From The Economist:
Under the clear waters of the Red Sea, a high-speed data cable is being laid that will connect—for the first time—Israel to Saudi Arabia. The new link, which is part of two longer submarine cables running all the way from France to India, promises not only to improve the speed and lower the cost at which information can whizz between Europe and Asia. It is also knitting together a new regional alliance between Israel and countries in the Gulf that once regarded it as an enemy.The article is behind a paywall, but Arab media are writing about it.
The article says that the cable "would break the Egyptian monopoly of Internet traffic in the region.”
The new data pipeline is being built by Google and Telecom Italia and should be finished in 2024.
This route consists of two separate cables, one ending in the Jordanian port of Aqaba, the other starting in Eilat.
One Israeli official said, “For over seven decades all the Middle East’s trade routes and communications networks bypassed Israel. For the first time since Israel’s establishment, we’re becoming part of a regional infrastructure.”
