The race to save Gaza's historic treasures from Israeli bombs

The history of the Gaza Strip dates back more than 5,000 years. In antiquity, it was a key port on the Mediterranean coast, on a busy trade route between Egypt, Syria and Mesopotamia. In 332 BC, Alexander the Great besieged Gaza. In 1799, Napoleon stayed there. This vibrant cultural heritage is seen by many Palestinians as central to their identity. Despite the suffering of nearly two years of war, some are committed to saving Gaza’s past.

As Israeli bombs were bringing down tall buildings one after another in Gaza City, a phone call came that Gaza's top archaeologist, Fadel al-Otol, had long feared. The Israeli army was warning that it was about to attack a tower that guarded thousands of ancient treasures.

"Honestly, I can barely speak, I haven't slept for two days," Fadel said from Switzerland, where he now lives with most of his family. "I was extremely worried. I felt like a missile could hit my heart at any moment," he added.

After international experts urged Israel to give them an extra day to evacuate, Fadel and several others remotely guided Palestinian volunteers and aid workers through an incredible feat. Racing against time, they moved six truckloads of artifacts — including fragile pottery, mosaics and centuries-old skeletons — to a safer location across the bombed-out city. Some items had been damaged earlier by bombing and theft, but Fadel had left boxes of carefully packed and inventoried items on shelves.

He estimates that 70% of the contents of the ground-floor warehouse were successfully removed. They included many rare finds.

But all remaining items were crushed when missiles destroyed the 13-story al-Kawthar building on Sunday.

"I am very sad. My heart is breaking," Fadel wrote in his last message. "It never occurred to me that archaeological sites, museums and shops would one day be destroyed," he said.

Small territory with diverse civilizations

The history of the Gaza Strip dates back more than 5,000 years. In antiquity, it was a key port on the Mediterranean coast, on a busy trade route between Egypt, Syria, and Mesopotamia. In 332 BC, Alexander the Great besieged Gaza. In 1799, Napoleon stayed there.

The small territory, as it is known today, has seen various civilizations, including the Canaanites, Egyptians, Philistines, Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, Jewish Hasmoneans, Romans, Christian Byzantines, Mamluks, and Muslim Ottomans. All have left their mark.

This living cultural heritage is seen by many Palestinians as central to their identity.

Fadel al-Otol had humble beginnings in one of Gaza’s large urban refugee camps, Shati (Beach) camp. As a boy, he was fascinated by the finds that washed up along the coast during winter storms. “It all happened by chance,” Fadel says, recalling his career. “It turned out I was living near the site of the ancient port of Anthedon.”

During the 1990s, as a teenager, Fadel followed a team from the French Biblical and Archaeological School in Jerusalem as they conducted excavations at Anthedon, which dates back nearly 3,000 years.

He completed his training in France before returning to his homeland to direct important excavations, including at St. Hilarion, a large early monastery in central Gaza, which was recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage site last year.

“I really enjoyed working there,” Fadel says. “It reflects the rich history and social tolerance of Gaza. The place was built in the 4th century and continued to flourish until the 7th century. During the Umayyad Islamic period, Muslims and Christians lived there,” he adds.

The change that came on October 7, 2023

For years, Fadel managed the shop run by the French school in Gaza City. The shop included major finds from nearly three decades of local excavations. More recently, there have been exciting discoveries at the Church of Al-Bureij in central Gaza and the largest Roman cemetery ever found in Gaza, Ard al-Moharbeen.

That all changed on October 7, 2023, when Hamas fighters from Gaza led a cross-border attack on Israel, killing an estimated 1,200 people. Hamas took 251 hostages, of whom 48 are still being held in Gaza, although only 20 are believed to be still alive.

In response, Israel launched a massive bombardment and ground invasion. According to the Hamas-run Health Ministry, nearly 65,000 Palestinians have been killed since then. There has been widespread destruction.

During the war, UNESCO says it verified damage to 110 sites of religious, historical and cultural significance.

In the Old Quarter of Gaza City, the distinctive octagonal minaret of the iconic Mosque of Omar the Great - the largest and oldest mosque in the Strip - is left like a broken log.

Nearby, the 700-year-old Qasr al-Basha, one of Gaza's jewels, was bulldozed and demolished. In recent years it has been used as a museum and it is not known what happened to the thousands of artifacts it contained. The IDF said it had no information about the site being targeted.

The entrance to the medieval gold market, Souq al-Qissariya, was hit directly. The IDF said it had hit "a military target," and the restored traditional Hammam al-Samra bathhouse no longer exists.

Further north, Ard al-Moharbeen was damaged and bulldozed. The IDF said it targeted “a Hamas military compound used for operational purposes.”

