The Saint Hilarion Monastery at Tell Umm al-Amr near Deir al-Balah, in the center of the Gaza Strip, on Aug. 11, 2024. (Credit: Eyad Baba/AFP)
It was around 9 a.m. in Gaza on Sept. 10 when a coordinator from the NGO Première Urgence Internationale received a message from the Israeli army ordering the evacuation of a building in Gaza City. They'd been given 30 minutes.When Fadel al-Otol, a Gazan archaeologist now in Switzerland, saw the notification on his phone, his heart raced. The 13-story 'Kawthar' tower houses the last intact archaeological depot in the enclave. Israel had already destroyed both national museums. "It was a catastrophe for me," he says. "These objects are the fruit of our work in Gaza from the past 30 years."Among these precious, labored-over objects are sarcophagi, ceramics, coins, steles, sculptures, frescoes, Byzantine mosaics, and pieces recovered from the site of Saint Hilarion Monastery, one of the oldest in the Middle...
It was around 9 a.m. in Gaza on Sept. 10 when a coordinator from the NGO Première Urgence Internationale received a message from the Israeli army ordering the evacuation of a building in Gaza City. They'd been given 30 minutes.When Fadel al-Otol, a Gazan archaeologist now in Switzerland, saw the notification on his phone, his heart raced. The 13-story 'Kawthar' tower houses the last intact archaeological depot in the enclave. Israel had already destroyed both national museums. "It was a catastrophe for me," he says. "These objects are the fruit of our work in Gaza from the past 30 years."Among these precious, labored-over objects are sarcophagi, ceramics, coins, steles, sculptures, frescoes, Byzantine mosaics, and pieces recovered from the site of Saint Hilarion Monastery, one of the oldest in the...