In the rubble of a bombed site in Khan Younis, a group of volunteers in yellow high-visibility vests work in near silence.

They have no tools but their hands, relentless determination, and the knowledge that what lies beneath the debris is irreplaceable. Carefully, they lift carved stone fragments and pottery vessels by hand, wrap ceramic pieces in whatever protective material they can find, and admire ancient statues, shattered on the ground, dating back thousands of years.

The volunteers are part of the Heritage Guardians Team, an initiative affiliated with the Mayasem Association for Culture and Arts. Although Israeli shelling never stopped rocking Gaza, they’ve been trying — carefully, methodically, and with bare hands — to save what remains of the Strip’s archaeological heritage before it disappears entirely under the rubble. 

Webmaster Addition: Israel loves to destroy the archeological evidence of people they don't like. The reason is simple. Everywhere you travel, from Egypt to Rome, you constantly trip over evidence of those regions' ancient history. Not so with Israel. Hard archeological evidence of Isral's history is as elusive as the King Arthyr legends. And Israel has never been shy about weaponizing fake archeological relics, as evidenced by the Oded Golan case, which included items such as the James Ossuary and the Jehoash Tablet. Golan was declared innocent in a highly politicized trial, but many experts remain convinced the items were fakes. In his decision, the judge was careful to say his acquittal of Golan did not mean the artifacts were necessarily genuine, only that the prosecution had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Golan had faked them.