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Past excavation on the Temple Mount (Photo: Israel Antiquities Authority)
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| By Israel Insider staff July 16, 2007 |
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A current dig on Jerusalem's Temple Mount by Waqf Islamic trust officials has infuriated a group of Israeli archeologists. The group has slammed the Antiquities Authority for authorizing the dig, which will precede infrastructure work in the area.
The digging began last week, and is creating an 80-meter-long, one-meter-deep ditch spanning from the northern side of the Temple Mount compound to the Dome of the Rock, charged the Committee for the Prevention of Destruction of Antiquities on the Temple Mount.
"The Antiquities Authority would never have allowed such damage to antiquities at any other archeological site in Israel," said Dr. Eilat Mazar, a Temple Mount expert and spokeswoman for the committee, an apolitical group of archaeologists and intellectuals from across the political spectrum.
"The Antiquities Authority has the ability and full backing of the police to enforce real archeological supervision, but does not do so," she said.
According to Mazar, the work is being done "without real, professional and careful archeological supervision involving meticulous documentation."
Although the work was approved by police, the committee claims that digging of this nature, with heavy machinery in a fragile historic site, requires, by law, approval by archeological authorities.
The committee, which is an apolitical group of archaeologists and intellectuals from across the political spectrum, stated that, by law, such work requires approval by archeological authorities.
"There is disappointment at the turning of a blind eye and the ongoing contempt for the tremendous archaeological importance of the Temple Mount," stated Mazar, speaking for the group.
Decades-old regulations state that while Israel controls the security of the site, Waqf is in charge of administration activities.
According to Wakf director Azzam Khatib, the work began after an electrical shortage in the Al-Aqsa Mosque.
Jerusalem police spokesman Shmuel Ben-Ruby verified that the police, in conjunction the Antiquities Authority, authorized Waqf officials to begin digging.
This new controversy comes shortly after Israeli officials decided to nix the debated plans to build a new bridge to the Mughrabi Gate, which would run through the archeological garden next to the Temple Mount, due to worries that further construction would harm artifacts in the area.
The excavation ignited anger and violence from the Islamic community of Jerusalem who charged that the dig, being held many meters outside the Temple Mount, would damage the Dome of the Rock mosque there.
It also angered leading Israeli archeologists who staunchly opposed the plan to build the new bridge, because it would damage the area's artifacts and block the view of the site.
"The archeological garden is one of the foremost national accomplishments and should not be touched under any circumstances," said Prof. Amos Kloner, a former archeologist of the Israel Antiquities Authority. |
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