Palestinians overcome obstacles to unearth ancient treasures in Gaza

Just metres from the Mediterranean shore, archaeologists in Gaza are unearthing ancient wonders in the Palestinian enclave.

“There’s a saying, that Gaza lies above treasure,” said Nemaa El Sawarka, a guide and archaeologist working at the Saint Hilarion Monastery.

The monastery south of Gaza city is believed to be one of the largest uncovered in the Middle East.

While students stroll around the site, gazing at the baths and mosaics, Ms El Sawarka laments the lack of awareness among Gazans of their rich heritage.

“People come to me who aren’t aware of this place,” she said, beside a collection of mosaic fragments labelled with numbers.

“They talk about the stones and that this place is Christian, but we say this is our heritage,” Ms El Sawarka said.

Around 1,500 Gazans visit Saint Hilarion each week, according to staff, a significant increase since before the pandemic when only 1,000 people toured the site each month.

Dating to the fourth century AD, it has a crypt and quarters where pilgrims would stay.

Gaza’s antiquities are a testament to leaders who have laid claim to the Eastern Mediterranean over centuries past, but preserving such heritage is proving challenging.

The Palestinian territory has been under an Israeli-led blockade for 15 years and the entry of goods and people is strictly controlled.

Rene Elter, an archaeologist and scientific director of the Saint Hilarion restoration project, said the team had been hindered by the border restrictions.

“To carry out the strengthening and the restoration of the crypt, we had to make 3,000 blocks,” he said, of the stones cut to recreate the arched ceiling that stood centuries ago.

“These tools exist in the West Bank. In Gaza they don’t exist; there’s no tradition of stonemasonry in Gaza.

“It was impossible to import mechanical tools into Gaza, to cut the stone, so what did we do? We adapted. We made the tools ourselves."

While huge parts of the site have been excavated since the monastery was discovered in the 1990s, some areas have not been recovered because of a lack of resources.

Beside the baths a striking mosaic stands under a roof, protecting the array of animals marked out in the stone.

But elsewhere the mosaics lie out of view under pebbles or sand, as there is nothing to shield them from the bleaching sun.

The archaeological work of recent years has been funded by the British Council, the UK government’s Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, and the Aliph Foundation which focuses on heritage in conflict zones.

While such investment is welcome, Ms El Sawarka, 27, said the nature of such project financing means there can be gaps during which work stops.

“The thing we are most afraid of is that between contracts, in the period between signing a contract, there is a period of interruption,” she said.

As a student, she received three months of training at the site in 2018. She returned two years ago to work on the project, which is run by the French organisation Premiere Urgence Internationale.

The NGO has trained dozens of young Gazans, who Mr Elter hopes represent the future of archaeology in the territory.

“There are a lot of sites to discover but the Palestinians don’t have the means to make the most of them,” he said.

This year a fifth-century Byzantine church was opened to visitors in northern Gaza, while in February builders stumbled on a gravesite thought to be 2,000 years old.

“Our job is to create a team that can manage their heritage in the years to come,” Mr Elter said.

The French Development Agency last month announced it would fund a canopy to cover the site, paving the way for those hidden mosaics to be unveiled to the public.

Ms El Sawarka pictures the site becoming “the best place in Gaza”.

But as long as the Palestinian territory remains under blockade, few outsiders will have the opportunity to see the ancient site brought to light.

For Mr Elter, who has worked in Gaza intermittently over the past two decades, conducting excavations at the site is unlike anywhere else in the world.

“Here, everything is difficult and you must adapt," he said. "We adapt, we work with people who have the drive to do something excellent."