“I can call international agencies from the telephone company in Gaza. I could take you there to call your home.”
“Really? That would be great. I did write them a short letter about moving, but didn’t explain much. The have had no address to write to.”
“Well, we can fix all that. Now about that priest . . . ”
Caleb’s mind was thousands of miles away wondering how his parents would react. He didn’t hear any more of what Butrus said.
***
Caleb used a map of the camp he had copied by hand, leaving room for additional tents. The numbering system in English now obsolete with the changes and additions, he converted to the new map to allow a registration of each family and their tent. It included a bit of biographical data, date of arrival, home city or village, and names and ages of children. He knew this would be increasingly important for aid agencies and eventually UNRWA. In addition, Sabria had wanted to know data of children in the camp to share with the other women planning to start a school.
As he walked from tent to tent to interview each family with Sabria translating, his mind wandered to Butrus’s kind offers. Should this be the time to ask Sabria to marry him? And how should he explain all this to his parents? He didn’t really need their permission. But they did need to know since their faraway son would be continuing his radical departure from his upbringing.
***
The evening walk with Sabria had become a time every day to share with each other. She had acquired a western dress from the donated clothing that seemed to enhance her olive skin and flashing dark eyes. They walked hand in hand past neighbors he had met, attracting attention. They knew he and Sabria did not live together, and therefore were not married. But the idea of a man and woman not his wife holding hands seemed to puzzle them. It just wasn’t done in public, and particularly when not married.
“Are you bothered by the stares of people as we walk together?” Caleb asked.
“A bit,” Sabria confessed. “But I enjoy our time together and I guess you do as well. So in the greater scheme of things, it doesn’t matter.”
“But your reputation does matter, to me as well as you.”
“So, do we quit holding hands?”
“No. I have a better idea.” He suddenly dropped to one knee in the path as it ended at the beach. Holding her hand Caleb gazed up at a surprised Sabria. “I don’t have a ring to give you yet, but I will get one somehow. Will you marry me?”
Sabria, laughing through a few tears, covered her mouth. She dragged Caleb to his feet and threw her arms around his neck. “Oh yes, I will. I love you, Caleb. I remember. ‘Where you go I will go.’ And something about only death being able to separate us.”
They kissed quickly. Several women apparently overheard the conversation and proposal, and though in a foreign language to them, ran together and danced around the couple.
Sabria and Caleb joined in the dance, which soon attracted children who came running to join in the festivities, running around in circles.
After a couple minutes Sabria shook hands with their new neighbors, and Caleb thanked them placing his hand over his heart. They left the site of the spontaneous celebration, and walked down the beach.
“What about your parents, Caleb? They don’t know anything of us, do they?”
“No, but I’m going to tell them about you, and what I’d like to do . . . with your permission.”
He explained Butrus’s offer of a telephone call to Texas at the phone company in Gaza. Then Caleb told of a Melkite priest in the camp who could marry them.
Sabria stared wide-eyed at him. “You move fast,” she laughed. “I think it would be a great idea. But let’s wait for any arrangements until you talk to your family. And I will explain it to mine. But they know and love you. It will be no problem for them. They will be just as happy as I am.”
As they strolled quietly near the peaceful waves Sabria wondered what the future would hold, the love of a Palestinian with an American. How can we together make a difference? Where would they ultimately live? She loved her people and the land and couldn’t imagine leaving them. She glanced at her amazing man from the far away country where people from disparate places live “with liberty and justice for all.” She glanced at Caleb. “Do you think these refugee camps will last? Will these children ever find freedom and justice in a land where Jews and Arabs live together in peace?”
“That’s our goal, my love. May we become peacemakers as the years go by.”
***
Joseph picked up the ringing telephone in their Dallas home to find their son Caleb on the line. His heart raced as he heard Caleb’s voice through a few crackles and occasional missed words of greeting.
“We’ve been so worried and wondering how you are.” He put his hand over the receiver shouting, “Helen, get on the line. It’s Caleb.”
“Hi, Caleb,” his mother said grabbing another telephone. “How and where are you?”
“I’m in Gaza, and I’m fine.”
“We wrote to you, to general delivery in Fureidis, but you probably never got the letter.”
“No I didn’t. We’ve been here just a month now.”
“Who’s ‘we?’”
“That’s why I called. To let you know what I’m up to and some plans for the future.”
“Are you coming home? You must not be in school now,” his mother said.
Caleb began a summary of what had happened both in Haifa and Tantura, becoming unplanned refugees with the host family, his new work to help out and then about Sabria. He explained how he had fallen in love with her, a young woman who is Christian and cares for her family and others.
“She’s an Arab? A Christian? How can that be?”
“She’s from the Melkite church, an Arab one that dates back to that first church in Antioch, Syria, where Paul visited.”
“But is she a real Christian?”
“She is, Mom. She loves and follows Jesus. You will love her too. A gentle spirit and yet determined in caring for people who have lost everything.”
“What do you mean by ‘lost everything?’ Who are these people?” Joseph asked.
“They are Palestinian Arabs, historic over the centuries of living here, who have been displaced from their homes. They’ve lost family members, their livelihood. They have fled death and destruction. Refugee camps are being built to meet basic needs of a place to live and food. Mom, you have no idea what these people have been through. And they are not allowed to return to their homes or lands. Huge numbers of them.”
“And you are there with them? The young woman is also a refugee?”
“Yes. Sabria is one also. We are here with her family, together. Like Jesus who walked this land. He too had nowhere to lay his head. Remember?”
