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Archaeologists Find Ancient Tunnel Used By Jews To Escape Roman Conquest Of Jerusalem
IHT ^ | 9-9-2007 | AP

Posted on 09/09/2007 3:30:54 PM PDT by blam

Archeologists find ancient tunnel used by Jews to escape Roman conquest of Jerusalem

The Associated Press
Published: September 9, 2007

JERUSALEM: Israeli archeologists on Sunday said they've stumbled upon the site of one of the great dramatic scenes of the Roman sacking of Jerusalem 2,000 years ago: the subterranean drainage channel Jews used to escape from the city's Roman conquerors.

The ancient tunnel was dug beneath what would become the main road of Jerusalem in the days of the second biblical Temple, which the Romans destroyed in the year 70, the dig's directors, archaeology Professor Ronny Reich of the University of Haifa and Eli Shukron of the Israel Antiquities Authority, told a news conference.

The channel was buried beneath the rubble of the sacking, and the parts that have been exposed since it was discovered two weeks ago have been preserved intact.

The walls — ashlar stones one meter (3 feet) deep — reach a height of 3 meters (10 feet) in some places and are covered by heavy stone slabs that were the main road's paving stones, Shukron said. Several manholes are visible, and portions of the original plastering remain, he said.

Pottery sherds, vessel fragments and coins from the end of the Second Temple period were discovered inside the channel, attesting to its age, Reich said.

The discovery of the drainage channel was momentous in itself, a sign of how the city's rulers looked out for the welfare of their citizens by organizing a system that drained the rainfall and prevented flooding, Reich said.

The discovery "shows you planning on a grand scale, unlike other cities in the ancient Near East," said anthropologist Joe Zias, an expert in the Second Temple period who was not involved in the dig.

(Excerpt) Read more at iht.com ...


TOPICS: Israel; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: ancient; archaeologists; archeology; biblicalarchaeology; godsgravesglyphs; israel; jerusalem; josephus; letshavejerusalem; romanempire; templemount; thejewishwar; theromanwar; tunnel
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1 posted on 09/09/2007 3:30:57 PM PDT by blam
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To: SunkenCiv

GGG Ping.


2 posted on 09/09/2007 3:31:21 PM PDT by blam (Secure the border and enforce the law)
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To: blam; Alouette; Salem; SJackson; All

Ping Israeli news list


3 posted on 09/09/2007 3:32:03 PM PDT by SevenofNine ("We are Freepers, all your media belong to us, resistence is futile")
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To: blam
have the muslims declared it the fourth holiest site in islam yet?
4 posted on 09/09/2007 3:38:08 PM PDT by CzarNicky (The problem with bad ideas is that they seemed like good ideas at the time.)
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To: blam
Josephus mentioned these in his writings. If they are the escape tunnels, there should be a treasure trove of valuables the Jews lost trying to get them out of Jerusalem before the Romans sacked the city. Even the sewage area has the potential for some real artifacts since many Jews swallowed their valuables before leaving the city.
5 posted on 09/09/2007 3:40:56 PM PDT by vetvetdoug
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To: CzarNicky
"have the muslims declared it the fourth holiest site in islam yet?"

No, but they were planning on using the tunnel to undermine the approach to the West Wall. This flood of publicity has stopped that plan from being put into effect.

6 posted on 09/09/2007 3:50:53 PM PDT by alloysteel (Never attribute to ignorance that which is adequately explained by stupidity.)
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To: blam
Wow, anyone read Joel Rosenberg's latest book???

The guy seems to have quite an interesting history in regard to his novels.

In his first book he wrote about a hijacked jet, coming in on a kamikaze attack into an American city. He wrote it 9 months before 911.

As the story unfolded a US President was in a war with Saddam Hussein over weapons of mass destruction.

His second novel, The Last Days opened with an attack on a US Diplomatic convoy heading into Gaza, the death of Yasser Arafat and radical Islamic terrorist trying to take over the West Bank and Gaza. Two weeks before it was published a US Diplomatic convoy was attacked in Gaza. Thirteen months after it was published Arafat died and Hamas took command of the West Bank and Gaza.

