In what part of the world would the Phoenicians have focused their trading efforts?

Answer 1

Around the Mediterranean Sea. North Africa, around present day Tunisia, and in Lebanon in the Middle East.

Answer 2

The Mediteranean. They originated in what we now call Lebanon, and became sea people trading their cedar trees, some say originally by floating them in rafts on currents down to Egypt. The original Hewbrew temple in Jerusalem was reputedly built of cedar by a Phoeniciean architect (not much gratitude there!). They became remarkable boat-builders using cedar, and set up trading posts which became seperate city-states as far away as North Africa (Carthage)and Spain. Carthage, and Phoenician trade domination, civilisation was destroyed by then emerging Rome after the Carthaginian Hannibal, from a Phoenician base in Spain, nearly destroyed Rome itself. The Romans then set out to destroy all traces of Phoenician culture, which was then probably the most sophisticated in the Mediterannean (and far ahead of Europe etc) because it incorporated inputs from the whole area, extending to India, through peaceful trade. Until fairly recently therefor, the records have been thin, and often distorted, including the libel that they sacrificed children. Their religion centred on "the spirit of place", as part of an all-encompassing spirit imbuing everything. To represent it symbolically, (although their most important "god" was female) they used statues of bulls or he-goats, generically called "The Baal", or spirit (the female is most important in perpetuating the tribe; but the male infuses the whole herd, just as the all-encompassing spirit of Earth does). This is a pretty sophisticated world view if you think about it. However, the Jews in particular, with their world view focussed on a single (and jealous) god, directing attention to the after-life rather than the mundane matters of life on earth (perpetuated in Christianity and Islam), could not understand the Phoenician outlook and the Baals as merely symbols of an idea, and recorded them as worshipping the Golden Calf! With Roman and later invasions the Phoenicians retreated to their mountains, along with the Djebel Druze (mountain Arabs) and maintained what they claimed were pure-blood enclaves right up to post World War 1. Often blue-eyed and fair-haired (as my Lebanese grandfather was) they can look distinctively different from the coastal Lebanese stemming significantly from Syrian and other invasions.

Answer 3

Along the Mediterranean coast and into the Atlantisc as far as Britain

Answer 4

They were once controlled by the Mesopotamians (Assyrians, Babylonians, Sumerians) so they would have traded with Assyria and Babylon.

Answer 5

On all the countries facing the Mediterranean sea.

Answer 6

egypt was the closest, but as far as I know they were between Africa and Asia and there for in a good spot to trade in both directions.

Answer 7

I'm guessing carthage.