Pictured above is one of the Winged Bull statues from ancient Assyria. There are now only a few of these left, as the rest have been destroyed by ISIS. Over the past year, ISIS continues to seek out cultural sites and artifacts, like these bulls in Syria, and demolish them with explosives and sledgehammers.
Many people are familiar with ISIS and their destruction in the USA, specifically for the terrorist threats they have been attached too. More recently, their name grew in the Christian community for their continual beheading of Christians in the middle east. But it’s not just people that this group is attacking.
In February, a video was released of them destroying an abundance of idols, statues, and other artifacts in the Mosul Museum, the second largest museum in Iraq. In the video you can see them smashing statues on the ground, busting them with hammers and drilling through larger pieces.
In March, another video was released of them razing the archaeological site of Khorsabad, which isn’t far from the Mosul Museum. This site used to be a capital of Assyria, when King Sargon II was in power. This was not the only complete site bulldozed by ISIS. In fact, they released a video a month later of them demolishing the the ancient city of Nimrud. Like Khorsabad, this site still held many of the original art pieces and architecture from when it was still a thriving city in the Assyrian empire.
More recently, reports of the destruction of Palmyra were released in early September. There, ISIS has continuously blown up statues, a temple and multiple tombs. Because this is a World Heritage site it has been declared a war crime by UNESCO. During the destruction of the site, the Syrian archaeologist who overlooked the site was murdered when he wouldn’t give away the location of treasures previously hidden.
This all leads to one question. Why? Why has ISIS chosen to destroy all of these cultural sites? According to Business Insider, theories that ISIS is pocketing some of these idols and treasures to sell for profit have been surfacing, though there is no hard evidence.
More popular are statements found within the videos, about how these are all things that don’t fit into the religion ISIS follows, and so they must be destroyed.
Either way, the destruction of all these sites and artifacts is something that should not be tolerated. Many of these pieces being destroyed can be dated far back into the early development of human culture. Because of these pieces we have been able to learn so much about the culture of ancient people.
When the heritage of such ancient cultures is being attacked, humanity is being attacked. It is in areas like this that many of the innovations we rely on today were born and cultivated. Multiple Syrian people today look to these sites for their heritage, as story lines of what their people have done.
Here in America, specifically Atlanta, people were up in arms about even the idea of altering the face of Stone Mountain, where a portrait of Civil War heroes finds its home. The same fury can be found with the proposals of removing other war monuments to those who fought for the right to own slaves. The claims for this anger? Cultural heritage. People also argued that it was art censorship.
These feelings of anger can be drawn back to the pain that would be felt if the culture of someone’s heritage was erased. And these are the same feelings of anger and pain people in the Middle East are feeling.
ISIS is not just attempting to control people; they’re attempting to wipe out culture that doesn’t agree with their own. The hatred they hold for others isn’t just targeted at Christians like many Americans believe; it’s towards anyone who isn’t like them. This is why they are wiping out the culture of people who have lived in these lands longer than their religion itself.
And that is why this destruction needs to stop.
