Syrian Desert
The Syrian Desert covers parts of four countries: Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. It is a vast rocky plateau, not a sandy desert like the Sahara, sitting at the centre of the historical "Fertile Crescent" trade region. The desert was crossed for centuries by caravan routes connecting the Mediterranean to Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) and to Arabia, and it is home to the ruins of the ancient trading city of Palmyra.
- Areaapprox. 500,000 km²About the size of Spain
- Countries4Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Saudi Arabia
- TypeRocky desertNot sandy. Mostly stony plateau
- Rainfallapprox. 125 mm/yearMost in winter from Mediterranean storms
- Famous cityPalmyraAncient trade hub in Syria
- Hidden treasureVast oil reservesUnder the deserts of Iraq and Saudi Arabia
The Syrian Desert compared
The Syrian Desert is much smaller than the great Arabian Desert to the south but covers a vast area in its own right.
What is the Syrian Desert?
The Syrian Desert is a rocky plateau covering eastern Syria, western Iraq, northeastern Jordan, and a strip of northern Saudi Arabia. Unlike the great sand seas of the Arabian Peninsula, the Syrian Desert is mostly bare rock and gravel (called hamada), with only patches of sand. The terrain is dotted with dry wadis (river valleys) that fill briefly with water after the rare winter storms. The desert is bordered on the west by the more fertile coastal regions of Syria and Lebanon, and on the south by the vastly larger Arabian Desert.
Palmyra: queen of the desert
The greatest treasure of the Syrian Desert is the ancient city of Palmyra. Palmyra grew up around a natural oasis in the centre of the desert and became one of the wealthiest cities of the Roman Empire by controlling the trade routes between the Mediterranean and Mesopotamia. The city reached its peak in the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD. The famous Queen Zenobia ruled Palmyra in the 3rd century and briefly conquered much of the eastern Roman Empire before the Romans struck back and destroyed her empire.
The ruins of Palmyra (huge stone temples, colonnaded streets, monumental arches, towering tombs) were one of the most spectacular archaeological sites in the world until the Syrian civil war. The terror group ISIS captured Palmyra in 2015 and deliberately destroyed several of the most important monuments, including the Temple of Bel and the Arch of Triumph. Some restoration work has been done since the Syrian government recaptured the site in 2017, but the damage was severe.
The Bedouin
The traditional inhabitants of the Syrian Desert are the Bedouin, the Arab nomadic peoples who have lived here for thousands of years. The Bedouin moved between seasonal pastures with their herds of camels, sheep and goats, taking advantage of the brief winter rains that turn parts of the desert briefly green. Several major Bedouin tribes (the Rwala, the Aniza, the Shammar) ranged across the entire Syrian Desert and into the surrounding settled areas. Most Bedouin are now settled in towns rather than living as nomads, but Bedouin tribal identity remains hugely important.
The deserts and oil
Beneath the Syrian Desert in Iraq and Saudi Arabia lie some of the largest oil reserves on Earth. The famous Iraqi oil fields around Basra, Kirkuk and Rumaila all sit at the edges of the Syrian Desert. The oil has shaped the politics of the region for over a century and continues to do so. The desert oil wealth has built modern cities like Riyadh and Kuwait City, but has also fuelled wars, dictatorships and the rise of extremist groups.
Deeper dive: the Fertile Crescent, Palmyra's destruction and modern oil politics
The Syrian Desert sits at the centre of the Fertile Crescent, the arc of land where some of the world's first agricultural civilisations developed around 10,000 years ago. The Crescent runs from the Nile Valley in Egypt, north through the Levant (modern Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, western Syria), then east along the foothills of southern Turkey and northern Syria, then down the Tigris and Euphrates valleys to the Persian Gulf. Wheat and barley were first domesticated here, sheep and goats were first herded here, and the first cities (Jericho, Catalhoyuk, Eridu, Uruk) emerged here. The Syrian Desert provided a barrier between the settled valleys and a route along which trade, ideas and conquerors moved across the region.
The destruction of Palmyra by ISIS between 2015 and 2017 was one of the worst single losses of cultural heritage in modern history. The terror group dynamited the Temple of Bel (one of the most important pre-Christian temples in the eastern Roman world), the Temple of Baalshamin, the iconic Arch of Triumph, and several of the tower tombs. They also murdered Khaled al-Asaad, the 82-year-old chief archaeologist who had spent his life studying the site and refused to reveal where artefacts had been hidden. The destruction was partly ideological (ISIS regards pre-Islamic monuments as idolatry) and partly performative (videos of the destruction were used as propaganda). Restoration efforts since 2017 have included digital reconstructions and proposals to rebuild the most important monuments, though many archaeologists argue that the destroyed monuments should be preserved as ruins rather than recreated.
The oil reserves under the Syrian Desert and the wider region are the most consequential underground resource on Earth. Iraq alone holds approx. 145 billion barrels of proven reserves (about the same as Iran or the United Arab Emirates), all on land that historically formed part of the Syrian Desert and the southern Mesopotamian floodplain. Saudi Arabia's vast reserves are mostly further south but include the huge Ghawar field that extends into the desert edge. The political consequences have been enormous: oil revenues funded the rise of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, the Saudi royal family, and many other regimes; conflicts over oil contributed to the Iran-Iraq War (1980 to 1988), the Gulf War (1990 to 1991), the Iraq War (2003 onwards), and many smaller conflicts. As the world shifts away from fossil fuels, the economic and political balance of the Middle East may shift dramatically over the coming decades.
The main country is Syria. The neighbouring big desert is the Arabian Desert.