There were suggestions that as many as 25,000 manuscripts at the Ahmed Baba Institute in Timbuktu had been burned, and even that the building itself had been torched. When the dust cleared the damage, though serious, turned out not to be as dire as feared.

I swore blind to myself a couple of weeks ago that I'd never publish another word on Bamiyan. I fear deeply for the future of that beautiful valley and its long-suffering people, but I felt I'd reached a point of just repeating myself. One thing Bamiyan should never be is boring.

If you believe this, the days of the pyramids are numbered: "According to several reports in the Arabic media," writes Raymond Ibrahim, "prominent Muslim clerics have begun to call for the demolition of Egypt's Great Pyramids."