Archaeology and Politics

AOL News July 15th asks the question, ‘Is Holy Land archaeology being hyped by politics?’ is a piece on the propaganda going on between Israelis and Palestinians – and archaeology is being used to score points. For example, Eilat Mazar claims she has found evidence Jerusalem was an important place in the Late Bronze Age, based on a small fragment of a clay tablet. Meir Ben-Dov, an older archaeologist, commented – it didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know. On the other side of the fence, thousands of tons of debris, potentially rich in archaeological treasure, have been removed from the Temple Mount during mosque renovations over the last 10 years and until recently, mosque guides at Al Aqsa, denied that Solomon’s Temple had once stood there.