Released Hostage Held by UNRWA Teacher

One of the hostages, recently released from Gaza, revealed on Wednesday that he was held for nearly 50 days in an attic by a teacher from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

The story was publicized on X by Channel 13 journalist Almog Boker.

The hostage also said that the teacher who held him captive was a father of 10 children. He had barely been provided food or medical attention, and was locked away by the teacher, he said.  READ MORE...

Ancient Human Remains in Spain

Human remains are found in a cave, and unearthed to be analyzed by Tibicena, an archaeology company, in Galdar, on the island of Gran Canaria, Spain March 13, 2023.(photo credit: Tibicena Arqueologia y Patrimonio S.L./Handout via REUTERS)



Ancient human remains that were buried in caves in Spain have been shown to be modified prior to their burial, according to a recent study.

The research, published in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS ONE on Wednesday last week, examines the Cueva de los Marmoles, one of the most important cave contexts from southern Spain.

The significance of this cave is that it "returned a large number of commingled skeletal remains suggesting its funerary use from the Neolithic to the Late Bronze Age," the study said. However, the reason why these buried remains were modified still remains a mystery to researchers.


Researchers in the study also explored the fragmentation patterns that characterized different skeletal regions and took both macroscopic and microscopic analyses of whatever modifications were made to the human remains.

Radiocarbon data
The study concluded that through radiocarbon data, the remains date back several millennia, and also estimates that the minimum amount of people's remains discovered number up to 12 - seven adults and five children. 

The research does acknowledge that caves have been used as burial sites in the Iberian Peninsula for thousands of years, with its practice being originated in the 4th millennium BCE.  READ MORE...

Russia Deciding to Use Nuclear in Ukraine

Senior Russian military commanders recently discussed how and when the Kremlin would use tactical nuclear weapons (TNWs) in Ukraine, The New York Times reported on Wednesday.


According to the report, President Vladimir Putin was not part of the conversation. Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said on Tuesday that there were no indications that the Russian leader "has made a decision at this time to employ nuclear weapons."


Also on Tuesday, Security Council of the Russian Federation deputy chairman Dmitry Medvedev said on Telegram that Kyiv's objectives to return all occupied territories to its control constituted an existential threat to Russia and would allow for the use of nuclear weapons.  READ MORE...

Ancient Writing Finally Deciphered

Artists and archeology

(photo credit: ITSIK MAROM)

The ancient language of Linear Elamite may have finally been deciphered, according to a peer-reviewed paper recently published in the journal Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archäologie (Journal of Assyriology and Near Eastern Archaeology).


The findings, based on a set of ancient silver vessels, propose a new method for decoding Linear Elamite's symbols, according to the Smithsonian magazine.


“This is one of the major archaeological discoveries of the last decades,” said Massimo Vidale, an archaeologist at the University of Padua who was not involved in the research. “It was based on the same approach of Champollion’s breakthrough – identifying and reading phonetically the names of kings.”


The language originates in the 5000-year-old city of Susa, in what today is southwestern Iran. An ancient urban oasis and the capital of Elam, Susa was one of the first places to use written symbols in its bustling society.


French archeologists in the early 20th century uncovered the first evidence of a writing system nearly as old, or older, than Sumerian cuneiform that used a different set of symbols. 

The system appeared to have fallen out of use, but after a few hundred years a new written language popped up which scholars have named Linear Elamite. The previous Elamite writing system was called Proto-Elamite.  READ MORE...

Neolithic Settlements in Turkey

Archaeology professer and director of the Göbeklitepe Culture and Karahantepe Research Project

in front of Karahantepe excavation site.

(photo credit: JUDITH SUDILOVSKY)

Istanbul archaeology professor Necmi Karul picks his way as nimbly as a gazelle along the hilly back slope of Karahantepe. A monumental Neolithic site near the Syrian-Turkish border, Karahantepe has turned what archaeologists until now believed about the evolution of human sedentism on its head.


It, along with the nearby Gobeklitepe Stone Hill site, is considered one of the first permanent settlements. They have brought into question the process of organized human society, suggesting that it was established before the emergence of agriculture, and included some kind of cultic or communal rituals.


Karul points out spots where some 11,000 years ago Neolithic humans carved out huge blocks of limestone and somehow brought the heavy pillars to the other side of the mound. After being carved with images of animals and humans, these blocks were placed in concentric circles in what he calls “special buildings.”


Walking along the sloping hillside Karul also points at stones jutting out from the earth in a circular pattern. Underneath, he said casually, there are the same thousands-year-old monumental pillars that have been excavated just on the other side of the mound.


He said 250 such pillars visible on the surface have been identified, and some 60 pillars have been found in the excavations.  READ MORE...