AKABAH, ā′kạ-bä, Arabia, town of historic and strategic interest at the head of the Gulf of Akabah, identified with the Græco-Roman Ælana and the scriptural Elath, whence Solomon’s fleet sailed for Ophir. A branch line joining Akabah to the Mecca Railway from Beirut was begun in 1906. The Gulf of Akabah, the Ælanitic Gulf of the ancients, is the eastern of the two inlets into which the Red Sea divides at its northern end. It is from 12 to 17 miles wide and extends for about 100 miles in a northeasterly direction, bounding the mountainous peninsula of Sinai on the east.