Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reopened a decadeslong dispute over the Siloam Inscription, a 2700-year-old limestone tablet displayed at the Istanbul Archaeology Museums.Not surprisingly, this article supports the official Turkish view that the inscription should remain in Turkey. But it gives a good description of it and surveys the debate over repatriating it to Israel. My favorite episode in this saga is when the Israeli government offered to trade elephants for the artifact.Speaking in Jerusalem on Monday, Netanyahu said he had asked then Turkish Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz to return the artifact during a 1998 visit but was turned down.
His comments have once again brought attention to the tablet’s history and its significance to both Israel and Türkiye.
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PaleoJudaica has been following the back and forth over the Siloam Inscription, and other discussions of it, for many years.
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