'A handbook of Syria (including Palestine). London: Naval Staff Intelligence Department, June 1919' [‎220r] (444/738)

JUDAEA
433
The Plain of Philistia is mostly level, but rises now and
again into gentle ranges 250 ft. high and is cut by large
and deep transverse gullies—W. esh-Sherrah, Hesi, Mejma‘,
Burshein, Sarar, and others—outlets of the drainage of
the Judaean Highland (see Coastal Streams, below). The
plain embraces the notable agricultural centres of Gaza,
Mejdel, and Esdud, and nearly all the low ground is capable of
cultivation; in spring, tracts of it have the appearance of a
vast series of cornfields interspersed with pasturage or patches
of reeds and rushes. There are but few trees except around
certain coast centres. Inland the soil is of a light brown
colour. Along the whole sea-board runs a strip of downs or
dunes (with low cliffs here and there), sometimes composed
of pure sand, sometimes covered with patchy grass. The
drifting sand, which in places has encroached 2| or 3 miles
or even more inland, is often an impediment to agriculture.
South-west of Gaza, the plain rapidly merges into desert.
The part of the Plain of Sharon appertaining to Judaea
embraces the highly cultivated districts round the important
towns of Jaffa, Ramleh, and Ludd, and is traversed further
north by the Nahr el-‘Auja and its tributary wadis. It is
an admixture of cornfields, melon, cucumber and vegetable
gardens, orange and palm groves, and strips and patches of
sand covered in places with coarse grass, thorns or thistles,
with frequent villages situated on mounds. As in the
Philistian plain, water is abundantly found by digging, the
soil is light and fertile, and in places affords excellent pasturage.
The She'phelah. It should be noted that, as far as Judaea
is concerned, the Central Range does not fall immediately on
the maritime plain. Along a great part of the western base
lies a tract of lower hills, varying in breadth and forming
a middle or transition zone between the mountains and the
plain. It is a smaller and more open range, from 500-800 ft.
high (and one or two summits up to 1,500 ft.)—the so-
called ‘Shephelah’, or ‘low ground’, extending northwards
from abreast of Gaza almost to the confines of Samaria,
and representing roughly an area 30 miles in length by
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