Aqaba

"If we are to rely on biblical scriptures, Aqaba has been continuously inhabited since the fourth millennium BC. It is mentioned as Ezion-Geber, where King Solomon built ships on the shores of the Red Sea, near Eilat in Edom (Kings 9:26). Recent archaeological excavations, however, date the site to the 1st century BC, when it was populated by the Nabateans. The Romans called it Ayla, and at the time of the advent of Islam, it was administered by the Ghassanids (Ghassasina, a Christian Arab clan from the northern Hijaz) on behalf of Byzantium. It lied at a vital junction of trading routes between Asia, Africa and Europe."
Healing Iraq