Antiquities scholar’s killing stuns Syrians
Archaeological pillar devoted his life to study of Palmyra site
Islamic State militants behead one of Syria’s most prominent antiquities scholars, then hang his body from a Roman column.
DAMASCUS, Syria — The 81-year-old antiquities scholar had dedicated his life to exploring and overseeing Syria’s ancient ruins of Palmyra, one of the Middle East’s most spectacular archaeological sites.
He even named his daughter after Zenobia, the queen that ruled from the city 1,700 years ago.
On Wednesday, relatives and witnesses said Khaled al-Asaad was beheaded by Islamic State militants who seized the city this year, his body hung in a main square.
The killing stunned Syria’s archaeological community and underscored fears the extremists will destroy or loot the 2,000-year-old Romanera city on the edge of a modern town of the same name, as they have other major archaeological sites in Syria and Iraq. Scholar questioned
Antiquities officials said they believed IS militants had interrogated al-Asaad, a longtime director of the site, trying to get him to divulge where authorities had hidden treasures secreted out of Palmyra.
“We have lost not just a scholar of archaeology but one of the pillars of archaeology in the 20th century,” said Ahmad Ferzat Taraqji, 56, an antiquities expert. The Sunni extremists claim ancient relics promote idolatry and say they are destroying them as part of their purge of paganism — though they are also believed to sell off looted antiquities.
Known as “Mr. Palmyra” among Syrian antiquities experts for his authoritative knowledge and decades administering the site, al-Asaad refused to leave after IS militants captured the town and neighboring ruins in May.
The Palmyra site was al-Asaad’s life, said his nephew, an opposition activist who uses the name Khaled al-Homsi. Even when he could no longer go to the Roman ruins because of his advanced age, al-Asaad lived nearby, “and he could see the archaeological site from his house,” al-Homsi told the Associated Press.
On Tuesday, al-Homsi watched as al-Asaad was brought in a van to a main square packed with shoppers. Al-Asaad stood as a militant read out five accusations against him, including that he was the “director of idols” and visited Shiite power Iran.
Then, another militant pulled out a knife, at which point al-Homsi said he left the square, unable to watch. Al-Asaad’s body was later hung from a pole on a main street, a paper outlining the “charges” against him hung around his waist.
Maamoun Abdulkarim, the head of the Antiquities and Museums Department in Damascus, said al-Asaad was a pioneer in Syrian archaeology.
He said IS had tried to extract information from him about where some of the town’s treasures had been hidden in order to save them from the militants. UNESCO site
Palmyra was a prominent ancient city-state under the rule of the Roman Empire. In the 3rd century, its queen, Zenobia, led a revolt against Rome that briefly succeeded in holding much of the region until it was crushed.
The ancient remains, including temples and dramatic colonnades, are a UNESCO world heritage site.