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November 22, 2024

A Bold Historian Who Died on the Frontlines in a Final Archaeological Quest

Ze’ev Erlich “knew more about Israeli history than nearly anyone I’ve ever met.”

In southern Lebanon on Wednesday, Hizballah fighters ambushed a group of Israeli soldiers, killing two and wounding two others. Among the dead was Ze’ev Erlich, who—although he was wearing a helmet, uniform, and combat gear—was not a soldier but a historian. A senior commander had invited the seventy-one-year-old to look at a possible site of the grave of the New Testament apostle Simon the Zealot. Matti Friedman, who writes that Erlich “knew more about Israeli history than nearly anyone I’ve ever met,” interviewed him for a 2013 article about a remarkable collection of wooden beams:

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November 22, 2024

  1. The ICC Is Self-Defeating and Perverse

    Its recent move against Israel demonstrates what should have been clear all along.

  2. Hizballah’s New Leader Doesn’t Have What It Takes to Maintain the Public’s Trust

    “More schoolkid than orator.”

  3. The Jewish Poet Who Called Out T.S. Eliot’s Anti-Semitism

    Emanuel Litvinoff and English excuses for “criticism” of Jews.

  4. Ishmael, Moses, and the Case for Free Will

    What a comparison of passages reveals.

  5. A Bold Historian Who Died on the Frontlines in a Final Archaeological Quest

    Ze’ev Erlich “knew more about Israeli history than nearly anyone I’ve ever met.”