L
Neotethys may now be propagating
into at least the northeastern part of the Mediterranean. This is evidenced by the
outcropping of Late Triassic oceanic basalts in Cyprus (Lapierre
et al, 2007) and in Turkey (Robertson
and Parlak, 2015). Events in Israel are however often younger than those to
the north and the North Eratosthenes Transform (NET) is speculated to form a
limit to the Neotethyan ocean at this time. Areas south of this transform are likely
to be rifting at this time, with an estimated date of initiation of 240Ma (Jagger at al, 2018)). Widespread carbonate
deposition characterises the northern and north-eastern margins of the African
(including Arabian) plate, though with an increasing proportion of deepwater
facies.
