Overview
For Israeli and Palestinians alike, archeology is an issue of national memory. Does the bible tell the truth? Can we trust its account of David and Salomon's reign? Have the Hebrews been exiled form Egypt before they colonized the country of Canaan? What clues do the findings of the archeological sites in Jerusalem offer to support one version over an other? Was Jerusalem itself a small settlement or a large urban center? Biblical archaeology is a topical subject, one that arouses passions, divides the Israeli and Palestinians, and has become a subject of discussion amongst the Israeli themselves.Jean-Fran?ois Mondot's book gives a voice to the interested parties on both sides, asking them to evoke their own individual experiences, as well as the national - political, religious - problems caused by their discoveries, and that of their colleagues. The book thus composes a series of six portraits, four Israelis and two Palestinians, based on lengthy interviews. In these countries were nothing, and least of all the relation to the past, is neutral, archaeology becomes a crucial, every day issue. One of the interviewees is the Israeli archaeologist Finkelstein, the author of the best-seller La Bible d?voil?e ('The Bible Unveiled'), who gives here his opinion on the most polemical aspects of his own discoveries. Using this series of lively portraits to address a complex subject, the book also presents the testimony, never heard before, of Palestinian archaeologists.Jean-Fran?ois Mondot was a student at the famous ?cole normale. He taught history and geography, before he became one of the editors of the Cahiers de Science et Vie. In 2000, he published Journal d'un prof de banlieue and, in 2002, Petite chronique d'un grand minist?re, une ann?e rue de Grenelle.
