Beersheba was developed by the Ottoman Empire from a camel-trading centre on the northern edge of the Negev, halfway between the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It was on the railway line which ran from Istanbul to Hafir el Auja (the main Ottoman desert base during the raid on the Suez Canal in 1915 until the EEF advance to Rafa outflanked it), and which was damaged beyond repair in May 1917 during an EEF raid. Beersheba's hospital, army barracks, railway station (with water tower), engine sheds, large storage buildings, and a square of houses, were well-designed and strongly-constructed stone buildings, with red tiled roofs and a German beer garden. The inhabitants of the region from Beersheba northwards varied; the population consisted mainly of Arabs adhering to Sunni Islam, with some Jewish and Christian colonists.