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On The Bookshelf

`The Gold Of Exodus'

ROBERT DEL VALLE

Special to The Jewish News

7

he Bible you have in your
home will tell you that Mt.
Sinai is the location where
Moses received
the Ten Commandments
from God. If you possess
an atlas, that book will tell
you that the aforemen-
tioned height is found in
the peninsula of the same
name that juts into the
Red Sea between Israel
and Egypt.
According to Howard
Blum's The Gold of Exodus
(Simon and Schuster;
$25), however, the two are .
not the same. The real Mt.
Sinai is a promontory
called Jabal al Lawz in the
northwestern corner of Saudi Arabia
— and there hangs a tale worthy of an

Indiana Jones movie.
Blum's book, a feast of reportage
and cautious conclusions, is in fact
three stories in one. The dominant
thread is taken up with the adventur-
ous attempts of two unlikely treasure
seekers — commodities
broker Larry Williams
and ex-cop Bob Cor-
nuke — to infiltrate
Saudi Arabia and plant
their feet on the holiest
site mentioned in the
Old Testament — and,
incidentally, to uncover
the mountain of gold
that legend claims to be
there. -
A parallel strand
recounts the Saudi gov-
ernment's decision to
use Jabal al Lawz (to
them, simply an expe-
dient geographic location) as a mili-
tary installation and the keystone for

movie, and "60 Minutes" is lobbying
the Saudis
f for permission to send in
a team o arc aeo o
'IIs believe that
Blum stands firm. gt*
this [book] proves that the Bible is
historically true," he told me, "that
sanExodus and there was a
theorseeswaand
m
that
at something hapPened
t ja a Lawz. Did idiappen by
.34 thundering down a mountain
stones? That's a matter of

a

9

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4/10
1998

108

HALOM N ► A\41a SOVER

To Their Customers and Friends

at is nee
scholars to get der
1--le spoke of Jabal al
Las.vz, the mountain in a
remote region of Saudi
Arabia that, thanks to
131um's newest book, The
Gold of the Exodus: The
Discovery of the Thie
Mount Siflaa, is gaining a
lot of publicity.
Excerpts of the tale
have already been in Van-
ity Fair, Castle Rock is
turning the book into a

Howard Blunz:
believe that this [book]
proves that the Bible is
historically true.'

Blum
tracks how Israeli war-
planes might" sown
forced to launch deadly
missiles at the 11101111-
rain, potentially pum-
meling Mt. Sinai, the
home of God, into rub-
ble. During his
rqmwch, he learned of a
massive Saudi military
buildup. And guess
where a key radar sys-
tem anl military base
is? Jabal al Lava is part
of a 17-year, $6.5 bil-

L