Groundwater is generally less prone to contamination than surface water; however, pollutant inltration can occur due to aquifer characteristics and anthropogenic land use (LU) changes.This study presents the rst DRASTIC-based groundwater contamination risk (GwCR) framework for stressed aquifers around the Ismailia Canal, a newly developed articial canal in Egypt. It evaluates the standard DRASTIC, Pesticide DRASTIC, DRASTIC-Lu, and Pesticide DRASTIC-Lumodels, along with theirmodied versions, using Single Parameter Sensitivity Analysis (SPSA) and GIS techniques. SPSA identied the following parameter weights for the pesticide-specic DRASTIC model: D>S>T>A>I>C>R. One- Map Removal Sensitivity Analysis (MRSA) analysis showed the Pesticide DRASTIC model wasmost sensitive to net recharge (1.36%) and soilmedia (1.0%), with moderate sensitivity to the vadose zone (0.65%), topography (0.45%), and hydraulic conductivity (0.42%). Excluding key parameters, particularly D, A, and S, caused signicant variability, impacting vulnerability assessments.The Pesticide DRASTICSPSAmodel outperformed others, with 82.6% of groundwater samples, along with relative frequency greater than 0.8 in moderate to very high vulnerability zones.The Pesticide DRASTICSPSAmap indicated that 36.21 km², 6.26 km², 19.03 km², 31.0 km², and 13.09 km² of the study area were in very high, high,moderate, low, and very low susceptibility zones, respectively.The high and very high vulnerability zones were primarily located in the northern and southern regions of the Ismailia Canal, where the protective clay layer is absent and shallow groundwater and sandy vadose zones prevail.The very high vulnerability area increased from 27.3 km² in the original DRASTICmodel to 30.52 km² under the Pesticide DRASTICSPSAmodel.These ndings apply to other regions with similar hydrogeological and socio-economic conditions, oering insights for future freshwater canal system development in Egypt.