Crossword Dictionary
dead sea
Dead Sea, Arabic Al-Baḥr Al-Mayyit (“Sea of Deathâ€), Hebrew Yam HaMelaẖ (“Salt Seaâ€), also called Salt Sea, landlocked salt lake between Israel and Jordan in southwestern Asia. Its eastern shore belongs to Jordan, and the southern half of its western shore belongs to Israel. The northern half of the western shore lies within the Palestinian West Bank and has been under Israeli occupation since the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. The Jordan River, from which the Dead Sea receives nearly all its water, flows from the north into the lake.
The Dead Sea is one of the saltiest bodies of water on Earth, with almost 10 times more salt than ordinary seawater. This is because water flows into the Dead Sea from one main tributary, the River Jordan. It then has no way to get out of the lake and so is forced to evaporate.
The soaring hot and dry conditions of this region mean that large quantities of water are evaporated. This leads to the salt and other minerals becoming more and more concentrated. In fact, it’s estimated that in the whole of the Dead Sea there is about 37 billion tonnes of salt.