Turkey and Saudi Arabia Advance a Land Route Rivaling Israel’s IMEC Plan
Rising threats to the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb are pushing governments to look for overland alternatives for trade between India and Europe. Two competing visions are now in play, a Turkey-Saudi axis via Jordan and Syria, and a separate route through the Gulf states, Jordan and Israel, which Israel has been slow to advance. This week, the Turkish-Saudi track moved forward.
On Tuesday, Turkish Transport and Infrastructure Minister Abdulkadir Uraloglu said on X that Turkey had signed two memorandums of understanding with Saudi Arabia in rail and logistics after meeting Saudi Transport and Logistic Services Minister Saleh Al-Jasser in Riyadh. Uraloglu said the steps would strengthen connectivity, trade and regional development. Al-Jasser said the two countries already enjoy high-level cooperation and that the agreements support joint work, knowledge exchange and studies, adding that both sides want better links by air, sea, land and rail.
The report says the idea is reviving a rail line first opened in 1908, connecting Damascus with Medina, and later branching north to Aleppo, Turkey, Lebanon and especially Beirut. That route was badly damaged in World War I and later broke into separate segments, though limited sections have remained active in Syria and Jordan. Al Arabiya described the revived concept as a shift from pilgrim traffic to freight and supply chains, with the theoretical possibility of a continuous rail corridor from Turkey through Jordan and Syria to Saudi Arabia and then the rest of the Gulf, linking Asia and Europe.
Israel is also trying to promote a similar project, the IMEC corridor, as an alternative to Hormuz. In April, Israeli officials were reported to be accelerating the initiative, which would connect India to Europe through the Gulf states, Jordan and Israel. Syria, meanwhile, is advancing its own strategy to become a logistics and energy hub, and President Ahmed al-Sharaa said in April that Syria wants to use its location to serve as a secure route for energy and goods between the Gulf, Turkey and the Mediterranean. As part of that vision, Syria, Jordan and Turkey signed transport cooperation agreements in Amman on April 7, with implementation to begin immediately and continue for about three years. Separately, the United Arab Emirates said on May 15 it was speeding completion of a new Abu Dhabi to Fujairah oil pipeline, expected to double ADNOC export capacity and operate in 2027, as another workaround to Hormuz.
