The Hezbollah militia is once again digging antiquities in the Deir a-Zor sub-district at the Tel Hariri (Kingdom of Marie) site, after a break that lasted several months. The search for antiquities with the help of primitive equipment contributed to the destruction of the place.

In an interview with the Orient.Net website, M.K., a citizen of the town of al-Sial in the rural area of al-Bukmal and one of the former workers in the excavation workshops employed by the Hezbollah militia last year, said the excavation and antiquities restarted operations on the Tel Hariri area and installed two checkpoints. 

M.K. also noted that about 40 people are working at the site, all connected to the same militia, unlike the previous time, during which civilians were employed in the excavation operations. He also told that there are two antiquities experts brought in to supervise the works, one a Lebanese citizen and the other a Syrian. 

The man noted that Hezbollah moved objects discovered to the city of Deir a-Zor and from there to the capital, where they are transported to Lebanon and sold abroad in cooperation with senior regime officials, as happened in the past when dozens of objects were discovered from the Marie Kingdom and Salihi Europe.

In the same context, the activist "Khalaf al-Khatar" from Deir a-Zour said: On November 9, the Hezbollah militia brought two bulldozers to the archeological site (Kingdom of Marie) in order to dig and search for antiquities, similar to what happened last year when they excavated the site itself. For a while they used dynamite, which led to much destruction and the place was almost completely wiped out, according to eyewitnesses.