Woman applying for new Israeli identity card says she’s 120 years old

It’s news to Guinness Amarilis Espinoza, a Guinness spokeswoman in London, said she was not familiar with Amash's contention, but said multiple documents would need to be produced to back up a birth certificate, like the birth certificates of a spouse and children, death certificates, school certificates and medical examinations. "Anything that helps reconstruct the timeline of the person back to that age," Espinoza explained. "There is a lot of documentation that needs to be prepared before we could announce a person is the oldest person." Relatives said she has 10 sons and one daughter, her eldest, now in her late 80s. She has about 120 grandchildren, 250 great-grandchildren and 20 great-great grandchildren, they said. A granddaughter-in-law, Hamda Amash, 40, said Mariam is a "healthy, active woman. She walks each day and makes sure she drinks at least one glass of olive oil." She was a pampered second wife who married relatively late, explaining the ages of her children, Hamda Amash said. "Her house is always full of people," she said. "People like to come to her house. She talks to us about the old days. She knows the history since the Turkish times." Turkish control over the Holy Land ended with World War I.