standing between or separating two objects or areas; "Paris--where the same city lies on both sides of an intervening river"; "after reaching the top of the hill he looked across an intervening meadow to another line of hills"
occurring or falling between events or points in time; "so much had happened during the intervening years"
of the distant or comparatively distant past; "We met once long ago"; "they long ago forsook their nomadic life"; "left for work long ago"; "he has long since given up mountain climbing"; "This name has long since been forgotten"; "lang syne" is Scottish
the area around the eastern Mediterranean; from Turkey to northern Africa and eastward to Iran; the site of such ancient civilizations as Phoenicia and Babylon and Egypt and the birthplace of Judaism and Christianity and Islam; had continuous economic and political turmoil in the 20th century; "the Middle East is the cradle of Western civilization"