Paleo aridity in the Levant driven by a strong North Atlantic latitudinal surface temperature gradient and present-day relevance

The mechanisms underlying the current greenhouse gas (GHG) forced decline in Mediterranean rainfall remain a matter of debate. To inform our understanding of the current and projected drying, we examined extended arid intervals in the late Quaternary, Eastern Mediterranean (EM) Levant indicated by substantial salt deposits in a Dead Sea sediment core covering the past 220 kyr. These arid events occurred during interglacials, when the Earth was at perihelion to the sun in boreal fall and during glacial–interglacial transitions, associated with icesheet melting. Climate models forced with realistic late Quaternary insolation variations show that when the Earth is closest to the Sun in boreal fall, the North Atlantic latitudinal surface temperature gradient in the winter intensifies. In response, the overlying midlatitude North Atlantic jet stream and the extratropical storm track move poleward while sea-level pressure rises in the subtropics. These changes bring about a weakening of the Mediterranean storm track and a decline in rainfall over the entire basin. During glacial–interglacial transitions, meltwater from continental icesheets forced abrupt subpolar North Atlantic cooling. This also strengthened the latitudinal surface temperature gradient, likely causing similar atmospheric response and aridity in the Mediterranean. There is a strong resemblance between this paleo-climate scenario and the climatic changes corresponding to the present and projected GHG drying of the EM. Hence, the late Quaternary palaeohydrology of the Dead Sea indicates an important North Atlantic centered response to external forcing, which leads to Mediterranean drying and is relevant in the present.