The Shahid's Widow

by Danny Bar

  “No, my son,” the Sheikh placed his hand on Adnan’s head, “you are gravely mistaken, Allah won’t abandon you, and the afterlife will bring you much more happiness than this world, be on your way and set your eyes on Allah,” the Sheikh blessed him with growing impatience.

  Adnan placed his head on the Sheikh’s shoulder, then recomposed himself and left the mosque with his head bent. Outside, the messenger already waited for him and drove him to the Damascus Gate.

  “From this moment on you are not to contact anyone until the operation. Tomorrow you will take a taxi to the address written here,” he presented him with a note written in English, and Adnan slowly read it.

  “The Independence Garden, Tel Aviv, on the bridge next to the Hilton hotel.”

  “Yes. Jamil will be there to give you the bag. From there, you will walk together the short distance leading to the operation point. Now smile in the face of suffering and torture, for you are headed to heaven,” the messenger told him with a smile and hurried to leave.

  Adnan remained confused.

  He sat on the rail beside Damascus Gate and waited for a passing taxi. The street was empty and dark. Finally, he rose and slowly walked to a nearby public phone.

  “Ellen?” he asked hesitantly.

  “Ortado! I am so happy to hear your voice.”

  “Ellen, I don’t want to be alone tonight,” he told her in a broken voice.

  “What happened? You sound terrible,” she said with concern.

  “I am afraid, Ellen. I want to be with someone, this loneliness is driving me insane.”

  “Ortado, bring your things from the hotel and spend the night at my place.”

  With eyes red with tiredness, Ronit looked at the computer screen and the reply she had received regarding Adnan’s entry to Israel.

  “He never entered Israel, at least not according to the Border Control Department’s records,” she told Amos in a tired voice.

  “You understand what this means,” Amos told her.

  “That he has a fake passport.”

  “That’s right, send a patrol car to arrest him,” Amos instructed.

  “I already have, he’s not at the hotel, he left.”

  “In a taxi?”

  “Possibly,” Ronit answered.

  “Try to locate the driver.”

  “We’re doing that right now.”

  Yasmina handed the missive to Jamil. After he had read it, he enveloped himself with a long silence, then went outside to the yard. Through the window, Yasmina could see him standing in front of the improvised sink, his torso exposed, gunshot wounds adorning his arm. He shaves his beard and mustache, then took off his pants and stood naked in the tub.

  Yasmina shifted the flowered curtain and followed him with her eyes as he scrubbed his body with soap. Then she followed the white paths carved by the water as it washed the soap off his body, sliding down his chest to his stomach and disappearing between his thighs. A stinging heat spread and traveled down her stomach, her face was ablaze.

  No. I hate you! I hate you! I hate you! She reminded herself over and over, her fingers crushing the edges of her dress and her breath quickening.

  Jamil took the small towel and with slow movements began to wipe his body, lingering for a long moment as it slid down his stomach, then passing it with a deliberate slowness between his thighs and pressing it to his back. When it almost slid all the way down his back, he sharply pulled it to the front and turned his head to look at the window.

  Yasmina shuddered. Her lips were dry; she took the water jug and drank from it with long sips, large drops sliding down her neck and wetting her thin dress.

  Jamil got dressed. When finished, he kneeled to piously pray on a small mat that had belonged to Issaam.

  The food Yasmina had prepared remained on the table, untouched.

  A sense of gloom fell over the house.

  Have I gotten used to him? Yasmina was suddenly frightened, could it be that he has filled the empty space left by Issam’s death? The answer to that question intimidated her and threatened to chill her burning desire to take vengeance on him.

  I hate you, Jamil, she reminded herself again, I will never forgive you for the bodily tortures you forced upon me, and the body never forgets. The body that felt Jamil forcing his will on it, the body that has suffered the sharp pain and shrank with terror, this body alone will be able to defeat you. She decided to make use of it as part of her war against herself.