The last time it was safe for experts to visit the 5th-century Byzantine church in Jabalia, they found that a shelter built to protect its beautiful mosaics had collapsed on them.

"The situation in Gaza is very difficult. People are just looking for something to eat and drink," says Fadel, whose eldest daughter and two young grandchildren remained in the Strip.

He says that locals still care deeply about all the losses of heritage sites.

Military camps at archaeological sites

Being an archaeologist in Gaza has never been easy. Hamas - seen by many as a terrorist group - took control of the Strip by force in 2007, a year after winning Palestinian elections. Israel and Egypt then kept it under a strict blockade, saying this was to stop money and weapons reaching Hamas.

At times, Hamas celebrated finds from the ancient past. But it also built housing projects and military camps at archaeological sites — including Anthedon, Tel es-Sakan, a rare 4,500-year-old Bronze Age settlement, and a 6th-century synagogue in Gaza City.

With little space, a rapidly growing population, and a crumbling economy, history was a small advantage. Fadel tried every avenue to gain support for local archaeology and found an ally in a French Palestinian from Gaza City, Jehad Abu Hassan.

Jehad works for the French humanitarian organization "Première Urgence Internationale" and has set up a program called "Intiqal", which trains young people from Gaza to work on excavations and public tours.

“We received a lot of applications and requests to do volunteer work, so we think the local community started to see the importance of cultural heritage, where they could do something in this area,” he recalls.

For now, Jehad Abu Hassan says survival is the top priority for Gazans, but he believes cultural heritage could ultimately be an important part of a post-war plan.

"You would have to start from almost zero, build again and tell the world that Gaza is not just images of violence and despair," he says, "but we have culture, we have history, we have people on this land."

In the past two years, the highest international courts have opened cases of alleged war crimes committed by Hamas and Israel, which deny the charges.

The destruction of a people's cultural heritage is part of an ongoing lawsuit at the International Court of Justice, where South Africa has accused Israel of genocide; a case which Israel has said it has rejected.

Israel blames Hamas

Israel blames Hamas for the destruction of important historical sites. The Israeli military says that “Hamas deliberately embeds its military assets within densely populated civilian areas.

"The IDF does not seek to cause excessive damage to civilian infrastructure and carries out attacks only based on military necessity. In accordance with international law, careful attention is paid to the presence of sensitive sites," an IDF statement said.

A twist of fate has preserved another impressive collection of treasures from Gaza's past. A selection is currently on display at the Institute of the Arab World in Paris, and is being used to tell the little-known story of the territory as an oasis, open to the world, at the crossroads of civilizations.

"With what has happened, they have a new emotional impact," says curator Elodie Bouffard.

There is an abundance of vases, statues, columns and small lamps. The centerpiece of the exhibition is a large 6th-century mosaic from a church, decorated with animals and a grape vine, found by workers excavating a road in Deir al-Balah.

Many of the items on display were originally sent to the Museum of Art and History in Geneva about two decades ago for an exhibition organized by the internationally supported Palestinian Authority. It was intended to fund a new museum in Gaza. After Hamas took power and Gaza's borders were sealed, the objects were left behind and kept in storage.

A wealthy Gazan businessman, Jawdat Khoudary, had donated many of these works. He reluctantly left his home for Egypt at the start of the war with his family.

"A life destroyed in two hours"

“I know all the shovel operators who dig, so I convinced them, if you find a piece of marble or ceramic, don't destroy it, keep it in good condition and give it to me and I will give you a considerable amount,” says Jawdat.

"They thought I was a little crazy looking for pottery and stones, but day after day we convinced them that it's our history."

Like everyone in Gaza, Jawdat is mourning loved ones lost in the war, but he is also angry about the loss of historical jewelry, coins, Palestinian costumes and artifacts he had collected over decades. He had placed some of the valuables in safe deposit boxes at the bank, but many were on display at his al-Mathaf (Museum) guesthouse in Gaza City.

Last year, Israeli forces struck the bank, which the IDF said was part of its attacks on Hamas, as well as Jawdat's home and museum. The Israeli military says it targeted the latter because a senior operative from Hamas's Camp Shati battalion was stationed there.

“I faced the reality that what I had built in my life was destroyed in two hours,” Jawdat says ruefully. The remaining workers from his company in Gaza have helped him recover some artifacts, but a video sent to him shows his museum badly burned.

Most of what has disappeared is irreplaceable, says Jawdat.

In Paris, there is a long queue for the Gaza exhibition. Meanwhile, in Geneva, Fadel al-Otol, who has been working at the Museum of Art and History since April, has been tasked with cataloguing, researching and preserving a total of about 500 objects from Gaza that are still held there. Looking at the entire collection, he says it evokes “sadness and nostalgia.”