The seven oases of the ancient settlement of Al Buraimi -- now divided with two oases in the city of Buraimi, Oman, and five oases in the city of Al Ain, UAE -- were irrigated with a complicated system of wells and aflaj (singular: falaj) systems. Each system consisted of a series of vertical access shafts that lead to the horizontal falaj channel. Some of these access shafts are more than 20 meters deep in some of the larger systems. Workmen were lowered -- or climbed -- down the shafts to dig and later maintain the water channel. The vertical shafts are usually about 10 meters apart. In the mountains, falaj systems were more often above-ground constructions though some, as at A'Dahir, were a combination of under-ground and above-ground.

The falaj at Khalieef, near the spur that runs along the border between the UAE and Oman at Foha, consists of XX access shafts and a section of wide, deep subterranean channel.

Over the years, witness by the remains of control panels, I-beam steel bars that once suspended pumps, and other evidence, water was pumped from these access shafts. Originally, however, it is assumed the water was collected and diverted to the oases at the community now known as Khalieef, a suburb of Al Ain between Hili and Foha.

The falaj system is less than two kilometers from the remains at the Hili archaeological park and the hundreds of Hafit period tombs on the low mountain range beside the Buraimi industrial park.