Right after development and artefact robbing, one of the main threats to archaeological sites is dirt bikes, or off-road motor cycles. Particularly archaeological sites in reserves are often at risk from dirt bike riders, if there are no expensive enforcement measure to keep them away.
And now the dirt bike riders have come to Tell Halif! They are churning up the hill I worked on for so many years. It is partly our own fault: we dumped excess soil on the side of the hill and created a steep, dusty slope ideal for dirt bikes. If the dirt bikes were restricted to that dump, things would not that be bad, but now the riders are churning up parts of the hillside.
Israel has a dirt bike problem. Somehow it is a national past-time, a destructive past-time in such a small land. And the authorities are doing little to counter the destruction. At Tel Goded large boulders were strategically placed to hinder dirt bikes, but they found new tracks to ride the sides of the hill. Some small tells are so rutted that little topography remains. Byzantine village sites such as Abu Hof are scarred by dirt bike tracks.
For the sake of an adrenalin rush and proving macho prowess important heritage is lost, the land scarred. Pleasant reserves are turned into noisy, dust bowls. The problem is not unique to Israel. I have also seen it in New Zealand, where the old gold digger town of Macetown was severely damaged by dirt bikes, for example. It’s likely that dirt bikes also destroy archaeological sites in other countries.
The irresponsible and ego-centric behaviour has to stop. But of course these people do not listen. They think they enjoy nature through their destructive behaviour. A hill is just a place to prove their skills, not a place where generations of people have lived and have left behind their traces. It does not worry them that these traces are now damaged, sometimes even obliterated. So, it may be up to us to say that it is enough, that the destruction cannot continue. We must advocate for change.
Imagining the past: Archaeology and the Bible 