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Archaeologists scrambled to save three decades of archaeological finds in Gaza on Thursday after the building housing them was threatened by an Israeli strike.
The French Biblical and Archaeological School of Jerusalem said it moved the artefacts out after Israel ordered it to evacuate its Gaza City storehouse.
The school’s director, Olivier Poquillon, told French news agency AFP they carried out the operation in secrecy due to the “overriding concern, as a religious organisation, of not endangering human lives”.
“This was a high-risk operation, carried out in an extremely dangerous context for everyone involved; a real last-minute rescue,” Mr Poquillon said.
The evacuation came as the Israeli military unleashed a “mighty hurricane” of air and ground attacks on Gaza.
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Israel is trying to fully occupy Gaza City even as the humanitarian catastrophe caused by its war – with Palestinians being killed almost daily, the destruction of homes, and constant displacement and starvation – continues to worsen.
In what it called a final warning on Monday, Israel’s military told Hamas that Gaza would be destroyed if it did not disarm and release the remaining hostages seized during the 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war.
Archaeological site of Saint Hilarion Monastery near Deir el-Balah in Gaza(AFP/Getty)
Mr Poquillon said they had to improvise transport, labour and logistics at the last minute to save the relics, as there were no international actors and no infrastructure remaining on the ground.
The Israeli military didn’t confirm its warning to the French Biblical and Archaeological School to carry out the evacuation.
According to the school, the storehouse contained artefacts from Gaza’s five primary archaeological sites, including the fourth-century Saint Hilarion monastery, a Unesco world heritage site. It said all these sites had sustained damage from Israeli attacks.
Some “unique” mosaic artefacts were left behind in their original place at the archaeological sites, risking damage due to weather, neglect and bombardment, the agency said.
Mr Poquillon said Gaza has “extremely ancient heritage, very precious for the region, showing the succession and coexistence of peoples, cultures and religions”.
The urgency to save artefacts and heritage sites in Gaza has been exacerbated by Israel’s destructive war on the besieged Palestinian territory, he added.
Unesco has identified damage to at least 94 heritage sites in Gaza.
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In April, the Arab World Institute in Paris exhibited more than 130 archaeological artefacts from Gaza, including a Byzantine mosaic from a sixth-century church, Roman oil lamps, and a marble statue of Aphrodite found by a Palestinian fisherman.
Many of these artefacts, stored in Geneva since 2007 due to the instability in the Gaza Strip, came from Franco-Palestinian excavations and the private collection of Palestinian entrepreneur Jawdat Khoudary.