TheLod–Ashkelon railway is a railway line linkingLod andAshkelon. It is operated byIsrael Railways, and spans approximately 50 km of mostlydouble track in central and southern Israel.
The railway traces its origins to theOttoman rule inPalestine and theSinai and Palestine military campaign ofWorld War I. The main Turkish objective in the Middle East during World War I was to either capture or disable theSuez Canal, which would have put theBritish Empire at a great disadvantage. However, transporting troops and supplies fromConstantinople to the front lines took months by camel caravan.[1]
After his assault on the British garrison along the canal in January–February 1915,Jamal Pasha enlisted the help of the German engineerHeinrich August Meissner, who also planned theHejaz Railway, to help him find a more efficient method of logistics. Meissner started constructing a railway to the south of the Palestine region, with the Wadi Surar station of theJaffa–Jerusalem railway, some 15 km south ofLod railway station, serving as the starting point. AtAl-Tina, the railway split into two branches: one toBeit Hanoun via Majdal, and the otherto Beersheba. The two lines were collectively called the 'Egyptian Branch'.[1] The Lydda–Wadi Surar section, previously of1,000 mm (3 ft 3+3⁄8 in)metre gaugenarrow gauge, wasconverted to the Hejaz railway width of1,050 mm (3 ft 5+11⁄32 in) narrow gauge standard, allowing rail traffic from Hejaz railway via theEastern railway to continue further south from Lydda (Lod).
When the British captured the territory in 1918, they dismantled both "Egyptian Branch" railways, save for a short section between Beit Hanoun and Majdal. This 13-km-long section was converted into1,435 mm (4 ft 8+1⁄2 in)standard gauge and later incorporated into the newPalestine Railwaysmain line, which opened to passenger service on 1 November 1920, and linkedEl Kantara, Egypt viaGaza City, Majdal (Ashkelon),Lydda andHadera toHaifa. A whole new, much more direct, standard gauge railway section was built from Majdal via Isdud (Ashdod) andYibna (Yavne) to Lydda; one of the purposes for the new route was to enable shipment of citrus fruits from orchards aroundRehovot to theport of Haifa.
TheTehran Children—a group of 1230 Jewish refugees fromPoland, mostly children, who escaped in 1939 toUSSR, then in 1942 toIran, then brought by theJewish Agency for Israel by sea toSuez, and from there on a train to theYishuv—travelled the whole length of the Lod–Ashkelon railway, stopping atRehovot railway station on February 18, 1943, before continuing further north.
During the1948 Arab–Israeli War, the railway was severed at theGaza Strip border, and the southernmost station which remained accessible toIsrael Railways wasDayr Sunayd near thekibbutzYad Mordechai. The passenger service on the line stopped, but freight service continued on the whole stretch between Lod and Majdal.[2] During the bus drivers' strike in 1956, the passenger service on the line was reinstated just for the few days of the strike;[3] then again, for the short time between 1972 and theYom Kippur War in 1973, passenger service was introduced betweenGaza City (occupied by Israel following theSix-Day War in 1967) andTel Aviv.
In November 1961, a short branch line to theport of Ashdod was opened just north of the city of Ashdod; then, on 17 November 1982,Heletz railway connected the branch line to the port of Ashdod with therailway to Beersheba, allowing the freight traffic between the south of Israel and the port to bypass the busy railways around Lod. One more branch line, toRutenberg Power Station just south of Ashkelon, opened in 1990 to supply the power station with coal imported via the port of Ashdod. This branch line is out of use since 2000, when a pier was built at the power station to allow unloading the coal directly from the ships.
The regular passenger service was introduced betweenLod andRehovot in 1990, then extended toAshdod in 1992, and later toAshkelon in 2005. Between 1999 and 2001, the section between Lod and Rehovot was converted to double track.
In 2002–2003, a short 3-km-long branch line was built fromBe'er Ya'akov railway station to the newly builtRishon LeZion HaRishonim railway station. This section is part of the futureRishon LeZion–Modi'in railway, which, beginning in 2021, is being extended further westwards toRishon LeZion Moshe Dayan railway station on theAyalon railway,[4] as well as eastwards, in the median ofhighway 431, towardsModi'in and thehigh-speed railway to Jerusalem.
In 2013, theCoastal railway was connected to the Lod–Ashkelon railway, enabling a direct passenger service from Tel Aviv and the north of Israel to Ashdod and Ashkelon, without going through Lod. FromYad Mordechai, the southern end of the Lod–Ashkelon railway, the line has beenextended to Beersheba through the northern Negev. This extension was completed in 2015.
In 2021 the section between Ashdod and Ashkelon waselectrified the using an overhead line25 kV 50Hz AC system; however, this electrification was not the Lod-Ashkelon railway as such, but rather a continuance of the electrification of theTel Aviv–Bnei Darom Railway, which reaches Ashdod via Bat Yam, Holon, and Rishon LeZion. The section between Lod and Rehovot was electrified in 2022, while the remainder of the line, between Rehovot and Ashdod, underwent electrification in 2023.
As of 2022, the section between Rehovot and Pleshet (near Ashdod) is one of the few railways in central Israel still consisting of only single track. Works to double track the section between Rehovot and Yavne are expected to be completed in late 2022. The last remaining single track portion, an approximately 3km section between Yavne and Pleshet will be rebuilt at a later date as double track, partially-underground within a widened Route 410, and include a relocated and expandedYavne East railway station.[5]
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