony, salty, sandy desert;
much of Anatolian peninsula is plateau as well.
 Mountains
 Rugged mountains divide the land and countries - create isolation
 Hindu Kush Mountains of Afghanistan - landlocked and mountainous country - isolation
 Zagros Mountains - western Iran
 Elburz Mountains - south of Caspian Sea
 Taurus Mountains - separate Turkey from rest of Southwest Asia
 Water Bodies
 Almost completely surrounded by bodies of water
 Vital for trade and access to region and rest of world
 Tigris, Euphrates - Fertile Crescent - flow through Turkey, Syria, Iraq; empty into Persian
Gulf
 Jordan River - flow from mountains of Lebanon; natural boundary between Israel and
Jordan; flows into salty Dead Sea
 The Dead Sea is so salty only bacteria can live there; 1,349 feet below sea level - lowest place
on Earth

4.  Resources of region:
 1/2 of world’s oil reserves found in Southwest
Asia
 Valuable resource: water; water is plentiful in
Turkey, Iran, Lebanon, Afghanistan, scarce in
other places
 Coal, metallic, copper, potash, phosphates -
scattered and not very large

5. Section 2: Climateand Vegetation
 Arid Lands
 Southwest Asia extremely arid
 Most areas less than 18 inches of precipitation a year
 Most rivers do not flow all year long
 Irrigation key to produce efficient farmland
 Also, Mediterranean climate, ranges of mountains and plateaus
 Deserts Limit Movement
 Rub al-Khali - most famous desert - Empty Quarter - place where no one comes out
(size of Texas); summer temperatures - 150 degree F
 An-Nafud Desert - occasional oasis - vegetation found because of water
(underground springs)
 Syrian Desert - north from An-Nafud
 Negev Desert - occupies parts of Israel
 Salt Deserts - because of rain shadow of mountain ranges; high mountains block
rain, dry winds increase evaporation, chemical salts remain
 Dasht-e Kavir and the Dasht-e Lut - lands are salt crusted, surrounded by
quick sand-like salt marshes, extremely hot

6.  Semiarid Lands
 On edges of deserts - semiarid climate -
support grass, shrubs - cotton and wheat can
be grown
 Good pasture for animals - in Turkey - goats
 Coast Lands
 Mediterranean coast across Turkey = hot
summers and rainy winters; heavily populated
areas

7. Section 3: Human-Environment
Interaction
 For real, for real: In ‘77 Saudi prince Muhammad ibn Faisal tried to buy
icebergs from Antarctica…why? What might this suggest about the
needs of the area?
 Would you exchange water for oil? Oil is abundant in the region,
however, water is not. How does this affect the people, the life, the
cultures of this area?
 Dams and Irrigation Systems
 Turkey is building man-made lake on Euphrates River - why might this be
controversial?
 Israel’s National Water Carrier project carries water from northern part to central
and southern Israel (comes from Golan Heights, Jordan River, Sea of Galilee
 Drip Irrigation: slowly drips water just above ground to conserve water (reduce
evaporation)
 Desalinization: removal of salt from ocean water (still may be too salty for irrigation)
 Fossil water: pumped from underground aquifers
 Qanat: a system of underground brick-lined tunnels (collects runoff water from
mountains)
 Noria: waterwheel run by the flow of water or by animal power

8.  Oil: 1/2 of all petroleum reserves in the world; huge for economy
 Oil and natural gas deposits formed millions of years ago when sea
covered area of Southwest Asia; plants and animals lived and died in
waters; remains sank, mingled with mud and sand - formed basis of oil
and gas
 Oil and natural gas are trapped in rocks - oil must be extracted from
layers of rock - not discovered in some parts until 1920s and 30s
 Exploration during late 1800s until WWII and then again after WWII
 Petroleum not processed is called crude oil; must be pumped from
ground to refinery, which converts oil into useful products; pipelines
transport crude oil; see processing petroleum on page 498
 Placement of pipelines depends on ports and access to worldwide
markets; most along Persian Gulf
 Risks with transporting oil: oil spills (1991 - largest ever)