Authors: Hesh Kestin
“She says, ’Praise Allah, when those are found who took my Salim, please tell our soldiers to carve out their eyes and kindly fill the bloody sockets with their testicles.’ ”
In the makeshift basement television studio, the star of the moment is being strapped into a chair. Earlier, a doctor saw to the tracker’s leg, flooding it with anti-inflammatory medicine and injecting antibiotics. Casually he informed Salim that the knee is lost. “It will no longer be a joint,” he said. “It will never again bend.”
Once the tracker is secured, a Hezbollah fighter turned stagehand runs lines from an automobile battery to the tracker’s bare feet.
Salim is sweating but defiant. “Fuck you all!”
“Traitor,” Tawfeek Nur-al-Din tells him calmly. “The world will see what happens to a false Muslim.”
“Fuck you all and all your families!”
“Camera.”
At the first jolt, the tracker throws all his weight backward as he screams in pain. The chair falls.
“Did no one secure the chair?”
There is the usual discussion among Arabs about who is to blame, then about what must be done, then about why that will not work, then about who should lie on the floor behind the chair and hold it steady. All are reluctant to hold the chair because of the current. The director, once an engineering student before—as he likes to say—God found him, calms these
fears with an explanation of the principles of electrodynamics. Also, the chair holder will not be in the picture because the viewfinder is focused only above the traitor’s waist. Through all of this, the tracker has moved into a semiconscious state, foam seeping through his clenched teeth. Only when they attempt another take does his jaw abruptly relax, the foam, now pink, flowing freely down his jaw.
In the Subaru sedan the family sits in silence, Dudik and Uri in the rear, as the white car stops and goes in the evening traffic that chokes the Geha Road running north along the eastern border of Tel Aviv. They are stuck behind a green Egged bus and ahead of a Goldstar beer truck. As far as can be seen, the road is one long parking lot.
Dahlia checks her watch. “Have we ever used the siren, Elias?”
“No, chief super.”
“Let’s see if it works.”
The
wa-wa-wa
of the siren and the flashing lights cause the Egged bus to edge off the road onto the shoulder, but even as it clears the way, it is evident they will have to wait until a thousand more vehicles do the same.
“Chief super, there is another way.”
“Have you ever done it?”
“Only in training.”
“Then you need the practice.”
“I beg your pardon, chief super?”
“You need the practice. Do it.”
Elias turns the wheel hard right around the bus, then spins it back left as the car flies down the shoulder. Between the siren and the sound of the tires on gravel, the noise in the car is deafening.
This merely inspires the Ethiopian to shout. “A question, chief super!”
“Go ahead, Elias.”
“My family dreamed of coming to Israel! When we learned this was possible, not just a dream, we walked seven hundred miles across all of Ethiopia to Kenya, where the airplanes took us! Of ten of us, six survived! A lion killed my sister! The others, human lions! Now every day we see the television news! War without end! We go to funerals! Our paradise is spoiled! It is very sad for us!”
“For all of us!”
Suddenly the gravel shoulder turns to pavement. They no longer need to shout.
But Elias has gotten used to it. “Why must it be so?!”
“I don’t know,” Dahlia says softly. “It’s a tough neighborhood.”
Uri leans forward from the rear. “We have to do something, mom.”
“We will, Uri.” Her phone buzzes in her bag. She looks at the number, shuts it off. “We will, my darling. We will.”
In the makeshift television studio the doctor examines Salim once again. The doctor is not Hezbollah but a volunteer. Earlier that day, three Hezbollah entered his office, put a gun to his head, and volunteered his services. He tried to explain that he is a dermatologist. The militiamen had been ordered to bring a doctor. They asked, “Is a dermatologist not a doctor?” Now, with his patient out of his head mouthing a senseless monologue, something about a mare, he does his best. The thing that he most wishes to avoid is to lose this patient. “Keep his head elevated,” he tells the Hezbollah commander. “Otherwise he will choke on his own vomit. And keep him warm.” He is a dermatologist, for God’s sake, who has not looked beyond skin for twenty years. But they, the armed men in the basement, they are the Party of God.
Tawfeek Nur-al-Din places his hand on the doctor’s shoulder. “You will stay with us,” he says, leaving no room for doubt. “What is required for both prisoners, write it down, and you will have it. These boys must not die.”
