However, within minutes of putting up the story, I took it down, following receipt of an email from a prominent British Egyptologist, who was asking me to comment on an email received from one of Dr Shaheen's colleagues in Belgium. This person was greatly concerned by the aforementioned news report since he knew Prof. Dr. Shaheen personally, and could not understand how such a high ranking member of the SCA could say such things. Indeed, Dr Shaheen is at the top of his profession, as in 2008 when it became known that Dr Zahi Hawass intended retiring from his position as Secretary General of the organization, Dr Shaheen was being groomed to take his place. In the end this never happened, as Dr Hawass was appointed overseer of the SCA at a governmental level, a position he can now retain for life.
Perplexed by what had been written about his colleague, Dr Shaheen's friend wrote: "I know he would not say this unless there is massive evidence [to support such claims]. This man is … very very skeptic[al] about all theories [that do] not conform [to] the established archaeologic paradigm"
It certainly seemed that something was wrong with what Dr Shaheen had apparently said or been quoted as saying, and this was worrying his friend, who was genuinely in fear that his friend might have lost the plot, especially after being overlooked in favour of Dr Hawass, who stayed on as head of the SCA.
This was a worrying situation, and so I immediately made tracks to contact Dr Shaheen in the hope that he might throw some light on what had really gone on at that conference.
I also looked into the origins of the news report and immediately began to find a pattern emerging, one that was already familiar to me. Firstly, the supposed news site that posted the story normally deals with ET visitations and UFOs. Nothing wrong with that, of course, for if the story is real and they have the exclusive, then good luck to them. However, I then discovered that the individuals behind the news story on allnewsweb.com were new age fundamentlists, who promote a brutish and somewhat unhealthy agenda relating to the Great Pyramid and the monuments of Giza as a whole.