Dayan Is Accused in Antiquities Plunder

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"Stunning military victories made Israeli general Moshe Dayan an iconic figure on the international stage, but his reputation for looting antiquities is little known outside the country where his myth was born.

Across three decades until his death in 1981, Dayan, of the trademark eye patch, established a vast collection of antiquities acquired through illicit excavations. He also traded in archaeological finds in Israel and abroad, antiquities experts say.

"Moshe Dayan didn't deal in archaeology. He dealt in antiquities plundering," said Uzi Dahari, deputy director of the Israel Antiquities Authority. "He was a criminal. He knew he was breaking the law. He knew that all his activity was against the law, and he did it nevertheless."

The Holy Land is a treasure trove for antiquities collectors _ and plunderers.

"There are 30,000 antiquities sites. Every hilltop has antiquities, and, of course, you can't put guards on each hilltop," said Amir Ganor, head of the robbery prevention unit at the Israel Antiquities Authority."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/16/AR2006061600863.html

to plunder the valuables of the country(ies) being dominated. Goering stole hundreds of paintings and statues from museums across Europe. Lots of them were found stored in salt mines but lots still are missing and may have been sold to other museums or remain in the hands of private collectors.

he was a crook. Are you suggesting that all of Israel, even within the green line, is illegaly occupied?

historically, the invading military, no matter its affiliation, has a difficult time resisting the temptation to loot the country it's occupying. Whether it's Israel or Nazi Germany (or the U.S. as per Iraqi artifacts and antiques that were looted during the initial weeks of OUR occupation of that country), it's the same or similar standard of the "to the victor goes the spoils".

I'm assuming that the antiquities in question were looted from within Israel, ergo your theory about occupying forces isn't germane to this situation. I actually have no quarrel with the assumption that occupying armies will do a certain amount of looting, but scale does matter. With the Nazis it was often official policy and was done on a massive scale. If you have evidence that the Israelis have conducted massive looting or have a policy of looting in the territories they occupy, please present it.
Comparing what the Nazis did throughout Europe with what Israel has done in Palestine or what the US has done in Iraq, is just iincorrect.

Israel. Unless the antiquities were brought into Israel (then British Palestine) by their rightful owners when refugees fled after the Holocaust, they didn't belong to residents of Israel per se due to the establishment and recognition as a sovereign state. They belonged to predecessors. And because Moshe Dayan was part of the initial Israel governor and military, he felt he had the right to claim possession and ownership over someone else's property (the antiquities). And he felt he had that right because of his status. Israel for all practical purposes was taken over and made claim to by immmigrants the way this country was established. (Settlers took over land and waterways from Native Americans and wouldn't allow them to keep what they had prior to the settlers' arrival.) And Dayan felt anything within the borders belonged to the new state of Israel and he helped himself accordingly.

as i understand it, the rightful owners of the jewish antiquities are the predecessors of israel.... well Moshe Dayan was one of those predecessors..he was born there, was jewish and the antiquities that he took were jewish antiquities.....so i would think you dont have a problem with that...

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that this was something widespread in the military, rather than just Dayan.

From the article:

Nor did he limit his activities to Israel proper, taking advantage of his positions in the military to extend his trajectory to territories Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast war. Dayan served as defense minister from 1967 until 1974.

"Probably most of Dayan's looting was done in areas conquered after 1967 and under his own military rule," Kletter wrote. "There he faced no democratic institutions to oppose him."

I hope that was clear enough :)

how is this news?

While Dayan is considered a hero in Israel, no-one has ever denied that the man had some serious vices (besides the stealing of antiquities, he had a rather...elastic, shall we say, approach to the truth when it suited him politically, as well as a marked inability to keep his hands of other men's wives).

"While Dayan is considered a hero in Israel, no-one has ever denied that the man had some serious vices..."

Anything to vilify the 'heroes' of Israel is seen as a "good thing." It is used in an attempt to further denigrate Israel and her existence. Just wait, I am sure their will soon be an expose about Golda Meir and her being a lesbian or killing small animals. Or maybe one about Rabin? I am not sure, but I bet they are in the works.

The truth is that every "hero" is also a "villain." It is the nature of humans. Look at the stories about Gandhi and Mother Theresa, even they are not beyond the reach of human vice. However, the Israelis are expected to be.

This story is news because it was printed in several newspapers. Roughly 25 according to Google:

http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&ned=us&ie=UTF-8&ncl=http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/artandlife/1404AP_Plundered_Art_Dayans_Collection.html&filter=0

And my from my own google search, all of them seem reprints of the same AP article.

What's puzzling me is that nothing in the article is something that was not publicly known for years, nor does it mention anything whch would cause new interest in Dayan (e.g. a new biography or movie coming out). It just seems kind of disconnected.

There was a three-part Israeli series on SBS here a few months back about Israeli leaders, and Moshe Dayan was one of the three covered. He used his position of being a hero to cover his looting and using the IDF for his personal means to cart his antiquities to wherever it was he kept them. But while he was at superhero status for a long time, his fall from grace was a huge one once Israelis lost faith in his ability to protect them. I saw a segment from what must have been an Israeli comedy show of the time where (if the subtitles were accurate) they were totally taking the piss out of him. But time tends to balance the picture in a lot of cases. Some of the stuff in his career was quite heroic, so if he's now at somewhere in between superhero on a pedestal and utter arsehole status, my opinion is that where he should be...

I noticed in the article that while Dayan's widow sold the collection to the museum, Dayan's first wife said she would have donated it if it had been her. Kind of cements the high opinion I got of her from what I saw her saying in the documentary...