The commander’s use of the term
boys
seems to indicate a sympathetic streak, one that may be appealed to. “What
I
need is to be with my wife and family. They do not know where—”
Before the dermatologist can finish the sentence, the man they call Commander Tawfeek hits him in the face with the butt of his rifle, breaking his nose. Blood flows freely.
“You are a physician,” the commander says. “Treat yourself.”
On the sixth floor Dahlia can find neither Zeltzer nor Kobi, but farther down the hallway she discovers Zaid Jumblatt in his office. She stands by the door. Next to the flat-screen television mounted on the wall opposite his desk is a sepia-tinted portrait of Theodor Herzl, the founder of political Zionism. “Working late?”
“We Druze are not shirkers.”
“That is your reputation.”
“When you are a minority, you must be twice as good, work twice as hard, three times as long. Come in.”
Dahlia tosses a folded sheet on his desk. “Is this what you wanted?”
Jumblatt examines the paper. “It was. But now it is no longer sufficient.”
“You requested approval for extraordinary measures. You have it.”
“Zeltzer gave orders.”
“Chaim Zeltzer has no authority in this area.”
“On the contrary. Only Dahlia Barr may permit an extraordinary act, but only Zeltzer may order it carried out.”
“We have Al-Masri only a few hours longer.”
“Extended. Kobi went to the Supreme Court. Another forty-eight.”
“Without my knowledge?”
Jumblatt removes the steel-framed spectacles whose tinted lenses protect his eyes from those of others. His eyes are red, tired. “You have been away,” he says softly.
“So?”
He picks up the remote control on his desk. “So it is unlikely you have seen this.”
Dahlia finds herself looking down at the remote, as if the issue is this slim bit of electronics encased in plastic. “I don’t understand.”
“An intercepted transmission. By morning Al-Jazeera will display it to the world. Otherwise we would keep it from you.” He fingers the remote. “Regrettably, it has fallen to me to bring you this news.” On the opposite wall the flat-screen lights up as tinny Arabic martial music booms out.
Dahlia blanches at what she sees.
“They are working on the Bedu because they believe harming your son will anger the Israeli public. They are racist so they believe we are as well. Dahlia, they will keep your son safe.”
“That poor boy,” she says, though it is unclear which of the two she means. Later, when told what she said, she herself will not be sure.
Escorted by four Cyprus Police motorcycles, a black Ford SUV flying the United States flag on its right front fender comes to a halt before the American embassy in a residential suburb of Nicosia. Cyprus is literally an island of neutrality in the Middle East—in most of which flying the U.S. flag on a vehicle would not be a good idea. Even so, two Israeli security guards in aviator glasses and ill-fitting blue blazers step out of the vehicle to check the empty street. They give an extra look at the windows of the neighboring Greek Orthodox monastery, which happens to own the land on which the embassy stands. Only then does one of the security guards open the left rear door.
A small older man steps out. He wears fifties-era round sunglasses, a sixties-era blue suit, and a new gray tie. Entering the building—which like some outsize mausoleum is faced with limestone inside and out—he is greeted by the embassy’s chargé d’affaires, a well-dressed bureaucrat whose shoes are polished to mirror brightness, and a thick individual with a goatee and thinning hair who is officially the embassy’s deputy commercial attaché. The Marine guard in the reception booth stands as still as a tree. Whatever it is he sees is not something he will ever consider remembering, unless in a moment of alcohol-fueled effusion he whispers it to his Cypriot girlfriend, who may then whisper it to someone else.
Following diplomatic protocol, the chargé speaks first. “Welcome to Cyprus, Mr. Arad. It’s always good to see you.”
“Likewise, sir,” Zalman Arad says in the clipped accent he acquired in his youth when the British ruled Palestine and Cyprus and much of the Middle East. He follows a protocol of his own. “And this must be Mr. Smith.”
“Delighted to make your acquaintance, sir,” Smith says. He has been to Tel Aviv twelve times to sit down with Arad and share intelligence of a distinctly non-commercial nature, but protocol is protocol. “Our guest has already arrived.”
“Oh, very good,” Arad says.
