May 29, 1068 Earthquake: Ramla,palestine,jerusalem,tabuk,kufa,halla, Israel

A large earthquake in the Gulf of Aqaba and the Hejaz in NW Arabia occurred during the morning of Tues 18 Mar 1068. It is said that Aila (Eilat) at the head of the Gulf of Aqaba, was completely destroyed with all but 12 of its inhabitants.…The earthquake was felt at Qadi al-Qura, Khaibar, al-Marwa, Medina... and Wadi al-Safra, Badr and Yanbu, to the SW of Medina. In Sinai, the earthquake was strong enough to cause alarm at the monastery of St. Catherine. There is some archaeological evidence to suggest earthquake damage at the citadel of Amman in Jordan, possibly from this event. The shock was also experienced in Egypt, where Tinnis apparently suffered some damage... Water rose in wells in Egypt and Palestine, and the retreat and return of the sea on the Mediterranean coast of Palestine drowned a large number of people... Paleoseismic data suggest that the Aqaba strike-slip fault emerges from the Gulf and appears to cross the 7th-12th-century-AD Islamic walled city of Aila, terminating under the city, indicating repeat movement with the last scarp forming sometime between 1045 and 1278... The occurrence of the seismic sea wave, which can be assumed to have been in the Mediterranean Sea, does not necessarily indicate the epicentral region, but rather the region where there were vulnerable submarine slopes that could produce a flow slide as occurred in the on-land 1202 earthquake and thus does not seem to confirm this... there is some indication that the damage in al-Ramla has been grossly exaggerated, particularly the loss of life, which is estimated in various sources to range from 15000 to as many as 25000 since correspondence between leaders of the Jewish communities in Ramla and Jerusalem appears to include no references to a major calamity in the 1060s.

May 29, 1068. Ramla This was a locally destructive earthquake in the region of al-Ramla. It is alleged that the earthquake was destructive at al-Ramla in Palestine, causing the ruin of many houses with loss of life. One account speaks of 15000 casualties ( sic. ), including 200 boys at a single school. There is no other evidence of damage in Jerusalem, 40km from al-Ramla, though it is reported that the roof of the Dome of the Rock was displaced and then returned to its former position. The assertion that the inhabitants of al-Ramla migrated to Jerusalem after the earthquake also suggests that damage there was slight. However, it is difficult to accept that the same earthquake caused serious damage to Baniyas, 160km to the north of al-Ramla, where it is said that about 100 people were killed. The absence of information from urban centres between the two towns suggests that damage in Baniyas is grossly exaggerated, as is the loss of 15 000 men reported for al-Ramla

(above from ref #9116)

Mar 18, 1068. This is the first historical earthquake known to have strongly affected the Gulf of Suet area. It was located near Elat at the north end of the Gulf of Aqaba. (ref #2949)

Mar 18, 1068 (possibly 1067, 1069). Levantian Sea, 31.92 N, 34.85 E. A strong earthquake in Palestine, that also extended over Egypt and Syria. In Ramallah, it seems, 25000 citizens were lost (ref #2130).

Mar 18, 1068. Ramla was destroyed; it extended to the Hejahz […] Only two houses of Ramla remained and 25,000 persons perished (ref #3744)

1068 05 29. Recent evaluation by Guidoboni and Comastri (2005) [ref #10420], however, resolved two earthquakes at that time and associated the tsunami with the second one, on May 29, 1068: “….The sea sank into the earth….” […] other dates associated with this event, namely 1067 04 20, 1067 11 11, 1068 04 20, 1070 02 25, 1168 03 18, and 1169, and conclude that these are duplications and misreports of the earthquakes that actually occurred on 18 March and 29 May 1068. (ref #10416)