Destruction of Irans cultural sites by Israel US tantamount to destroying a civilization

Destruction of Iran's cultural sites by Israel, US tantamount to destroying a civilization

TEHRAN – Since US and Israeli strikes began in February, over 130 registered monuments and museums across Iran have sustained damage, from the Golestan Palace to historic quarters in Isfahan, Kordestan, and Lorestan. In an exclusive interview with Tehran Times, Touraj Daryaee, historian of ancient Iran and editor of Encyclopaedia Iranica, discusses the emotional and scholarly weight of watching millennia-old heritage damaged within weeks, the limits of international legal accountability, and what the destruction means for how Iran's history will be told and remembered.

The following is the text of the interview:

You've spoken about the scale of damage to Iran's cultural heritage sites since the war began — with reports of over 130 sites affected. As a historian, how do you personally process watching monuments that survived millennia of conquest being damaged in weeks?
As a historian, I know that throughout time, monuments wither and get destroyed for various reasons — that is a fact that has always been there. However, when you see Israeli and American deliberate destruction of cultural sites, it of course raises a whole set of more intense emotions, because this is tantamount to destroying somebody else's civilization and cultural tradition. So, it is really horrible, and 130 sites is no small destruction — it is quite large.

Is there a legal or diplomatic mechanism — UNESCO or otherwise — that could realistically hold parties accountable for damage to protected heritage sites during this conflict, or is that framework effectively powerless in practice?
In response to your second question: of course you could always hold parties accountable under law, but international laws are so difficult to apply to countries, especially superpowers, rogue nations, and those who do not accept any of these international laws. But becoming a UNESCO heritage site — we have 30 of them in Iran, and some have been damaged — has the advantage of always receiving funding from UNESCO and all sorts of international bodies, both governmental and non-governmental, for restoration, upkeep, and promotion of the site. So what we really need to do is, one by one, try to make more of Iran's historical sites UNESCO sites. It's a tedious task with rules and regulations that need to be followed, but 30 have already been designated, plenty of them in the past couple of decades. Once you do that, a site becomes much more on the radar, and it may make governments who are at war think twice about damaging them.
Golestan Palace, which you've called "the Versailles of Iran," was damaged even though it has no conceivable strategic value. When a site like that is hit, what does it tell you about how these targeting decisions are being made?
I think the Versailles of Iran, in Tehran, was damaged because it was close to a target that the Israelis and Americans considered an important asset — so this is collateral damage, but the damage is the same regardless, and at some parts it is irreversible and tragic. I know, from discussions with UNESCO representatives, that there is a process to assess the damage and try to reconstruct it. But how do you reconstruct hundreds of thousands of mirror pieces that were installed 100 or 200 years ago, and try to find exactly how they were set by artists in the Qajar period? I think this is the tragedy of the Golestan Palace. It was the seat of power, and in some ways represented the Iranian tradition of power — damaging its throne and its building is, of course, a crime.

You're now responsible for a reference work meant to outlast any single political moment, while living through a war that's actively destroying the physical heritage that work documents. Has that tension changed how you think about Iranica's purpose — as a historical record, or as something more urgent?

The Encyclopaedia Iranica's main mission is to gather information academically and present it in the most detailed manner possible, covering the tangible and intangible culture and history of the Iranian world. In many ways, the Encyclopedia Iranica serves as the documentary identity of the Iranian people across its three volumes. We try to stay above politics, but when something like this happens—where hundreds of monuments are being destroyed or have been destroyed, and we don't know when it will end—I have thought about it. Since we do not yet have an entry on the Golestan Palace, I intend to note that during the U.S. and Israeli war on Iran, the palace was damaged, assess the extent of that damage, and include a paragraph so future readers know what happened.

In your writing on Sasanian Persia, you argue the empire has been undervalued partly because so much of its story survives only through Roman and Arab sources describing it from outside. If key Iranian sites are damaged or lost now, does Iran risk a similar problem in reverse — its own history being told mainly through foreign satellite imagery and foreign press, rather than Iranian scholarship and preserved material culture?

Indeed, I think the Sasanian Empire has been undervalued, and it's important not only for Iranian history but also for world history — the region matters. I should say that when you have such lacunae, such a lack of textual information, these monuments become, in a sense, a substitute record.
I would like to add that these monuments are sites of memory for the people of Iran, for the past, today and the future.

You've said raising international awareness now could "influence future conduct" and show Iranians their heritage is recognized abroad. Six months in, do you feel that recognition has translated into any real protection, or has the international response been mostly rhetorical?

War is a tragedy in any shape or form, and for any reason. One of the side effects is that people may become more focused on and aware of their cultural heritage and its upkeep. To a large extent, internally, there are so many monuments that the people of our own country have partly a hand in defacing or destroying or simply covering with graffiti.
But bombing from an outside force is a completely different issue and cannot be compared. I think when you're attacked from outside, it raises an awareness of your nation and what it has, regardless of what state it's in. People become more aware, and I think they become more respectful and diligent about their cultural heritage. That's the most important thing — we have to know what we have and how important it is, for future generations and for the country.

source: tehrantimes.com