Smith leads him through the magnetometer, which issues not so much as a peep, and up the limestone stairs to a reception room richly paneled in walnut.“Mr. Awad,” Smith says. “I believe you know Mr. Arad.” He smiles. “It occurs to me—your names differ by only one letter. Funny, I never noticed.”
“That is because we are cousins, Mr. Smith,” Zalman Arad says. “I do thank you for making available this very pleasant venue.”
The hint is not lost on Mr. Smith.
Now that they are alone the cousins do not shake hands. They are of course not alone at all: cameras and microphones record their every gesture, every syllable.
Arad takes a seat on a white linen couch opposite Fawaz Awad, himself seated on an identical white linen couch. Between them a plush white rug is emblazoned with the great seal of the United States of America, an eagle in a circle inscribed with the words
E Pluribus Unum
.
With one-armed grace, Fawaz Awad lights the Gauloise in his gold cigarette holder. “Always a pleasure to see you, Zalman,” he says in English.
The older man responds in Arabic. “How I wish I could say the same.” He pauses. “Of course you are aware the Americans forbid smoking in their buildings.”
“Very health-conscious, the Americans,” Awad returns in Arabic. Why not? The Jew’s Arabic is perfect. “Admirable. If they are so interested in saving lives, they should not send their sons to die in Muslim lands.”
“Not to worry. They will continue to do so.” Arad watches as the other man smokes, very much aware of the first rule of negotiation among Arabs: Never speak first. But Zalman Arad has been doing this for a long time. He is unafraid of breaking the rules of negotiating with Arabs. He made most of them. “Fawaz, now that you have sent a message to our hosts, can we speak candidly?”
“As candidly as possible in a bugged room. How are you, Zalman?”
“Exhausted. Almost sixty years I have been at this. It is time to pass the baton. And you?”
“Nothing personal, but I will not retire from service until the last Jew is drowned in the sea.” He smiles. “Patience is an Arab virtue.”
“How pleasant that you have at least one. You requested this meeting. Here I am.”
“Always direct, Zalman. So very Jewish.”
“My plane leaves in an hour.”
“Then hear me well. In the past, we have bargained over prisoners. You have jailed thousands of our brave fighters, our heroes.”
“Suicide bombers, terrorists, murderers of children.” Arad offers a wry smile. “Nothing personal. Please do continue.”
“Sometimes you have agreed to trade hundreds of our people for one of your own.”
“Not I. My government. I would not have traded, not once.”
“Now we wish to offer a trade of a different proportion. One of ours for two of yours. Give us Mohammed Al-Masri and take back the two soldiers.” He drops cigarette ash on the rug, looks
at the Jew, and shrugs. “No smoking, therefore no ashtray. Your American friends, so naive.” A pause. “That is the deal.”
“Interesting,” Arad says. “Who is Mohammed Al-Masri?”
“Please, Zalman. Your plane.”
“So you wish only this simple trade?”
“On the Lebanon-Israel border. In daylight. On our side the press will be invited. On yours you may do as you please.”
“Why?”
“Because you control your side of the border. If only for a time. The Christian Crusaders did the same. Also temporarily.”
Arad is patient. “Why this trade?”
“I’m sure you can draw your own conclusions, Zalman. But if I must I will spell it out. In the past the world came to believe that one Jew is worth a thousand Muslims. Today we wish to correct this misconception.”
“One Muslim is worth two Jews.”
“Exactly.”
“And if my government does not agree?”
“Then, my friend, the two young Jews will suffer.”
“I am not your friend.”
“Nevertheless, they will suffer.”
“And if it happens that your Muslim—his name again?”
“Al-Masri. Quite a famous Muslim. I am surprised that you are not aware of his presence in your dungeons.”
“And if it happens as a consequence that this quite famous Muslim suffers as well?”
“My dear fellow, we do not, as the Americans say, give a shit.” He removes the lit butt from his cigarette holder, drops it on the great seal, grinds it in with his shoe. “You may boil him in oil for all I care. His value is symbolic.” Another pause. “May I offer a piece of advice? If you do not make this trade, in my estimation it will further split your nation. There will be demonstrations in the streets. Perhaps a more reasonable government will be
elected. A more pliant one. The electorate will demand you act humanely, that you return these poor young Jews—”