In the Jordan Valley these rocks have been easily eroded into a bad-land landscape of gullies and cliffs. In East Africa, spreading processes have already torn Saudi Arabia away from the rest of the African continent, forming the Red Sea. The actively splitting the African Plate and the Arabian Plate meet in what geologists call a triple junction, where the Red Sea meets the Gulf of Aden. A new spreading center may be developing under Africa along the East African Rift Zone. When the continental crust stretches beyond its limits, tension cracks begin to appear on the Earth's surface.
Magma rises and squeezes through the widening cracks, sometimes to erupt and form volcanoes.
The rising magma, whether or not it erupts, puts more pressure on the crust to produce additional fractures and, ultimately, the rift zone. Plate interactions in the region have provided scientists an opportunity to study first hand how the Atlantic may have begun to form about 200 million years ago. The fracture continues to widen and geologists say they can see a new ocean in the making. If the rift continues, the region may eventually become submerged. By the way, much of this kind of thinking is what has been used to describe how Madagascar pulled away from the African continent and is now an island.