  But why has my body become so inflamed? She was horrified, what was the meaning of the passion that spread in her like a fire in a haystack?

  Perhaps this is the heavy guilt felt over the fact that I have intervened in things that should only be left in Allah’s hands? After all, I could have let him rot in jail and chose his death instead.

  No, Yasmina, you couldn’t have let him live, she immediately answered herself, while he lives, your soul is dead, because it has become infested with rot as well. But why does my heart harbor sorrow for him? she wondered, perhaps because he is going to his death to serve a rightful struggle for which I have sacrificed the man dearest to me, my husband?

  True, I disagree with the bloody path he has chosen to tread, but our goals are the same, it is only our ways that are different.

  Her mind was in turmoil, Yasmina struggled with herself not to be swayed over and warn Jamil: get up, run before bullets will pierce your body. The eyes of the Jews are upon your every step, and you cannot escape them, for they have sentenced you to death.

  She felt the need to draw him closer before he vanishes from her life forever, to hug him so that the touch of his body on hers will rekindle the hatred burning in her, but he has abstained from going near her for many days.

  She pulled back the curtain separating the bedroom from the small living room, took off her dress and wore the white gown she had washed on the previous day. The smell of soap still clung to it. She looked at the broken mirror on the wall and examined her body from every angle. The faint light penetrating the fabric made her see the curves of her body and breasts and her hand inadvertently went up and into the gown’s neckline.

  “Yasmina,” she heard Jamil’s voice and moved her hand away with embarrassment. He was standing behind her.

  “Yes, Jamil?” she was surprised by the softness with which she said his name.

  “I wanted to say goodbye. Tomorrow morning, I will leave here and go to meet my destiny, my naseeb,” he told her in a feeble voice.

  “No, ya Jamil,” she said in panic.

  “I have loved you, Yasmina. Your black eyes are the last thing I will remember before my body scatters in the air,” he whispered to her.

  She drew nearer and placed her hand in his. “Insha’allah, may you find peace for your tortured soul and your life in the afterlife be better than the sorrowful one you have led in this world.”

  “I have no sorrow for myself,” he told her, “and I do not fear the pains of the body. After a brief moment, I will no longer know what happened to it and its fragments will scatter between the bodies of the infidels. This was Issam’s fate and now it is my fate as well, for our years are numbered by Allah and this is the fate he has decreed for us.”

  Yasmina reached out with her arms and hugged him.

  “Yes, hug me, Yasmina. Give comfort to my aching body, be the last to taste the limbs of my body before they become bent and blasted beyond recognition.”

  “Enough, Jamil,” the curves of her body pricked his chest.

  “Who will taste of this body after I am gone?” he asked sadly.

  “Stop talking like that.” She felt her body clinging to his, and her hands tightened their grip on his waist to the point of pain.

  “Don’t cry, Yasmina,” he stroked her face.

  “I am crying over you Jamil, for the fact that you have sealed your own
fate. I am crying over Issam who never knew how you betrayed his trust, and I am crying over everything that has brought us to this,” she wept and her body trembled.

  Jamil hugged her. Yasmina placed her head on his chest.

  Ya Khalil!, she cried out in her imagination, I will lead Jamil to the gates of hell; only then will we create a new life for ourselves.

  “Come to me,” she stroked his head with a face wet with tears. He began to kiss her on her lips, wildly sucking her tongue into him with quick breaths. Yasmina yielded to him, her hands held his head and pulled him to her.

  “Yasmina, my love…” She silenced him and bit his lips until they bled. “Let me taste of your body before I die,” he begged her.

  “Take it, Jamil, it is yours.” His fingers crushed the fabric of her gown and pulled her against his hardening body. She trembled as he ripped the gown and buried his head between her breasts, “this is the scent that consumes a man’s body.”

  Yasmina unbuckled Jamil’s belt and tore his pants off him.

  “Come to me and get a taste of heaven,” Yasmina groaned.

