The Sinai Peninsula, or simply Sinai ( SY-ny; Arabic: سيناء, romanized: Seynāʾ or Sīnāʾ; Egyptian Arabic: سينا, romanized: Sīna), is a peninsula in Egypt, and the only part of the country located in West Asia. It is between the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Red Sea to the south, and is a land bridge between Africa and Asia. Sinai has a land area of about 60,000 km2 (23,000 sq mi) (6 percent of Egypt's total area) and a population of approximately 600,000 people. Administratively, the vast majority of the area of the Sinai Peninsula is divided into two governorates: the North Sinai Governorate and the South Sinai Governorate. Three other governorates span the Suez Canal, crossing into African Egypt: Suez Governorate on the southern end of the Suez Canal, Ismailia Governorate in the center, and Port Said Governorate in the north.
In the classical era, the region was known as Arabia Petraea. The peninsula acquired the name Sinai in modern times due to the assumption that a mountain near Saint Catherine's Monastery, named Mount Sinai, is the Biblical Mount Sinai, one of the most religiously significant places in the Abrahamic religions.
The Sinai Peninsula has been a part of Egypt from the First Dynasty of ancient Egypt (c. 3100 BC). This comes in stark contrast to the region north of it, the Levant (the present-day territories of Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria), which, due largely to its strategic geopolitical location and cultural convergences, has historically been the center of conflict between Egypt and various states of Mesopotamia and Asia Minor. In periods of foreign occupation, the Sinai was, like the rest of Egypt, also occupied and controlled by foreign empires, in more recent history the Ottoman Empire (1517–1867) and the United Kingdom (1882–1956). Israel, along with France and the United Kingdom, invaded and occupied Sinai during the Suez Crisis of 1956. Israel invaded the Sinai at the start of the Six-Day War of 1967 due to Egyptian forces massing to invade Israel. On 6 October 1973, Egypt launched the Yom Kippur War, seizing most of the east bank of the Suez Canal while Israel seized even more area to its west. Israel exchanged the ten kilometers along the east bank and territory seized in 1973 for a 1974 ceasefire. In 1982, as a result of the Egypt–Israel peace treaty of 1979, Israel withdrew from all of the Sinai Peninsula except the contentious territory of Taba, which was returned after a ruling by a commission of arbitration in 1989.
Today, Sinai has become a tourist destination due to its natural setting, rich coral reefs, and biblical history.
Because the Sinai Peninsula was the main region where mining of turquoise was carried out in Ancient Egypt, it was called Biau (the "Mining Country") and Khetiu Mafkat ("Ladders of Turquoise") by the ancient Egyptians.
The origin of the modern name is a source of contention (see Biblical Mount Sinai for a fuller discussion). The name Sinai (Hebrew: סִינַי, Classical Syriac: ܣܝܢܝ) may have been derived from the ancient Mesopotamian moon-god Sin. The moon-deity Sin is associated with the area; the ancient Egyptian moon-god Thoth is also associated with Sin, and his worship was widespread throughout the south tip of the Sinai Peninsula. The Jewish Encyclopedia (1901-1906) quotes a Rabbinic source, the 8th- or 9th-century Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer, which derives the name from the biblical Hebrew word seneh (Hebrew: סֶ֫נֶּה), a word only known from two occurrences in the Hebrew Bible, in both cases referring to the burning bush. Rabbi Eliezer opines that Mount Horeb only received the name Sinai after God appeared to Moses in the shape of a burning bush.
The English name came from Latin, ultimately from Hebrew סִינַי, [siˈnaj] (see-NIGH, in English phonetic spelling). In English, the name is now usually pronounced . An alternative, now dated pronunciation in English was SY-nee-eye.
Sinai is triangular in shape, with its northern shore lying on the southern Mediterranean Sea, and its southwest and southeast shores on the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Aqaba of the Red Sea. It is linked to the African continent by the Isthmus of Suez, 125 kilometres (78 mi) wide strip of land, containing the Suez Canal. The eastern isthmus, linking it to the Asian mainland, is around 200 kilometres (120 mi) wide. The peninsula is on the African Plate with the Arabian Plate on its eastern boundary.
The southernmost tip is the Ras Muhammad National Park.
Most of the Sinai Peninsula is divided among the two governorates of Egypt: South Sinai (Ganub Sina) and North Sinai (Shamal Sina). Together, they comprise around 60,000 square kilometres (23,000 sq mi) and have a population (January 2013) of 597,000. Three more governates span the Suez Canal, crossing into African Egypt: Suez (el-Sewais) is on the southern end of the Suez Canal, Ismailia (el-Isma'ileyyah) in the centre, and Port Said in the north.
The largest city of Sinai is Arish, capital of the North Sinai, with around 160,000 residents. Other larger settlements include Sharm El Sheikh and El-Tor, on the southern coast. Inland Sinai is arid (effectively a desert), mountainous and sparsely populated, the largest settlements being Saint Catherine and Nekhel.
Sinai is one of the coldest provinces in Egypt because of its high altitudes and mountainous topographies. Winter temperatures in some of Sinai's cities and towns reach −16 °C (3 °F).
A cave with paintings of people and animals was discovered about 30 kilometres (19 mi) north of Mount Catherine in January 2020, dates back to the Chalcolithic Period, c. 5th–4th millennium BCE.
From the time of the First Dynasty or before, the Egyptians mined turquoise in Sinai at two locations, now called by their Egyptian Arabic names Wadi Maghareh and Serabit el-Khadim. The mines were worked intermittently and on a seasonal basis for thousands of years. Modern attempts to exploit the deposits have been unprofitable. These may be the first historically attested mines.
The fortress Tjaru in western Sinai was a place of banishment for Egyptian criminals. The Way of Horus connected it across northern Sinai with ancient Canaan.
At the end of the time of Darius I, the Great (521–486 BCE) Sinai was part of the Persian province of Abar-Nahra, which means 'beyond the river [Euphrates]'.
Cambyses successfully managed the crossing of the hostile Sinai Desert, traditionally Egypt's first and strongest line of defence, and brought the Egyptians under Psamtik III, son and successor of Ahmose, to battle at Pelusium. The Egyptians lost and retired to Memphis; the city fell to the Persian control and the Pharaoh was carried off in captivity to Susa in Persia.
Rhinocorura (Greek for "Cut-off Noses") and the eponymous region around it were used by Ptolemaid Egypt as a place of banishment for criminals, today known as Arish.