Some Archaeologists Think They Have Found the Biblical City Where David Hid from Saul. Others Disagree

July 10 2019

According to the book of Samuel, David took refuge in the Philistine city of Ziklag while on the run from King Saul. While experts have proposed various sites as the city’s locations, none has yielded convincing evidence—that is, until Yosef Garfinkle, one of Israel’s leading archaeologists, made some unexpected discoveries while excavating Khirbet a-Ra’i. Amanda Borschel-Dan writes:

After seven seasons of digging, [Garfinkle’s] team found evidence of a Philistine-era settlement from the 12th–11th centuries BCE, under layers of a rural settlement dating to the early 10th century BCE, generally considered the Davidic era. Among the findings were massive stone structures and typical Philistine cultural artifacts, including pottery in foundation deposits—good-luck offerings laid beneath a building’s flooring. Some of the olive pits and other organic objects found in the deposits were sent for carbon dating, which confirmed their contexts, said the archaeologists.

Given the location of the excavations in the Judean foothills, Philistine artifacts, along with the carbon-14 dating, have all pointed the archaeologists toward identifying the site as [Ziklag]. The town is first mentioned in the Bible in the book of Joshua, in which it is apportioned to the tribe of Judah. Later, it is given to the tribe of Simeon. In the book of Samuel, David and 600 of his men and their families settled in for fourteen months at the Philistine city under the patronage of the Philistine King Achish of Gat, . . . and used it as a base to raid neighboring peoples, whom he and his men slaughtered.

[But] not all the experts are convinced that this is Ziklag. Indeed, the Bar Ilan University professor Aren Maeir . . . is adamant that it is not. . . . There is one verse in the book of Joshua in which Ziklag (along with Beersheba and other southern settlements) is apportioned to the tribe of Judah (15:31), which would make the newly proposed location possible. Indeed, much of Philistia lies in Judah’s allotment. In Joshua 19:5, however, it is allocated to the tribe of Simeon, which was given Judah’s southern portion [far from Ziklag].

Read more at Times of Israel

More about: Ancient Israel, Archaeology, Hebrew Bible, King David, King Saul

Egypt Is Trapped by the Gaza Dilemma It Helped to Create

Feb. 14 2025

Recent satellite imagery has shown a buildup of Egyptian tanks near the Israeli border, in violation of Egypt-Israel agreements going back to the 1970s. It’s possible Cairo wants to prevent Palestinians from entering the Sinai from Gaza, or perhaps it wants to send a message to the U.S. that it will take all measures necessary to keep that from happening. But there is also a chance, however small, that it could be preparing for something more dangerous. David Wurmser examines President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s predicament:

Egypt’s abysmal behavior in allowing its common border with Gaza to be used for the dangerous smuggling of weapons, money, and materiel to Hamas built the problem that exploded on October 7. Hamas could arm only to the level that Egypt enabled it. Once exposed, rather than help Israel fix the problem it enabled, Egypt manufactured tensions with Israel to divert attention from its own culpability.

Now that the Trump administration is threatening to remove the population of Gaza, President Sisi is reaping the consequences of a problem he and his predecessors helped to sow. That, writes Wurmser, leaves him with a dilemma:

On one hand, Egypt fears for its regime’s survival if it accepts Trump’s plan. It would position Cairo as a participant in a second disaster, or nakba. It knows from its own history; King Farouk was overthrown in 1952 in part for his failure to prevent the first nakba in 1948. Any leader who fails to stop a second nakba, let alone participates in it, risks losing legitimacy and being seen as weak. The perception of buckling on the Palestine issue also resulted in the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. President Sisi risks being seen by his own population as too weak to stand up to Israel or the United States, as not upholding his manliness.

In a worst-case scenario, Wurmser argues, Sisi might decide that he’d rather fight a disastrous war with Israel and blow up his relationship with Washington than display that kind of weakness.

Read more at The Editors

More about: Egypt, Gaza War 2023