Brook of Egypt

The Israeli archaeologist Nadav Na'aman and the Italian Mario Liverani have suggested that Wadi Gaza or Nahal Besor, was the Brook of Egypt.

It lies in the vicinity of Arish, the hometown of the Jewish commentator Saadia Gaon who identified Naḥal Mizraim with the Wadi al-Arish.

Ishtori Haparchi, in his 14th-century work Kaftor va-Ferach (Hebrew: כפתור ופרח), also identifies the Brook of Egypt as Wadi al-Arish.

This view appears in the Palestinian Targum on Numbers 34:5, where נחלה מצרים is translated נילוס דמצריי ("the Nile of the Egyptians"; preserved in the Neophiti and Vatican manuscripts, as well as in Pseudo-Jonathan),[10] in addition to medieval commentaries by Rashi and David Kimhi on Joshua 13:3.

[11] However, most commentators, such as Targum Onkelos, Abraham Ibn Ezra, Bahya ben Asher, Samuel David Luzzatto, Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin and Moisè Tedeschi on Numbers 34:5, reject this interpretation.