Abstract

Modern, Stevie March 15, 2016: A 19 year-old American tourist is arrested in Jerusalem. Police authorities had found him asleep in a prohibited cave area, deep under the Muslim quarter of the Old City. A search finds his backpack loaded with rubble dug with a pickaxe, at a site where myth tells of lost religious treasure. The tourist claims no memory of his actions. Israeli media reports the story as a possible case of 'Jerusalem Syndrome' - a religiously themed psychosis. The syndrome affects nearly 100 people each year out of millions of tourists who visit Jerusalem.