Al Wahat District
Libya's eastern oases became its petroleum heartland—Sarir field pumping 200,000 barrels daily while the aquifer beneath drains toward coastal cities.
Al Wahat—the Oases—exists because fossil water and oil occupy the same subsurface geology. This vast southeastern district, stretching from the Mediterranean coast near Ajdabiya to the Egyptian border, contains both the Sarir oil field (Libya's largest) and the eastern reaches of the Nubian Sandstone Aquifer. Water made settlement possible; petroleum made it valuable.
The district's name tells its history: scattered oases that sustained trans-Saharan travelers for millennia. Jalu, Awjila, and Gialo (now Jalu) appear in ancient caravan records as watering points between Cyrenaica and the Kufra basin. The Senussi order established zawiyas (religious lodges) here, building the organizational infrastructure that would eventually produce Libya's monarchy.
Modern Al Wahat exists because of Sarir. Discovered in 1961 and developed through the 1960s, the field produces over 200,000 barrels daily, piped north to the Mediterranean terminal at Marsa Brega and the older Tobruk connection. The Great Man-Made River's eastern branch draws from aquifers here, pumping water to Benghazi and the coastal strip.
The district's population of roughly 80,000 clusters around oil installations and oasis agriculture. Ajdabiya, the northern gateway, controls access to both the oil infrastructure and the eastern water supply. During the 2011 revolution, control of this town determined who held Libya's petroleum lifeline.
By 2026, Al Wahat concentrates Libya's resource dependencies: oil revenue flowing north, fossil water depleting underground, and political control determining who benefits from both. The oases that gave this district its name may outlast the petroleum that dominates it.