Israeli police charge four with forging biblical antiquities

Israeli police yesterday charged four antiquities collectors and dealers with 17 counts of forging some of the most treasured biblical artefacts to have surfaced in recent years.

They included a limestone ossuary box said to have held the bones of Jesus' brother James, supposedly the oldest physical link to the New Testament; a tiny ivory pomegranate bought by the Israel Museum for US$550,000 ($771,000) as the only known relic of King Solomon's Temple; and a stone tablet, dating from the ninth century BC, inscribed in ancient Hebrew with instructions by King Joash for maintaining the temple.

A 27-page indictment submitted to a Jerusalem magistrate after months of undercover investigation alleged that the men took genuine antiquities, then added false inscriptions to increase their value. They were clever enough to fool some of the world's most respected experts.

One of the men, a leading Israeli collector, owned the "James ossuary", inscribed "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus", and the "Joash tablet". Detectives claimed to have found a sophisticated laboratory in his home. According to the charge sheet, the forgers painted the "improved" items with a special coating designed to imitate the patina that would accumulate over thousands of years.

The ivory pomegranate is now thought to be much older than originally believed. The Israel Museum, a public body, paid the money into a numbered Swiss bank account in the 1980s and showed the exquisitely carved ivory, under spotlight and magnifying glass, as one of its most cherished possessions.

It has now been removed from display and archaeologists are trying to work out what the object really is.

Prosecutors claimed that the ring had been operating for 23 years. "These items," it said, "many of them of great scientific, religious, sentimental, political and economic value, were created specifically with intent to defraud."

"We only discovered the tip of the iceberg," said Shuka Dorfman, director of the Israel Antiquities Authority. "This spans the globe. It generated millions of dollars."

- INDEPENDENT