As the apocalyptic devastation of the first earthquake on February 6 raged in Turkey and Syria, one of the images almost immediately shared around the world was of the outer walls of Gaziantep Castle, tumbled like giant sugar cubes.
Why, when there was such traumatic and significant loss of life in an ongoing human, environmental and economic tragedy would anyone care about damage to a heritage site? Yet this picture went viral, swiftly followed by others: the crumpled minaret of the Sirvani Mosque, the collapsed Cathedral of the Annunciation in Iskenderun and the damaged synagogue in Antakya (ancient Antioch).
In January, Unesco added three locations to its official catalogue of endangered heritage monuments – Yemen, Lebanon and Crimea. In the face of global-scale conflicts and political disruption, you might think this an irrelevant, esoteric indulgence. But that would be to miss a crucial point.
There is a false dichotomy when it comes to care and concern for human life and for the works of human hands, heads and hearts. Historic buildings are freighted with meaning and memory. Heritage which has endured the vicissitudes of time carries with it the experiences and skills, the passions and preoccupations, the hopes and fears and ambitions of generations' worth of individuals, women and men, young and old.
These tenacious buildings are repositories of local pride. They are places that connect us, across time, with other humans. Because they make us care about other lives, and encourage us to understand them, they come to carry universal meaning.
Take that shaken Gaziantep Castle – a stalwart incarnation of the diverse, multi-cultural history of the region. Built in the Bronze Age originally as a Hittite lookout by the Anatolian civilisation that once controlled huge swathes of what is now Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq, the hillfort was then taken over by Roman imperialists, and redeveloped by the Byzantine emperor, Justinian I. The Ayyubid dynasty of the Sultanate of Egypt – founded by Saladin – further extended the fortification, as did the Ottomans. Gaziantep Castle was the locus of resistance to French troops in 1920 during Turkish War of Independence, and proudly boasted a display of artefacts from that time in the Gaziantep Defence and Heroism Panoramic Museum.
Unesco’s other newly listed at-risk locations have similar, capacious stories to tell. The ancient Kingdom of Saba in Yemen was a pivot of the frankincense trade that connected the southern Arabian Peninsula with Alexandria, the Levant, the Eastern Mediterranean and beyond.
Frankincense from Yemen and Oman ended up on the altars of temples and elite homes in Rome, Babylon, Cyprus and China. Saba was an engine of life, and the traders who started their journeys here via desert and sea routes, often with camel caravans 1,000-strong, took with them not just goods but languages and ideas.
Now threatened by conflict, ancient Saba was once an object lesson in collaboration – here community irrigation systems that functioned only thanks to a trustworthy time-share of water for 2,000 years created the continent’s largest man-made oasis.
Denying our collective history does not just ignore our past, it weakens our present and cauterises our future potential
Odesa in Crimea – currently witness to a war of attrition and once controlled in turn by Greeks, tribal Pechenegs and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania to name but a few – was in its 19th-century heyday an exemplar of multi-ethnic and cultural co-habitation. The vision and cohesion of the planning of the modern city – kickstarted by Catherine the Great and realised, in the majority, by Italian architects, is now being splintered apart by aerial attack.
Even the Rachid Karami International Fair in Tripoli, Lebanon, designed between 1962 and 1967 by the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer, and which ushered in a new outlook for the Arab world, now has to be protected not only because of its vulnerable, eroding and corroding concrete and steel, but because of state and social breakdown. All these sites are in clear and present danger because of political insecurity.
The very fact that monuments are regularly the target of attack during conflict proves their relevance. When the Buddhas of Bamiyan were destroyed in 2001 (after many previous attempts from the 13th century onwards), the message was being sent that 1,500 years counted for nothing in the face of one second of dynamite.
The destruction of antiquities at Palmyra, Syria was the frame within which the brutal and despicable beheading of its chief curator Khaled Al Asaad was positioned. Mr Al Asaad’s sacrifice to protect the whereabouts of the artefacts under his care proved his nobility, and the shared meaning of Palmyra’s heritage.
