Gaza’s Cultural Heritage Ravaged by Zionist Bombardment, Thousands of Artifacts Looted
Gaza’s historical and cultural sites have suffered extensive destruction during the Zionist entity’s two-year war, with over 20,000 rare artifacts spanning from prehistoric times to the Ottoman era looted or missing, according to local officials.
“The Zionist forces have systematically and extensively destroyed Gaza’s archaeological sites as part of a policy aimed at erasing Palestinian identity,” Ismail al-Thawabteh, head of Gaza’s Government Media Office, told Anadolu on Monday. Official records indicate that more than 316 archaeological sites and historical buildings in the Gaza Strip, dating from the early Islamic, Mamluk, Ottoman, and Byzantine periods, were fully or partially destroyed.
Among the damaged sites is Qasr al-Basha, a Mamluk-era palace built on a UNESCO heritage site dating back to 800 BC. Located in Gaza City’s Old City, 70% of the palace was damaged during the Zionist entity’s attacks, according to Hamouda Al-Dahdar, a cultural heritage expert at the Centre for Cultural Heritage Preservation in Bethlehem, in the occupied West Bank.
Technicians and workers continue to search for scattered artifacts under the rubble, using basic tools to recover what remains of Gaza’s historical identity. “What happened to Gaza’s heritage was not only destruction; it was organized looting, a practice criminalized under international law and considered an assault on global cultural heritage,” Thawabteh said.
Thousands of rare artifacts housed in museums were looted or destroyed during the conflict. Dahdar emphasized the significance of each piece as part of Palestine’s civilizational history, describing the systematic looting as “a grave cultural crime that affects national identity and humanity’s shared heritage.”
Qasr al-Basha had previously suffered damage during earlier Zionist aggressions but was restored by the Palestinian Authority after the Zionist withdrawal in 1994 and turned into a museum. During the latest war that began in October 2023, the palace and its collections were once again heavily damaged and looted.
The war has claimed the lives of more than 69,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, and injured over 170,700 others, leaving much of the Gaza Strip in ruins.
