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Thursday, September 1, 2011

Arabian desert


Arabian desert
Desert region, Arabian Peninsula.

Photograph:The Rubʿ al-Khali sand desert, most of which lies within Saudi Arabia.
The Rubʿ al-Khali sand desert, most of which lies within Saudi Arabia.



It covers about 900,000 sq mi (2,330,000 sq km), occupying nearly the entire peninsula. It lies largely within Saudi Arabia but large portions extend into Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, and Yemen. Its relief is broken by a number of mountain ranges, with elevations reaching as high as 12,000 ft (3,700 m), and it is bounded on three sides by high escarpments. At least one-third of the desert is covered by sand, including the Rubʿ al-Khali, considered to have one of the most inhospitable climates on Earth. There are no perennial bodies of water, though the Tigris-Euphrates river system lies to the northeast and the Wadi ajr is located to the south, in Yemen. Humans have inhabited the area since Pleistocene times.
Source: Britannica encyclopedia