Friday, December 26, 2014

Gold in them there caves?

MORE LOOTERS: Four arrested for attempting to loot ‘hidden treasure’ from ancient West Bank cave. Two Palestinians and 2 Israelis charged with colluding to dig up buried gold from Roman-Byzantine period (Daniel K. Eisenbud, Jerusalem Post).
Two Palestinians and two Israelis were arrested earlier in the week for allegedly colluding to attempt to loot buried gold from a protected ancient cave near the West Bank, the Antiquities Authority announced Wednesday.

According to an Antiquities Authority official, the two Arab suspects, from Tulkarm, were caught “red handed” by inspectors from the organization’s robbery- prevention unit digging a 4.5-meter hole at the 1,800-year-old site, which dates to the Roman-Byzantine period.

The suspects were found with excavation equipment, including a generator, electric drill, lighting, shovels and numerous buckets, the official said in a statement.

[...]
Who thinks up these things? If the reports are accurate, it sounds as though some people put a lot of effort and money into a high-risk project with extremely speculative returns. They'd have been better off buying lottery tickets.

Similar recent story here.