Israel confiscated an incoming shipment

[Joe Sermarini]

Last fall we shipped an order to a collector in Israel. It was a Vespasian silver denarius, Judaea Capta type, minted in Rome. It was confiscated without notification or explanation by Israeli customs. Our customer was able to learn it was confiscated only by making many many phone calls and refusing to give up. He appealed the decision to confiscate and has lost. This coin did not originate in Israel, had never been to Israel before, and had been in the U.S. for decades.

We had one other shipment to Israel seized by customs, also last year, but they sent the coin back to us instead of stealing it. 

Also, we have consignors from Israel who buy in Europe. The all now ask the sellers to ship directly to us rather than to Israel, not to save the postage, but because they have had coins confiscated.

Apparently the Israeli government will now confiscate any ancient coins coming into the country.

From this point forward, whenever we get an order from Israel, we will warn the customer of the risk and offer cancellation before shipping. Forum does not refund for coins lost to confiscation be foreign governments. (It is in our guarantee exceptions small print.)

[Meepzorp]

Hi Joe,

This is both shocking and sad, especially considering the fact that it was not minted in Israel. But I am not surprised. Does the Israeli government have a legal right to confiscate a coin that was not minted in Israel? I would imagine not. How is that even possible? Yet, the customer lost his appeal. Since the coin was minted in Rome, could it be that the Italian government had something to do with this?

It appears that many countries have ramped up their import/export restrictions recently. As you probably know, several days ago, I began a topic here in this section of Forum explaining Italy's new export restrictions. It seems that every dealer in Italy is having severe difficulty attempting to obtain an export permit from the Italian government. They all use the word "impossible" in their communications with me. They literally must produce paperwork from before 1919 (over 100 years ago!) to obtain an export permit. Some of these dealers have been exporting coins from Italy for decades with no problems. They were all caught off guard by these new restrictions. None of them saw this coming. None of them know what is going on. All of the dealers in Italy are as confused as I am.

Meepzorp

[Jay GT4]

I just got 3 coins FROM Israel.

Do you think it was because of the type?  Judea Capta....


 I would be curious to know from Joe, how many coins would you ship to Israel in a  year?  Ballpark.

Meep, as I said in your other thread, Italy isn't giving out export licenses because of Shut downs, not because of changes in law.  The offices are closed.  

[Joe Sermarini]

I just got 3 coins FROM Israel.  I would be curious to know from Joe, how many coins would you ship to Israel in a  year?  Ballpark.

Maybe a couple dozen.

[v-drome]

Hi, all.  I sent a coin from the U.S. to a friend in Israel last year.  He had me send him a photo and complete description of the coin, in the form of an invoice, before I sent the coin.  He then took that to a friend of his who was a coin dealer, and obtained an import license.  Once he secured the import license he told me to go ahead and send the coin by registered mail and we had no other problems.  I do not know if anything has changed since then.  This was a coin that was originally found in Israel, but I think it still had to go through customs. 

I also have an object that I am planning to send to a colleague as a donation to the Israel State Collection, and I was told that even for this, he will need to secure an import license prior to sending.

I will let the board know if I hear anything from him about this topic.

Jimi

[Canaan]

I have posted some time ago about this issue and still suffering from this issue. The only way to import ancient coins in israel is to be a lisenced dealer or collector from the Israeli Antiquities authority!
https://www.forumancientcoins.com/board/index.php?topic=110764.0