Kirkuk–Haifa oil pipeline

The Kirkuk–Haifa oil pipeline (also known as the Iraq–Haifa pipeline or Mediterranean pipeline) was a crude oil pipeline from the oil fields in Kirkuk, located in the former Ottoman vilayet of Mosul in northern Iraq, through Transjordan to Haifa in mandatory Palestine (now in the territory of Israel). The pipeline was operational between 1935 and 1948. Its length was about 942 kilometres (585 mi), with a diameter of 12 inches (300 mm) (reducing to 10 and 8 inches (250 and 200 mm) in parts), and it took about 10 days for crude oil to travel the full length of the line. The oil arriving in Haifa was distilled in the Haifa refineries, stored in tanks, and then put in tankers for shipment to Europe.

The pipeline was built by the Iraq Petroleum Company between 1932 and 1934, during which period most of the area through which the pipeline passed was under a British mandate approved by the League of Nations. The pipeline was one of two carrying oil from the Baba Gurgur, Kirkuk oilfield to the Mediterranean coast. The double pipeline split at Haditha (Pumping Station K3) with a second line carrying oil to Tripoli, Lebanon, which was then under a French mandate.

The pipeline and the Haifa refineries were considered strategically important by the British Government, and indeed provided much of the fuel needs of the British and American forces in the Mediterranean during World War II.

The pipeline was a target of attacks by Arabs during the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine, and as a result one of the main objectives of a joint British-Jewish Special Night Squads commanded by Captain Orde Wingate was to protect the pipeline against such attacks. Later on, the pipeline was the target of attacks by the Jewish Irgun paramilitary organisation.

In 1948, with the outbreak of the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the official operation of the pipeline ended when the Iraqi Government refused to pump any more oil through it.

The portion between Kirkuk and Tripoli remained in operation. It was looped between Kirkuk and Homs with the 30/32-inch Kirkuk–Baniyas pipeline which became operational in April 1952. It had also been looped before that point with a 16-inch pipeline (to both Tripoli and Haifa). The 16-inch line to Haifa was never commissioned. it was completed just as the political facts on the ground had turned against it.