The hidden battle for Gaza: Natural gas deposits and a $6 billion canal route
By isabelle // 2025-10-21
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  • The Gaza conflict is driven by strategic control over energy and trade routes.
  • Israel has repeatedly blocked Palestinian development of the Gaza Marine gas field.
  • The gas field represented a potential economic lifeline for the Palestinian people.
  • Israel also aims to build the Ben Gurion Canal as a rival to the Suez Canal.
  • These strategic resources are a major unspoken factor in the ongoing war.
The devastation in Gaza is about more than rockets and hostages. It is also about natural gas and a long-held dream to build a rival to the Suez Canal. For decades, major discoveries of offshore energy and ambitious infrastructure projects have been powerful, unspoken motivators in Israeli policy decisions, often at the direct expense of Palestinian sovereignty and economic survival. The current war has brought these strategic interests into sharp focus, revealing a relentless scramble for resources that has repeatedly undermined peace. The story begins in 2000, as the Second Intifada was brewing. PLO leader Yassir Arafat celebrated a natural gas discovery about 30 kilometers off the Gaza Strip. “This will provide a solid foundation for our economy, for establishing an independent state with holy Jerusalem as its capital,” Arafat said. This was the Gaza Marine field, a deposit containing an estimated 28 to 30 billion cubic meters (bcm) of natural gas. Although it may be small compared to Israel’s own Leviathan field, it represented a potential $4 billion lifeline for Gaza’s economy and a chance to overcome chronic energy shortages and dependence on foreign aid.

A history of blocked development

From the start, Israel moved to control this resource. In 1999, Prime Minister Ehud Barak deployed the Israeli navy to Gaza’s waters to impede a development deal between the Palestinian Authority and the British BG Group. Israel demanded the gas be piped to its facilities at a below-market price and that it control the revenues destined for Palestinians. A subsequent deal that would have sent the gas to Egypt was foiled when British Prime Minister Tony Blair intervened on behalf of Israel’s government, allegedly at the request of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. These maneuvers killed the prospects for Palestinian budget autonomy. When the Hamas-led unity government refused the terms, Israel imposed a blockade on Gaza. The pattern continued through multiple conflicts. The 2008-2009 war failed to transfer control of the gas fields to Israel, but the motivation remained. An Israeli energy crisis in 2011, which triggered the largest cost-of-living protests in decades, gave Netanyahu’s government a compelling motive to seek energy sovereignty in Gaza.

The canal dream

Alongside the gas lies an even grander ambition: the Ben Gurion Canal Project. This proposed waterway would cut through Israeli territory near Gaza, creating an alternative to the Suez Canal. The idea is not new; it has roots in early Zionist visions. Theodor Herzl himself imagined the Jewish land as a nodal point for traffic between Europe and Asia. In April 2021, Israel announced plans for the dual-canal, which would be almost one-third longer than the Suez and was projected to generate $6 billion or more in annual income. This project would grant whoever controls it enormous economic influence over global shipping routes. The Suez Canal handles 12 percent of world trade, providing Egypt with $9.4 billion in annual revenues. An Israeli alternative would be a geopolitical game-changer. Before October 7, the only thing standing between the Netanyahu government and this massive project was a Palestinian Gaza and Hamas. The convergence of these two strategic goals—control of Gaza’s gas and the path for a rival canal—paints a dramatic picture. The Gaza Marine field, as one expert noted, “remains inaccessible due to Israeli restrictions, and thus offers no relief to the people in Gaza suffering under a stifling Israeli siege.” Meanwhile, plans for the Ben Gurion Canal leapfrogged ahead with a 2020 deal between an Israeli state-owned company and a UAE-based firm to use an existing pipeline, just one month after the Abraham Accords were signed. Ultimately, the story of Gaza is not just one of territorial conflict but of resource colonization. The systematic blocking of Palestinian economic development, coupled with the pursuit of projects that erase Palestinian presence from the map, reveals a long-term strategy where control of energy and trade routes is deemed worth the cost of endless war and the obliteration of a people’s hope for a sovereign future. Sources for this article include: Original.Antiwar.com Newsweek.com TheGuardian.com
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