It's not just Unesco – previous cultures have understood the need to maintain buildings despite their incarnation of opposing ideologies. In 393 AD, a temple in Osrhoene, Mesopotamia was ordered to remain open so that the works inside could be enjoyed “for the value of their art rather than divinity” and a constitution of 399 AD was passed by the Byzantine emperors Arcadius and Theodosius that prevented individuals destroying polytheistic artworks (although there was mass destruction in the imperial name of the newly Christianised Eastern Roman Empire).
The protection by Unesco of the unique monuments on its World Heritage in Danger list is an act of wisdom and will. Powerful civilisations leave behind great monuments, great civilisations leave behind powerful ideas.
The Unesco listing brings responsibilities, maintenance, management, marketing. But it is also a strategy that connects the local to the global. When filming in the earthquake-struck region of Turkey this time last year, the swelling pride of Malatya locals in their new Unesco status heritage was clear to see. Bulent Korkmaz, a resident whose family have farmed the land here for generations, delightedly showed me around Arslantepe, an 8,000-year-old prehistoric site believed to be a home of one of the earliest examples of statehood, and of the world’s oldest swords.
Having explored and documented the new archaeology of the region, those we met have beseeched us post-earthquake to transmit our film to remind a global audience how beautiful and rich south-eastern Turkey normally is, and how beautiful it will be again.
Spending time recently in Jordan with female apprentices on the World Monuments Fund’s training programme for heritage stonemasons also rammed home the power of involvement in heritage as a form of extreme art therapy.
Two of the displaced women I met, Khadija and Aisha, agreed that despite the fact they had to leave their homelands and move to Mafraq just across the Syrian border, learning apparently arcane skills made them realise they were as strong as any man. Their mental health benefitted not only because they felt a direct connection to, and respect for, the artisans of the past who had created beauty out of stone here for millennia, but because they had the opportunity to build and to create, rather than witness the systematic destruction of heritage that had become the trauma of their life experience.
Unesco’s list of endangered sites is not just a collection of sterile stones. We are creatures of memory. Neuroscientists now tell us that we carry memory right across our brains; we cannot have a future thought unless we access a memory of some kind – of an experience, an idea, a sensation. So denying our collective history does not just ignore our past, it weakens our present and cauterises our future potential. We should never live in the past, but we are fools if we don’t admit that we live with it.
Bettany Hughes's Treasures of the World Season Two is currently playing internationally and in the UK. Her forthcoming book, The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, will be available in the autumn of 2023
Game Of Thrones Season Seven: A Bluffers Guide
Want to sound on message about the biggest show on television without actually watching it? Best not to get locked into the labyrinthine tales of revenge and royalty: as Isaac Hempstead Wright put it, all you really need to know from now on is that there’s going to be a huge fight between humans and the armies of undead White Walkers.
The season ended with a dragon captured by the Night King blowing apart the huge wall of ice that separates the human world from its less appealing counterpart. Not that some of the humans in Westeros have been particularly appealing, either.
Anyway, the White Walkers are now free to cause any kind of havoc they wish, and as Liam Cunningham told us: “Westeros may be zombie land after the Night King has finished.” If the various human factions don’t put aside their differences in season 8, we could be looking at The Walking Dead: The Medieval Years.
