Below Mount Tabor was a comparatively broad central plain that cut transversely across the country from W to E, separating the northern mountains from those to the S. The Jezreel Valley, or Esdraelon, was where many decisive battles were fought. It consisted of two parts, the eastern “low plain of Jezreel,” and the western section, “the valley plain of Megiddo.”​—Jos 17:16; 2Ch 35:22.

When approaching the mountains of Judah from the W, one comes to the hill section known as the Shephelah, with its several small W-E valleys leading from the coastal plains to the highlands. (Jos 9:1) For the most part these hills were suitable for the grazing of flocks and cattle, the springs in the valleys furnishing the necessary water.

The third feature of Palestine’s geography was called the Arabah (De 11:30), part of the great Rift Valley. It divides the country longitudinally from top to bottom. This deep cleft began in Syria to the N and extended southward all the way to the Red Sea’s Gulf of ʽAqaba. What made this central depression of the land all the more spectacular were the parallel mountain ranges and cliffs on either side of it.

When tracing this trenchlike depression from N to S, one quickly drops from the foothills of Mount Hermon to the Hula Basin, where the headwaters of the Jordan once formed a small lake. From there the Jordan, in some 16 km (10 mi), rapidly drops over 270 m (890 ft) to the Sea of Galilee, which is about 210 m (700 ft) below sea level. From Galilee to the Dead Sea, this great rift in the earth’s crust is the Jordan Valley proper, and by the Arabs is called the Ghor, meaning “depression.” It is a “gorge” as much as 19 km (12 mi) wide in places. The Jordan itself is about 45 m (150 ft) below the floor of this valley; and as it slowly snakes its way down to the Dead Sea, it continues to drop about 180 m (600 ft) more. (PICTURE, Vol. 1, p. 334) This makes the surface of the Dead Sea about 400 m (1,300 ft) below the level of the Mediterranean​—the lowest point on the earth’s surface.

The extension of the Rift Valley south of the Dead Sea for another 160 km (100 mi) to the Gulf of ʽAqaba was more commonly known as the Arabah proper. (De 2:8) Midway it reached its highest point, about 200 m (650 ft) above sea level.