By STEVEN GANOT — themedialine.org — The Nabu Museum in northern Lebanon returned five Roman antiquities to Syria on Thursday, after they had been on display since 2018. Art collector Jawad Adra had bought the pieces, including limestone statues and carved funerary stones dating back to the second and third centuries CE, from a European auction house before the outbreak of the Syrian war in 2011.

They were among the ruins of the city of Palmyra, one of the most important cultural centers in the ancient world. And while he couldn’t have known it at the time, Adra may have saved the artifacts from destruction; when Palmyra fell under ISIS control, the radical Sunni Islamist group blew up many of its main landmarks and archaeological treasures. Adra spearheaded the return of the artifacts to Syria, a move that Syria’s head of antiquities, Mohamed Nazir Awad, at a handover ceremony organized by the National Museum of Lebanon in Beirut, described as a “gracious initiative.” Syria’s Ambassador to Lebanon Ali Abdel Karim says talks are underway to arrange the return of other artifacts from the National Museum in Beirut to Syria.