  “Yes, I have reached it even before becoming a Shahid,” he was barely able to mutter while pushing his body between her thighs.

  And Yasmina yielded to him, wrapping her legs around his body and tightening them around his waist.

  Forgive me, Khalil, she moaned voicelessly. I have been overcome by death. This is the heavy price I have to pay for my terrible sin, I have taken the life of a human being, even if he is a beast. Only after the fire in my body is extinguished will I know if I have won, then I will stick out my tongue in the face of death and send this man to meet it. Only then will I completely be yours.

  Yasmina burned with passion and rage. She felt ashamed of the alien passion that overwhelmed her, but her body wanted to taste pain. Her fingers clutched Jamil’s back and scratched it until a cry of pain escaped his throat. She held his hips and dropped him to the floor. Jamil turned her on her back, rolled up the edges of her gown and discovered that nothing separated them.

  Yasmina squirmed under him, raising her pelvis up. Her hips closed on his body and she took him inside her with powerful and painful strokes that gradually made her tremble with pleasure.

  The voice of the Muezzin rising from the mosque speakers mixed with the sound of the moaning rising from the room, as it called the believers to come to the morning prayer and worship the creation.

  The surveillance team stationed close to Yasmina’s house clearly heard the voices coming from within and reported them to the commanding officer.

  “Got it,” he began to doubt the amount of trust that could be placed with Yasmina. He reported this to the head of the unit, sharing his feelings with him.

  “Then we can no longer rely on her signal,” the head of the unit instructed, “I want constant surveillance on all points of entry to the house, he might decide to leave early.”

  “Of course,” said the team commander, “a Duvdevan task force will be waiting close by.”

  “Keep me posted.”

  “I will.”

  39

  It was 3:00 am, the taxi driver had not yet been found. Ronit began to lose hope of finding him, but encouraged her colleagues to continue and search. Amos and the district coordinator sat in the next room drinking coffee, the umpteenth cup they’d had that evening, and waited for additional information.

  As per the Prime Minister’s instructions, a complete blockade was put over the territories and checkpoints were erected throughout the country.

  At the same time, the Shin Bet officers sat down with their Palestinian associates and checked ways of thwarting the attack. They agreed to conduct massive arrests of organization members and bring them for interrogation in the Palestinian Authority facility. Simultaneously, the Shin Bet investigators raided the prison cells of arrested organization leaders and took them for interrogation.

  “Interrogate them legally,” the head of the Shin Bet warned them.

  “I believe that this current investigation is under the ticking bomb procedure, therefore we can use special means to save lives,” his deputy said.

  But the head of the Shin Bet insisted, “No way! No special means!”

  Adnan lay on the sofa in Ellen’s apartment’s living room on Jabotinsky Street, curled in a fetal posture. Ellen sat on her deep armchair with her legs crossed. The soft yellow of the sweater she wore blended with the dim lighting.

  Adnan spoke and spoke for over six hours, without her being able to stop the flow of his speech even for a single moment. Like a huge tidal wave, he had barged into her house and her life in a whirlpool that threatened to sweep her away as well. Her humane obligation and professional aspirations crashed against each other like two vast waves. This is the story I have been dreaming about, she thought to herself, and already imagined the promo: “A live broadcast of a suicide attack: a network reporter accompanying a suicide bomber during his final hours, all the way to his suicide in a deadly terrorist attack.”

  Ellen knew that all other television networks would ask to use her material but also doubt her professional etiquette, and tell her that she had crossed too many lines. The hypocrites will say that I have traded in blood, but this is a journalistic achievement of the highest order – not one of them would be able to dispute that.

  Adnan’s sleep was fitful, and he muttered incomprehensibly. He trembled from head to toe and Ellen hurried to cover him with a blanket and stroke his sweat-drenched face.

  Her privately owned video camera had documented all six hours of Adnan’s long monologue. Ellen had promised him that the camera wouldn’t separate them but be positioned in the corner of the room. Before that, he had objected to all her persuasive attempts to allow her camera crew to tape him.

