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A rare cache of silver coins dating to the Hasmonean period, some 2,140 years ago, has been discovered in a salvage excavation in central Israel. The 16 coins, shekels and half-shekels (tetradrachms and didrachms), date from around 126 BCE. They had been minted farther north, in the city of Tyre, and bear the images of the king, Antiochus VII and his brother Demetrius Israeli, stated Avraham Tendler, director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority... Closer analysis of the coins showed that the cache contains one or two coins from every year between 135 to 126 BCE... Aside...

JERUSALEM: An Israeli man angry with his wife over money matters set fire to three million shekels ($870,000) on the lawn of his affluent suburban home Wednesday, a news website reported. After reaching the end of his tether in the marital spat, he had opened the family safe, taken out fistsfuls of bank notes, stuffed them in sacks and dragged them outside, said the online edition of Yediot Aharonot. "In 36 years, I have seen nothing like it," one fireman was quoted as saying after four fire engines hurtled through Rehovot, near Tel Aviv, following reports of someone trying to...