Israel’s Netanyahu uses fake ’2,000-year-old’ coin to justify settlements in West Bank -
Daily Sabah - GERMAN PRESS AGENCY - DPA - TEL AVIV -
Published 8 hours ago
▻https://www.dailysabah.com/mideast/2017/08/28/israels-netanyahu-uses-fake-2000-year-old-coin-to-justify-settlements-in
A 2,000-year-old coin promoted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as proof of the Jewish people’s connection to the Israeli-controlled West Bank has been found to be a souvenir reproduction.
“This exciting discovery is additional evidence of the deep connection between the people of Israel and its land - to Jerusalem, to our temple, and to the communities in Judea and Samaria,” Netanyahu said of the coin on Facebook Sunday, using the biblical Hebrew term for the West Bank.
Ancient discoveries are not uncommon in Israel and the West Bank. Earlier this month, Israeli authorities uncovered a 2,000-year-old workshop for stone vessels in northern Israel. But this “discovery,” first reported by Israeli media, turned out to be one of thousands of cheap souvenir coins minted by the Israel Museum.
“There is no chance that it is authentic; it is not an ancient coin. Even to call it a coin is to exaggerate what it is,” Haim Gitler, chief curator of archaeology and numismatics at the Israel Museum, told the Times of Israel.
The coin was found by an 8-year-old girl near the Israeli settlement of Neveh Tzuf in the West Bank in May. The supposed discovery garnered attention in Israeli media last week
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▻http://www.zimbio.com/pictures/v4xlRaNRlN5/Polish+Prime+Minister+Visits+Jerusalem/28jcJmqhwA9
Polish Prime Minister Visits Jerusalem
In This Photo: Donald Tusk, Benjamin Netanyahu
In this handout image provided by the Israeli Government Press Office, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) shows Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk (2L) around his offices on February 24, 2011in Jerusalem, Israel. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk is the head of a delegation of ministers arriving for a series of inter-governmental meetings with the Israeli Prime Minister and his government, with the goal of further strengthening ties between the two countries.
(Feb. 23, 2011 - Source: Handout/Getty Images Europe)
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Fake history: Netanyahu boasts about ’ancient coin’ from Jerusalem - turns out to be souvenir
▻http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.809399
Netanyahu uploaded (then deleted) to Facebook a photo of the object, describing how its discovery attested to long-time Jewish ties to the Holy Land
By Nir Hasson | Aug. 28, 2017 | 4:35 PM
Among those captivated by the recent story of the little Israeli girl who stumbled on a 2,000-year-old half-shekel coin – only to learn some days later that what she had found was a roughly 15-year-old souvenir – was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Various news outlets reported last week that Hallel Halevy, 8, had discovered a rare coin from the days of the Jews’ Great Revolt against the Romans, from 67 to 70 C.E., when walking to get her little sister from kindergarten in the West Bank settlement of Halamish, north of Ramallah.
Not only wasn’t the find a rare coin, it wasn’t a coin at all, at least according to the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. Officials noted that it’s a replica, dating back anywhere between 15 to 20 years, created as part of its educational program for kids. They also noted that the object had an imprint on only one face, not two, as coins do. The coins were given to children as a souvenir.
Meanwhile, however, Netanyahu had joined the trend, uploading a photo of the item on his Facebook page and writing how the coin, ostensibly a half-shekel dating to the era of the Second Temple, had been found in the province of Benjamin, in the West Bank. The moving discovery, the premier wrote in his post, further attests to the deep ties between the people of Israel and their land – including ties to Jerusalem, the Temple and Judea and Samaria.
Netanyahu’s Facebook editor, Yonatan Orich, says the post has been removed until the issue can be clarified