In his third novel, The Ezekiel Option, a dictator rises to power in Russia, an Iranian leader vows to annihilate Israel. On the day the novel came out Iran elected thenutjob who vowed to wipe Israel off the map, and Putin made a deal to sell Iran $1 billion worth of military weapons.

His last novel The Copper Scrolls, tells of the hunt for the hidden treasures of the Temple Mount. They find all sorts of treasure in the tunnels, including the Arc of the Covenant

7 posted on 09/09/2007 3:52:35 PM PDT by mware (By all that you hold dear..on this good earth... I bid you stand! Men of the West!)
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To: blam

I hope this wakes them up to the fact of what ancient overlords did to them. They are getting in the same situation again, only this time with the entire middle east looking to sack them.


8 posted on 09/09/2007 3:53:13 PM PDT by BigFinn (islam= a caustic blend of paganism and twisted Bible stories resulting in mayhem and death.)
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To: mware

Bingo.


9 posted on 09/09/2007 4:08:38 PM PDT by AliVeritas (What have you done for America today? Elder Hunter)
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To: AliVeritas

The thing about his novels is that I am always having to check what parts of his novels are based on fact. The Copper Scrolls has tons of material about The Dead Sea Scrolls.


10 posted on 09/09/2007 4:14:27 PM PDT by mware (By all that you hold dear..on this good earth... I bid you stand! Men of the West!)
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To: AliVeritas

BTW, Rosenberg at one time worked for Rush Limbaugh, Natan Sharansky and Bibi Netanyahu.


11 posted on 09/09/2007 4:16:22 PM PDT by mware (By all that you hold dear..on this good earth... I bid you stand! Men of the West!)
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To: blam

OK, so where’s the Ark?


12 posted on 09/09/2007 4:20:10 PM PDT by Fitzcarraldo (Skip the Moon, go for Mars)
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To: blam

Ping


13 posted on 09/09/2007 4:21:28 PM PDT by Carbonsteel
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To: blam

How can you say it’s not speculation?
How do you know this isn’t the tunnel the locals used to use to go to the loo?


14 posted on 09/09/2007 4:22:10 PM PDT by Joe Boucher (An enemy of Islam)
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To: blam
The discovery of the drainage channel was momentous in itself, a sign of how the city's rulers looked out for the welfare of their citizens by organizing a system that drained the rainfall and prevented flooding, Reich said.

The discovery "shows you planning on a grand scale, unlike other cities in the ancient Near East,"

Unlike some cities in Louisiana who will remain nameless.

15 posted on 09/09/2007 4:25:45 PM PDT by mware (By all that you hold dear..on this good earth... I bid you stand! Men of the West!)
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To: mware

As you probably already know, Rosenberg is a Christian. His personal story is inspiring.


16 posted on 09/09/2007 4:44:45 PM PDT by khnyny (Hillary has given Bill a new title: Chief Flying Monkey)
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To: khnyny
Yes, I got to get an autographed copy of his first book during CPAC some years ago.

He seems to be a wonderful man.

The next book should be a doozy. It is somewhat similar to The Left Behind series.

17 posted on 09/09/2007 4:47:32 PM PDT by mware (By all that you hold dear..on this good earth... I bid you stand! Men of the West!)
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To: 1st-P-In-The-Pod; 2ndDivisionVet; A_Conservative_in_Cambridge; af_vet_rr; agrace; Aiko; ...
FReepMail to be added or removed from this pro-Israel/Judaic/Russian Jewry ping list.

Warning! This is a high-volume ping list.

18 posted on 09/09/2007 4:48:19 PM PDT by Alouette (Vicious Babushka)
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To: blam

don’t tell the palis...they will use it to smuggle in suicide bombers!!!


19 posted on 09/09/2007 4:52:03 PM PDT by nyyankeefan
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To: mware

Just about ALL the cities of any size in the ancient Near East/Middle East were planned to the nines ~ and that’s because the folks doing the planning had already figured out how cities had to be planned, but they did it somewhere else ~ probably Ukraine.


20 posted on 09/09/2007 5:22:43 PM PDT by muawiyah
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