I see some of those faces were scratched out. I wonder if that was those Byzantine iconoclasts or Muslims?
“I see some of those faces were scratched out. I wonder if that was those Byzantine iconoclasts or Muslims?”
The article says: “When uncovered, the church was filled with earth.”
The fact that someone filled the church with soil means it was deliberately done. It may have been damaged by iconoclasts (I’m not seeing deliberate defacing of the figures as you are), but the Muslims were the ones who ordered it buried. They didn’t want the Christians to be able to have a secret church to worship in in secret.