JERUSALEM: Nearly three decades of archaeological finds in Gaza were hurriedly evacuated Thursday from a Gaza City building threatened by an Israeli strike, an official in charge of the antiquities told AFP.
“This was a high-risk operation, carried out in an extremely dangerous context for everyone involved — a real last-minute rescue,” said Olivier Poquillon, director of the French Biblical and Archaeological School of Jerusalem (EBAF), whose storehouse housed the relics.
On Wednesday morning, Israeli authorities ordered EBAF — one of the oldest academic institutions in the region — to evacuate its archaeological storehouse located on the ground floor of a residential tower in Gaza City that was due to be targeted.
The Israeli army did not confirm the warning when asked by AFP, but several sources said France, UNESCO and the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem played a key role in securing a brief reprieve that allowed most of the artefacts to be removed.
“With almost no international actors left on the ground, no infrastructure, nothing functioning, we had to improvise transport, labor and logistics,” said Poquillon.
