Posted on 07/08/2008 1:12:40 PM PDT by gandalftb
Iraq has created a special task force to investigate the theft of valuable ancient Judaic manuscripts that later turned up in Israel. The rare books, confiscated during the reign of Saddam Hussein, were rescued from US bombing at the start of the 2003 war and then sent to the US for restoration but later wound up in Israel instead.
At a press briefing at the National Museum in Baghdad, Minister of Tourism and Archaeology Mohammad Abbas al-Uraibi said a working group "will investigate in the US to find out if this is true or not."
Among some 300 precious works are a commentary on the "Book of Job" published in 1487 and a volume of biblical prophecies published in Venice in 1617, according to the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.
Iraq once hosted a thriving 2,600-year-old Jewish community that numbered some 130,000 people at the time Israel was created in 1948.
Iraq has also provided Interpol with a list of the tens of thousands of priceless antiquities stolen from Iraq in the chaos that followed the US-led invasion more than five years ago, Uraibi said. Around 32,000 artifacts were looted from 12,000 archaeological sites after the invasion, along with 15,000 items stolen from the National Museum in Baghdad alone.
Last month Jordan returned to Iraq some 2,466 artifacts, including gold coins, jewelry and Islamic and ancient manuscripts, stolen since then. Stolen antiquities found in Syria and the United States have also been returned to Iraq, while others discovered in Italy will be returned soon.
I didn’t know they cared.............I thought Judaica would be by product of the dogs.
They do care, they don't want them in Israel! ;-)
Seriously though, why would this be treated any differently then any of the other items that were stolen?
My question is how did Iraq come into possession of these manuscripts. Were they stolen?
Do you know why Iraq “used to have” 130,000 Jews and now does not?
Somehow I doubt that the hundred thousand+ Jews expleed from Iraq ever were compensated for their property that was seized and their lives uprooted- because they were Jewish. Maybe these texts are a start on some payback.
There was a large and thriving Jewish community in and around Baghdad for centuries.
Do you know what a genizeh is?
Keep in mind that the Taliban dynamited valuable infidel antiquities--and Saudi Arabia regularly destroys tombs and shrines. They may have been taken to protect them. So--return them.
I assumed that they were relevant to the Judaic history of Mesopotamia, but yours is a good question...
On the other hand the western world does not readily entertain questions of original ownership or otherwise the museums in Europe would be half empty ;-)
The question of original ownership and how Iraq came into possession of these manuscripts is a good one, only because if the items were originally taken by either force, coercion, or theft then the moral outrage of having these stolen during the invasion of 2003 and then returned to the people of the original authors holds little over which to sympathize with Iraq.
If however it came into Iraq’s possession as a bequest from the previous owners, and its ownership chain is untainted by an immoral acquisition, then Iraq can honestly say that custodianship should revert back to them... However, I am inclined to think that if the Iraqi custodianship is going to be less than beneficial to the artifact, then temporary custodianship should go to the Israelis on the basis that they do not restrict access to the artifacts (reasonably) , and that the artifacts be actively studied and those studies published, until such time as Iraq can guarantee the safety and accessibility of the artifacts.
I wonder how many of those items that mysteriously ended up in Israel are now along side the descendants of the original owners who are also in Israel.
It says they were "confiscated during the reign of Saddam Hussein". Sounds to me like they were stolen from their original owners by Hussein.
It's good to know these treasures are back with their rightful owners.
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