by Dr. Hassan Barghouti, archaeologist
Temple Mount, August 22 – Guys! Guys! Look at this! I got it! Here’s irrefutable evidence that this site was a Palestinian shrine way back during the late- oh. Huh. OK, forget that, guys! Forget it! False alarm! More Jewish stuff. As you were.
By Allah, that’s like the fifth time today. And I really thought we had this one in the bag.
The boys and I have been scouring archaeological sites for years, seeking the one artifact, structure, or other find, to once and for all debunk the Zionist narrative of continuous, ancient Jewish presence in Palestine. Our colleagues in academia and politics have focused mainly on coopting existing evidence of Jewish sovereignty and indigeneity, or perhaps accusing Zionist “archaeologists” of fabricating or distorting the existing evidence. Often we simply label Ottoman, Mameluke, Seljuk Turk, or other foreign conqueror “Palestinian” because as everyone knows, all Muslims are basically interchangeable. A select group of activists also tries to destroy sites and items that undermine the Palestinian narrative. But I still hold out faith that we can take the aboveboard route and find something unequivocal that settles the issue for good.
It wouldn’t have to be huge; an inscription of “Palestine” in Arabic on a coin minted by our ancient Islamic ancestors, for example. A bronze-age postage stamp with the same irrefutable name on it. “Huge,” on the other hand, would be more like a clay tablet with the edict of an ancient Palestinian ruler. So far, though, we have nothing like that. Plenty of things like that for ancient entities of “Judah” and “Israel.” But just one for our team and we can bring down the entire false edifice of two hundred years of archaeology and three thousand years of documented history. It’s science. As soon as we say it is. Until then it’s all just Zionist hasbara.
On a side note, it might also be gratifying to finally contribute something to the Museum of Indigenous Palestinian Culture something more recent than twenty-first-century-artifacts. We had a number of hopeful finds over the last few years that turned out useless. Somebody found a piece of metal north of Jerusalem with Arabic writing on it, but that turned out to be the bottlecap from a Pepsi-Cola bottle some Jordanian guy dropped there in like 1960. Under it were some coins from the Jewish Bar Kokhba revolt in 132 CE; we just reburied the ones we couldn’t sell.
One of these days, though.
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