page_title: Mediterranean Sea
section_title: Coastal countries
hierarchical_section_title: Mediterranean Sea / Geography / Coastal countries
caption_attribution_description: English: Waterfront of Catania, Sicily, with mount Etna in the background
context_page_description: The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant. Although the sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, it is usually referred to as a separate body of water. Geological evidence indicates that around 5.9 million years ago, the Mediterranean was cut off from the Atlantic and was partly or completely desiccated over a period of some 600,000 years during the Messinian salinity crisis before being refilled by the Zanclean flood about 5.3 million years ago.
  It covers an area of about 2,500,000 km², representing 0.7% of the global ocean surface, but its connection to the Atlantic via the Strait of Gibraltar—the narrow strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Spain in Europe from Morocco in Africa—is only 14 km wide. In oceanography, it is sometimes called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea, the European Mediterranean Sea or the African Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere.
context_section_description: The following countries have a coastline on the Mediterranean Sea:
  Northern shore (from west to east): Spain, France, Monaco, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania, Greece, Turkey.
  Eastern shore (from north to south): Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Egypt.
  Southern shore (from west to east): Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Egypt.
  Island nations: Malta, Cyprus.
  Several other territories also border the Mediterranean Sea (from west to east):
  the British overseas territory of Gibraltar
  the Spanish autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla and nearby islands
  the Sovereign Base Areas on Cyprus
  the Palestinian Gaza Strip
caption: Catania, Sicily, with Mount Etna in the background
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