  “There will be only two of them,” she pleaded with him, “a soundman and a photographer. Look, see for yourself,” she waved their press cards at him to make him believe her.

  “Just you and me,” he asked her, examined the cards and placed them on the table. For six hours she had hardly dared to open her mouth to speak, fearing Adnan would change his mind. What is happening here is inhuman, she thought. A man is walking to his death with open eyes, and he keeps speaking about it in a measured way and a detached tone. She could hardly believe such a thing was possible. The glass of water standing on the table and frequently emptied served as the sole testimony of the great effort required by Adnan and the great inner excitement that dried his lips.

  “Yama,” he muttered in his sleep, calling for his mother. Her heart went out to him. He’s just a child, she thought while looking at his face, a child calling for his mother, like a baby. “Mother” is the only word I know in Arabic, other than a few juicy curses, that is.

  The Middle East is crazier than any reality our viewers could ever imagine, she thought. A news reporter interviews a man asking her to broadcast his own suicide to the public, the images of his own body being torn to shreds by an explosion. The camera angles were known to Adnan from the tour he had taken with her at the Rabin Square. He requested that the blast take place in the center of the frame, “So you won’t miss the main event, God forbid. Do not remove the camera and don’t conceal the fountain, I will be standing there. Take care to be at least six-hundred feet away from the blast so you don’t get hurt, because the amount of explosives will be double from that previously used by the organization. The first blast will take place at exactly eight thirty. Five minutes later the second man will run into the mass of injured people and rescue forces and detonate a second charge. Don’t stop filming. Difficult, unwatchable sights will follow, limbs and organs will be scattered on the ground, but do not stop filming. No editor will be able to cut the drama taking place before his eyes.”

  What should I do with this double-edged sword? She asked herself and looked at him. Should I inform the police? Or should I simply i
nform the Government Press Office and pass the responsibility onto them?

  The option of turning Adnan in disturbed Ellen – after all, he had placed his trust in her, and she had promised not to report him. The two had also agreed that she would not reveal his intentions to her camera crew or her editor.

  But what of the dozens of innocent people who would be cruelly butchered unless I stop this? She thought. This dilemma seems unreal, like the sort of make-believe games they have beginner reporters play during their instructional course. “How would you react if…” Ellen thought and already considered whether she should consult with her editor. He would forbid me from reporting this to the police. He would simply say: go for it all the way, it’s a great story.

  She had even considered the legal aspects and reached the conclusion that she is treading uncharted territory. I wouldn’t try to stop a Palestinian hurling a Molotov cocktail bottle on an Israeli citizen, merely document the event, she tried to persuade herself. After all, her editor has often said she must take no sides in the conflict, that her role was to document a reality rather than try to change it.

  She also recalled the example given by a National Geographic photographer, during her days as a student, regarding the moral dilemmas of a nature photographer. “I am always conflicted regarding the question of whether I should save the little fawn from the lioness approaching to devour it. I have never done so, and I must never interfere with nature. Furthermore, I sometimes film documentaries in areas where there is a terrible drought, and my heart is torn to shreds at the sight of a monkey infant dying of thirst right in front of my eyes. More than once, one of the photography assistants asks my permission to give it some water to save its life. I always forbid them from doing so. Those are the laws of nature and we must not interfere with them.” Ellen still remembered how impressed she had been by the photographer’s determination. But are we in the jungle? she asked herself.

  “Mother…” Adnan cried out again and began to show the first signs of waking up. Ellen was jarred from her thoughts. She remained undecided about her next course of action and felt a pang of pain piercing her chest. She knew that her decision would determine the fate of people’s lives, including some children and babies. Perhaps she could save Adnan’s life as well. But does he want to be saved? She deliberated despite the fact that she already knew the answer. He did not want her to save him, he eagerly anticipated his death, yearning to find peace for his raging soul.