Located along the entrance to the Suez Canal is the De Lesseps Jetty, a narrow spit of land at the end of Palestine street that was constructed in 1899. The most noteworthy landmark on the jetty is the large base where a statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps once stood. De Lesseps was the French diplomat who developed the Suez Canal in the 1860s. The statue, which was sculpted by Emmanuel Frémiet and erected in 1899, depicted de Lesseps standing with his right hand welcoming visitors entering the Suez Canal and his left hand holding a map of the canal. During the Suez Crisis of 1956, a member of the Egyptian resistance dynamited the statue and destroyed it. In recent years, the statue was restored by the Paris-based Friends of the Suez Canal and moved to the a shipyard in Port Fouad where it stands today.
The city of Port Said is at the entrance to Suez Canal waterway,and all traffic through the canal from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea is controlled from this point.
Roy Westlake/© Roy Westlake
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Ferdinand De Lesseps Statue
Located along the entrance to the Suez Canal is the De Lesseps Jetty, a narrow spit of land at the end of Palestine street that was constructed in 1899. The most noteworthy landmark on the jetty is the large base where a statue of Ferdinand de Lesseps once stood. De Lesseps was the French diplomat who developed the Suez Canal in the 1860s. The statue, which was sculpted by Emmanuel Frémiet and erected in 1899, depicted de Lesseps standing with his right hand welcoming visitors entering the Suez Canal and his left hand holding a map of the canal. During the Suez Crisis of 1956, a member of the Egyptian resistance dynamited the statue and destroyed it. In recent years, the statue was restored by the Paris-based Friends of the Suez Canal and moved to the a shipyard in Port Fouad where it stands today.
