NAZARETH, GALILEE -- After a bumper season of winter rains, the streams and rivers of Galilee are brimming with water for the first time in a decade. But there is one sacred and mysterious Galilee water source, Mary's Well in Nazareth, whose waters are a mere trickle of what they were in Jesus' time.

Nazareth is the Galilee town where Jesus grew to manhood, and the place from which he set out across the nearby hills and valleys in his brief but revolutionary ministry. Mary's Well marks the site in Nazareth where Orthodox Christians believe the Angel Gabriel announced the birth of Jesus. And it is undoubtedly a place Jesus often visited with his mother in his childhood.

Yardena Alexandre, an archaeologist with the Israel Antiquities Authority, supervised two seasons of excavations at the site, undertaken during the renovations.

"We found remains from the Mameluke, Crusader and Roman period," she said. "The Roman finds were very minimal, remains of a few wall stubs and the remains of an ancient water channel. But from the Crusader period, there was an impressive structure, a well house built over the water cistern. Among the finds were hundreds of broken glass bracelets and hundreds of coins, which were most likely thrown into the well house by pilgrims and visitors. The coins indicate a presence at the well house from the Roman, Crusader, Mameluke and Ottoman period."

Civilians inspect Torah scrolls in a vault of Iraq's National Museum after looters broke in and went on a rampage.

Lieutenant Colonel Eric Schwartz, commander of the tank battalion which fought Iraqi forces around the museum as Saddam Hussein's rule crumbled, said the U.S. military was "absolutely not" to blame for the thefts from the world-renowned museum.

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The "Battle of the Museum" began on April 7 when U.S. forces took control of an intersection less than 500 metres (yards) away. They met fierce resistance and three days of fighting with Fedayeen militia and Special Republican Guard followed.

By the time it was over, looters operating right under the nose of U.S. forces had emptied the museum of priceless antiquities documenting the development of mankind in ancient Mesopotamia, one of the world's earliest civilisations.

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"I was responsible for securing this site," Schwartz said outside the museum on Thursday. "But you can't just charge into a city straight to the museum, you have to secure the zone first, and we were taking some pretty heavy casualties."

Schwartz said he was aware the museum was a protected site and had orders to "identify it and ensure its integrity".

[Dr Donny] George [director-general of the Iraqi Department of Antiquities] said one of his staff had run to a U.S. tank to tell them about the looting, only to be told: "It is not our responsibility".

Schwartz recalled a similar incident but said the man had been suspected of belonging to the Fedayeen.

Schwartz said his men from the 3rd Infantry Division around the museum came under fire from small arms and rocket-propelled grenades. He said one U.S. soldier was killed and 35 wounded.

"There were 30 to 50 Fedayeen defending the compound. Once it was defended, it lost its protected status," he said.

An evening with Hershel Shanks and Ben Witherington III about the headline-making archaeological discovery, the "James ossuary," the oldest evidence of Jesus.

What: The authors of the new bestseller The Brother of Jeusus (Harper SanFrancisco, 2003), Hershel Shanks and Ben Witherington III, will discuss major new archaeological evidence for Jesus at a talk Wednesday evening, April 30, at Washington National Cathedral.

"The Taking of Iraq's Heritage"

Could the U.S. have stopped the looting of the country's priceless antiquities? The answer is not that simple

One vault was in the Central Bank, which had caught fire before the looting. By some accounts, it holds some of Iraq's most precious items: ancient gold artifacts that were taken from the National Museum. It may also contain an accounting of Iraq's nebulous debt burden and possibly records of Iraq's overseas deposits or hidden accounts.