JEWISH-TEMPLE DENIAL WATCH: A brief article circulated by The Palestinian Information Center was promoting some Jewish-Temple denial in honor of Tisha B'Av:
Senior Israeli archaeologist casts doubt on Jewish heritage of Jerusalem (Middle East Monitor). Excerpt:
Professor [Israel] Finkelstein, who is known as "the father of biblical archaeology", told the Jerusalem Post that Jewish archaeologists have found no historical or archaeological evidence to back the biblical narrative on the Exodus, the Jews' wandering in Sinai or Joshua's conquest of Canaan. On the alleged Temple of Solomon, Finkelstein said that there is no archaeological evidence to prove it really existed.
Joseph Lauer has written to Professor Finkelstein and has circulated his reply by e-mail:
There is no point of answering them. This is typical Palestinian propaganda, aimed at showing that there was no Temple in Jerusalem etc. Of course, this is not what I say. What a pity. As long as they go this way, there is no chance for real peace in the Middle East.
And, as Jim West correctly
notes, it was
William Foxwell Albright who was "the father of biblical archaeology."