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World

Before the Destruction: Iraq's Oldest Christian Monastery

Satellite photos confirm that the oldest Christian monastery in Iraq has been reduced to rubble by ISIS.

/ 7 PHOTOS
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U.S. Army soldiers tour St. Elijah's Monastery on the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq, in 2008.  

The monastery stood as a place of worship for 1,400 years, including most recently for U.S. troops.

 

— Maya Alleruzzo / AP file
This combination of two satellite images provided by DigitalGlobe, taken on March 31, 2011, top, and Sept. 28, 2014, shows the site of the 1,400-year-old Christian monastery known as St. Elijah’s, or Dair Mar Elia, on the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq. The photo confirm what church leaders and Middle East preservationists had feared: The monastery has been reduced to a field of rubble, yet another victim of the Islamic State's relentless destruction.

A satellite image at top shows St. Elijah’s Monastery in 2011. Below it is a photo from Sept. 28, 2014, showing the site after the monastery was razed. Imagery analyst Stephen Wood, CEO of Allsource Analysis, pinpointed the destruction between August and September 2014.

— DigitalGlobe via AP
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Soldiers celebrate a Catholic Easter Mass at St. Elijah's Monastery on the outskirts of Mosul, Iraq in 2010. 

The 27,000-square-foot stone and mortar building was missing most of its roof, but it had 26 distinctive rooms including a sanctuary and chapel.

— Staff Sgt. Russell Lee Klika / U.S. Army via AP
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Visitors stand at the entrance to the ruins of St. Elijah’s Monastery in 2009. 

"Bulldozers, heavy equipment, sledgehammers, possibly explosives turned those stone walls into this field of gray-white dust. They destroyed it completely," Stephen Wood said from his Colorado offices.

— Carmichael Yepez / U.S. Army via AP
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U.S. soldiers look out towards the city of Mosul, from the top of the stairwell at the monastery. 

— Sgt. Mitch Armbruster / U.S. Army via AP
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Suzanne Bott leads a tour at St. Elijah's monastery in 2009. Bott spent more than two years surveying and restoring the site as a U.S. State Department cultural adviser in Iraq.

— Mary Prophit / U.S. Army via AP
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Cracks line the walls of the ancient sanctuary in 2008. 

— Maya Alleruzzo / AP
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