ISIS Demolishes Second 2000-Year-Old Temple in Ancient Syrian City
One week after detonating the 2,000-year-old temple of Baalshamin, ISIS has destroyed a second ancient temple in the Syrian city of Palmyra. Tuesday morning, the UN released satellite photos confirming the demolition of the Temple of Bel, which dates back to 32 B.C.
“We can confirm destruction of the main building of the Temple of Bel as well as a row of columns in its immediate vicinity,” UNOSAT Manager Einar Bjorgo said, according to the Guardian.
The photo above was taken on August 27. It shows, according to the UN, the temple standing, surrounded by a row of columns. The photo below was taken four days later.
Earlier this week, Syria’s antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim called the temple, which was visited by more than 150,000 people a year before the start of the Syrian civil war in 2011, “the most important temple in Syria and one of the most important in the whole Middle East.”
“I feel very sad and I am very pessimistic... for the future of Palmyra,” he told the BBC.
Before destroying the Temple of Bel and the Temple of Baalshamin, ISIS fighters beheaded Khaled al-Asaad, an 82-year-old Syrian scholar. Al-Assad, who spent more than 50 years as the head of antiquities in Palmyra, was reportedly killed because he refused to reveal the location of hidden artifacts in the region.
