Decades-old CIA documents on Ark of the Covenant resurface amid classified group text spat.
The CIA used experimental intelligence methods to attempt to locate the Ark of the Covenant, but the revelations are about 25 years old.
The Ark of the Covenant is more than a lost treasure for Indiana Jones to track down, it is also an important symbol in Jewish faith and history.
In “recently resurfaced” documents, as reported by right-wing British outlet the Daily Mail, the CIA outlines how it used a “remote viewer” to mentally locate the site of the artifact, which has remained a mystery for centuries.
The topic trended on X and Google amid heated political debates over whether or not military plans in Yemen that were accidentally shared in a Signal group chat with a journalist were classified.
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The CIA’s “Project Sun Streak” took place in the 1980s and sought to establish remote viewing, the “ability to describe remote areas or concealed data via unknown mental processes,” as an intelligence tool.
In one exercise, the remote viewer was asked to locate the Ark of the Covenant, and reported it to be “somewhere in the Middle East,” and “hidden–underground, dark and wet,” and protected by “use of a power unknown to us.”
CIA-RDP96-00789R001300180002-7 by Kinsey Crowley on Scribd
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Open in new tab The reports were unclassified and released in 2000. But the symbol has relevance today as the conflict between Israel-Hamas carries on.
The Ark of the Covenant is the one man-made object in Judaism that is considered holy, and it accompanied the Israelites in war, according to the Jewish Virtual Library.
A replica carefully constructed over three-and-a-half years to fit the specifications in the Torah was toured through historic sites in Israel last fall, according to the Jewish News Syndicate.
The same replica also appeared at President Donald Trump‘s Florida home at Mar-a-Lago earlier in 2024, according to JNS.
“It was a project designed to bring peace to the world and to bring victory to the Land of Israel, and to bring peace and kindness to America again,” the project’s financier Lewis Topper said of the ark, as JNS reported.
The White House and Trump Foundation did not immediately respond to inquiries about the replica time at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump has taken a hard pro-Israel stance in the conflict with Hamas, while pro-Palestinian protesters have railed against the resulting humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Kinsey Crowley, USA TODAY
Kinsey Crowley is a trending news reporter at USA TODAY. Reach her at kcrowley@gannett.com. Follow her on X and TikTok @kinseycrowley or Bluesky at @kinseycrowley.bsky.social.