In 473, a Saracen named Amorkesos captured the island and appropriated the revenues, but the Byzantine Empire retook it 25 years later, granting its inhabitants autonomy, subject to payment of taxes on goods exported to India.

Around 534, the Byzantines had to retake it again from a group whom Choricius of Gaza called an unholy race, and whom some scholars suppose to have been the Jewish inhabitants who had refused to pay the taxes.

[10] Since it is no longer a residential bishopric, Iotabe, in its Latin form called Iotapa in Palaestina, is today listed by the Roman Catholic Church as a titular see.

[14] The reference by Procopius to an autonomous Jewish community on the island of Iotabe until the 6th century figured in Israeli rhetoric during the Suez crisis and during and immediately after the Six-Day War.

[19] In March 1949, Israeli forces took control of the area around the coastal village of Umm al-Rashrash, later renamed Eilat, as part of Operation Uvda.

The uninhabited islands of Tiran and Sanafir gained strategic importance since they controlled all shipping to Eilat, Israel's only access to the Red Sea.

[25] In January 1968, the US government stood behind a failed attempt to induce Israeli withdrawal from that island as an opening move to a larger peace process.

[27] The agreement by Egypt to hand over the islands of Tiran and Sanafir to Saudi Arabia required the approval of Israel to modify the military annex to the peace treaty.

[32][33] On 14 June 2017, Egypt's House Committee on Defence and National Security unanimously approved the transfer of Tiran and Sanafir islands to Saudi Arabia and the plan was passed by the Egyptian Parliament later the same day.

[35] Finally, on Saturday 24 June 2017, President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt ratified the agreement that cedes sovereignty over the two Red Sea islands, Tiran and Sanafir, to Saudi Arabia.