Israeli Coastal Plain - Human Geography

Human Geography

About 57% of Israel's population lives in the coastal plain, much of them in the Tel Aviv metropolitan area (Gush Dan) and Haifa metropolitan area. It is the most predominantly Jewish geographical region of Israel and conversely the most predominantly Jewish region in the world, as Jews make up over 96% of the population in this region compared to 75% in the Negev, 70% in the Israeli portion of the Judean Mountains, and only 50% in the Galilee, and the Golan Heights.

About 4,320,000 people live on the Israeli Coastal Plain (57% of the total Israeli population of 7,600,000). 4,200,000 million of them are Jews (97.2%), and 120,000 are Israeli Arabs. This accounts for approximately one-third of the world Jewish population, and almost three-quarters of Israeli Jews.

The Israeli Coastal Plain has been populated for thousands of years, with references to it in Biblical literature. Recent research however, has concluded that the Coastal Plain was inhabited 5,500 years ago during the Bronze Age. It is thought that at this time, shifting settlement patterns in the land were caused by climate change which led to flooding of the area which had been a populated commercial and settlement center, and the creation of many swamps. Settlements are thought to have been spread across the plain, from Gaza up to the Galilee, with the land being an important trade route for the Egyptians.