The 100 Best Novels in Translation
Boyd Tonkin, Galileo Press
Read more about the coronavirus
The Outsider
Stephen King, Penguin
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
'The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey'
Rating: 3/5
Directors: Ramin Bahrani, Debbie Allen, Hanelle Culpepper, Guillermo Navarro
Writers: Walter Mosley
Stars: Samuel L Jackson, Dominique Fishback, Walton Goggins
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
UAE Rugby finals day
Games being played at The Sevens, Dubai
2pm, UAE Conference final
Dubai Tigers v Al Ain Amblers
4pm, UAE Premiership final
Abu Dhabi Harlequins v Jebel Ali Dragons
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Company Profile
Founders: Tamara Hachem and Yazid Erman
Based: Dubai
Launched: September 2019
Sector: health technology
Stage: seed
Investors: Oman Technology Fund, angel investor and grants from Sharjah's Sheraa and Ma'an Abu Dhabi
THE CLOWN OF GAZA
Director: Abdulrahman Sabbah
Starring: Alaa Meqdad
Rating: 4/5
What the law says
Micro-retirement is not a recognised concept or employment status under Federal Decree Law No. 33 of 2021 on the Regulation of Labour Relations (as amended) (UAE Labour Law). As such, it reflects a voluntary work-life balance practice, rather than a recognised legal employment category, according to Dilini Loku, senior associate for law firm Gateley Middle East.
“Some companies may offer formal sabbatical policies or career break programmes; however, beyond such arrangements, there is no automatic right or statutory entitlement to extended breaks,” she explains.
“Any leave taken beyond statutory entitlements, such as annual leave, is typically regarded as unpaid leave in accordance with Article 33 of the UAE Labour Law. While employees may legally take unpaid leave, such requests are subject to the employer’s discretion and require approval.”
If an employee resigns to pursue micro-retirement, the employment contract is terminated, and the employer is under no legal obligation to rehire the employee in the future unless specific contractual agreements are in place (such as return-to-work arrangements), which are generally uncommon, Ms Loku adds.
more from Janine di Giovanni
Abu Dhabi World Pro 2019 remaining schedule:
Wednesday April 24: Abu Dhabi World Professional Jiu-Jitsu Championship, 11am-6pm
Thursday April 25: Abu Dhabi World Professional Jiu-Jitsu Championship, 11am-5pm
Friday April 26: Finals, 3-6pm
Saturday April 27: Awards ceremony, 4pm and 8pm
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
BUNDESLIGA FIXTURES
Friday (all kick-offs UAE time)
Hertha Berlin v Union Berlin (10.30pm)
Saturday
Freiburg v Werder Bremen (5.30pm)
Paderborn v Hoffenheim (5.30pm)
Wolfsburg v Borussia Dortmund (5.30pm)
Borussia Monchengladbach v Bayer Leverkusen (5.30pm)
Bayern Munich v Eintracht Frankfurt (5.30pm)
Sunday
Schalke v Augsburg (3.30pm)
Mainz v RB Leipzig (5.30pm)
Cologne v Fortuna Dusseldorf (8pm)
Results:
2.15pm: Handicap (PA) Dh60,000 1,200m.
Winner: AZ Dhabyan, Adam McLean (jockey), Saleha Al Ghurair (trainer).
2.45pm: Maiden (PA) Dh60,000 1,200m.
Winner: Ashton Tourettes, Sam Hitchcott, Ibrahim Aseel.
3.15pm: Conditions (PA) Dh60,000 2,000m.
Winner: Hareer Al Reef, Gerald Avranche, Abdallah Al Hammadi.
3.45pm: Maiden (PA) Dh60,000 1,700m.
Winner: Kenz Al Reef, Gerald Avranche, Abdallah Al Hammadi.
4.15pm: Sheikh Ahmed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Cup (TB) Dh 200,000 1,700m.
Winner: Mystique Moon, Sam Hitchcott, Doug Watson.
4.45pm: The Crown Prince Of Sharjah Cup Prestige (PA) Dh200,000 1,200m.
Winner: ES Ajeeb, Sam Hitchcott, Ibrahim Aseel.
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
- Priority access to new homes from participating developers
- Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
- Flexible payment plans from developers
- Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
- DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Our legal advisor
Ahmad El Sayed is Senior Associate at Charles Russell Speechlys, a law firm headquartered in London with offices in the UK, Europe, the Middle East and Hong Kong.