No one spoke for several moments. Joe tried to gather his thoughts. So many questions. What had happened to their son? Why had he quit school in Haifa? And how did he get involved with all this trouble? As a foreign student there, how could he possibly end up in a refugee camp with an Arab family, and now in love with a girl who might be a terrorist? What was happening to their son? He knew terrible things were going on over there, but his church friends said that the powerful Arab countries were trying to push little Israel into the sea. His mind raced. And now Caleb ended up a refugee also. He’d have to appear calm to Caleb. Perhaps he could talk sense into him. “Maybe you should come home, son. We could sit down and talk through all this. You’d have time to think things through.”
“I’ve had lots of time to think things through, Dad. I know you and Mom don’t understand. But I’m not coming home now. Sabria and I are getting married here in Gaza. I just wanted to let you know that I am fine and have found the girl I want to spend the rest of my life with. You’ll meet her before too long and grow to love her too. In the meantime, I believe the best thing I can do is to stay right here for now and help desperate families of mostly women and children survive this crisis time. They may not make it.”<
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“Do you think this is best for you, Caleb?” his mother asked. “Is this something God wants for you at this stage in your life?”
“It is exactly. I’ve never felt so fulfilled. Doing something that makes a difference to desperate people. I love them. This is my heart. You know the Lord talked about loving your neighbor. Well, I’ve found what he meant.”
“And the girl, Caleb. As your mother, I wonder what to think. And her family, do they accept you?”
“Call her Sabria, Mom. She’s going to be your daughter-in-law. And yes, her mother is happy for us. Her father is a prisoner taken by the Israeli army somewhere. We don’t know where or even if he is still alive. His crime was to try to save his home and family.”
After moments of silence, Caleb’s father took a deep breath. “We have to digest all this, Son. I don’t know what to think or say right now. I guess just wish you the best and that you will listen to your heart and to God. We will pray that he will give you great wisdom in your choices. We love you.”
Caleb put the telephone down and sat quietly in the small room for a couple of minutes to reflect on their conversation. Then he rose and walked out to thank Butrus who had waited with Sabria. He gave her a hug and whispered in her ear, “It’s okay.”
Chapter 60
Caleb stood close to Sabria to exchange rings, narrow silver bands that he had found in a Gaza shop. The betrothal ceremony in the Melkite tradition occurred outside the wedding tent that had been erected on a field bordering the beach. He smiled, recalling the preparations. They’d had to make do with whatever they could find. Sabria’s dress was loaned from a new friend. Being white and with a veil, it fit close enough to delight the prospective bride. The ancient church had developed wedding traditions over the centuries. He had learned from the priest that solemn prayers would undergird every aspect of the ceremony and the marriage itself.
He looked at the crowd outside the tent, surrounding the priest and themselves. It numbered in the hundreds in the early evening. Probably they had never seen an American marry a Palestinian Arab girl. Many of them he now recognized from registering them. Women with hijabs, others with heads uncovered. Relatively few men. Lots of kids.
The prayers began. Without his robes, in plain clothes but with his tall cap, the gray haired and bearded priest had told the couple he had managed to escape his village with the headgear only. Sabria whispered a translation of the first two prayers of the ancient liturgy, asking for faithfulness in marriage and reaffirming that lawfully married couples are chaste in the eyes of God. Then they exchanged the rings Caleb had found. She had explained they symbolized the promises of faithfulness to each other.
At this point, they followed the priest into the tent, and stood in front of the standing crowd to express their consent to love each other like God loves us, no matter what happens. Sabria had translated their expressions of consent they both repeated in Arabic. At this point the Marriage Prayers for a happy life together began with the affirmation that the joining together was done by the Lord himself. The priest reached to join their hands together as a symbol of their divine union that Christ himself celebrates.
By this time, Sabria glowed, her cheeks flushed as she looked up at Caleb. The priest turned back to put a crown on their heads, made of small branches woven together. The crowning ceremony symbolized many things that Caleb could not remember except they were all good. Then the singing began, led by the priest, from Psalm eight, verses six and seven. Caleb noticed that some in the audience joined in. He himself had learned it in English from Sabria: “Crown them O Lord God with glory and honor and grant them dominion over the works of your hands.”
Reading from the New Testament ended with the story of turning the water into wine symbolizing the new testament, the new arrangement of grace, and the unity of the couple as they drank from their wine goblets together. Caleb suddenly realized anew, this was real and a forever commitment to a beautiful woman who less than one year ago was a stranger from a faraway land. Chills ran up his spine. They sipped their wine, arms entwined. Tears appeared in the dark eyes he so loved. She had been through so much, and now he with her. That participation with the suffering of her people moved him to tears as well. He could not imagine a better partner for the years ahead of them. Whatever happened, they would face it together. He tried to smile and wipe his eyes. Sabria with her finger reached up and wiped them for him. He instinctively enclosed her in his arms. The crowd gasped in unison, and then broke out laughing and clapping. The solemn priest even broke out in a smile and said something that made everyone laugh.
He ushered them to walk around the table standing behind him that held the Bible and the wine, symbolizing as Sabria had explained, that Christ is the Sun around which their life together must revolve. He then removed their crowns and they processed out of the tent and through the crowd who smiled and waved.
Along with the bridal couple, the naan, humus, fruit, and figs attracted many and formed the center of the large crowd of refugees who’d had little to celebrate this year. Many hugs and handshakes confirmed the joy of this unusual union of a strange American young man whom they’d come to appreciate, with one of their own. Butrus stood by proudly, having directed most of the arrangements, and paying for it. Hava had tears in her eyes; Caleb couldn’t be sure whether for sadness that Khalid wasn’t here, or for joy. