Free Republic

Syrian archaeologist Khaled al-Asaad was beheaded by the Islamic State on this date in 2015 for refusing them the ancient artifacts of his native Palmyra. Eighty-two years old — Palmyra was still a French colony at the time of this birth — Al-Asaad was involved in excavations around that city throughout his adult life. He became the custodian of the archaeological site in 1963 and held the post for 40 years. When the Salafist militant army rolled up on his oasis city that spring.* he helped to evacuate the town’s museum and Daesh put him to torture to extract the...

ISIS beheads Palmyra antiquities expert in the ancient city where he had worked for 50 years - then hangs his body from a column Islamic State militants have beheaded an antiquities scholar in an ancient Syrian city and hung his body on a column in a main square. The family of Khaled Asaad are said to have been told that the 82-year-old scholar who worked for more than 50 years as head of antiquities in Palmyra was executed by ISIS yesterday. Mr Asaad had been detained and interrogated for over a month by the ultra-radical Sunni Muslim militants, according to...

The Islamic State is continuing its rampage through the Middle East, killing anyone who gets in their way and destroying ancient sites in an effort to cleanse anything they consider anti-Islamic. Late last week we learned that before she was killed, America hostage Kayla Mueller was brutally raped and used as a sex slave by ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Today we've learned ISIS has beheaded a world renowned, 82-year old archaeologist who was protecting the ancient site of Palmyra in Syria. More from Fox News: Syrian state antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim told Reuters that the family of Khaled Asaad had informed Abdulkarim...