The Desert de les Palmes area, in the southeast Iberian Chain, belongs to a Mesozoic NE–SW high which separated the early Cretaceous basins of the Maestrat and Aliaga-Penyagolosa from the little Orpesa basin. Its structure is characterized by the development of a system of NE–SW to ENE–WSW extensional listric faults detached in a shallow upper crustal level (1.7–2.2 km), mostly affecting the pre-Upper Cretaceous rocks. These faults record two well-differentiated rifting periods: (1) a first late Triassic–early Jurassic rifting period that divided the Desert de les Palmes high in several blocks; (2) a second early Cretaceous rifting period, only developed in the eastern margin of the Desert de les Palmes high, which was related to the opening of the Maestrat, Aliaga-Penyagolosa and Orpesa basins. Based on the comparison of the main features of this Mesozoic structure with an analysis of the structural and subsidence data already known in the neighbouring Mesozoic basins (Maestrat, Aliaga-Penyagolosa and Columbrets), a geodynamic scenario for the crustal evolution of the eastern Iberian Chain is also suggested. This involves four evolutionary stages: (1) Triassic rift (late Permian–Hettangian); (2) early and middle Jurassic postrift (Sinemurian–Oxfordian); (3) late Jurassic and early Cretaceous rift (Kimmeridgian–middle Albian), which includes a short Hauterivian postrift period; and (4) late Cretaceous postrift (late Albian–Maastrichtian).