Experience: Commercial litigator who has assisted clients with overseas judgments before UAE courts. His specialties are cases related to banking, real estate, shareholder disputes, company liquidations and criminal matters as well as employment related litigation.
Education: Sagesse University, Beirut, Lebanon, in 2005.
WOMAN AND CHILD
Director: Saeed Roustaee
Starring: Parinaz Izadyar, Payman Maadi
Rating: 4/5
Tonight's Chat on The National
Tonight's Chat is a series of online conversations on The National. The series features a diverse range of celebrities, politicians and business leaders from around the Arab world.
Tonight’s Chat host Ricardo Karam is a renowned author and broadcaster who has previously interviewed Bill Gates, Carlos Ghosn, Andre Agassi and the late Zaha Hadid, among others.
Intellectually curious and thought-provoking, Tonight’s Chat moves the conversation forward.
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How has net migration to UK changed?
The figure was broadly flat immediately before the Covid-19 pandemic, standing at 216,000 in the year to June 2018 and 224,000 in the year to June 2019.
It then dropped to an estimated 111,000 in the year to June 2020 when restrictions introduced during the pandemic limited travel and movement.
The total rose to 254,000 in the year to June 2021, followed by steep jumps to 634,000 in the year to June 2022 and 906,000 in the year to June 2023.
The latest available figure of 728,000 for the 12 months to June 2024 suggests levels are starting to decrease.
Crazy Rich Asians
Director: Jon M Chu
Starring: Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Michelle Yeon, Gemma Chan
Four stars
GAC GS8 Specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4cyl turbo
Power: 248hp at 5,200rpm
Torque: 400Nm at 1,750-4,000rpm
Transmission: 8-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 9.1L/100km
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh149,900
The biog
Name: Shamsa Hassan Safar
Nationality: Emirati
Education: Degree in emergency medical services at Higher Colleges of Technology
Favourite book: Between two hearts- Arabic novels
Favourite music: Mohammed Abdu and modern Arabic songs
Favourite way to spend time off: Family visits and spending time with friends
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Akeed
Based: Muscat
Launch year: 2018
Number of employees: 40
Sector: Online food delivery
Funding: Raised $3.2m since inception
Specs
Engine: Electric motor generating 54.2kWh (Cooper SE and Aceman SE), 64.6kW (Countryman All4 SE)
Power: 218hp (Cooper and Aceman), 313hp (Countryman)
Torque: 330Nm (Cooper and Aceman), 494Nm (Countryman)
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh158,000 (Cooper), Dh168,000 (Aceman), Dh190,000 (Countryman)
Tips to stay safe during hot weather
- Stay hydrated: Drink plenty of fluids, especially water. Avoid alcohol and caffeine, which can increase dehydration.
- Seek cool environments: Use air conditioning, fans, or visit community spaces with climate control.
- Limit outdoor activities: Avoid strenuous activity during peak heat. If outside, seek shade and wear a wide-brimmed hat.
- Dress appropriately: Wear lightweight, loose and light-coloured clothing to facilitate heat loss.
- Check on vulnerable people: Regularly check in on elderly neighbours, young children and those with health conditions.
- Home adaptations: Use blinds or curtains to block sunlight, avoid using ovens or stoves, and ventilate living spaces during cooler hours.
- Recognise heat illness: Learn the signs of heat exhaustion and heat stroke (dizziness, confusion, rapid pulse, nausea), and seek medical attention if symptoms occur.
GOLF’S RAHMBO
- 5 wins in 22 months as pro
- Three wins in past 10 starts
- 45 pro starts worldwide: 5 wins, 17 top 5s
- Ranked 551th in world on debut, now No 4 (was No 2 earlier this year)
- 5th player in last 30 years to win 3 European Tour and 2 PGA Tour titles before age 24 (Woods, Garcia, McIlroy, Spieth)
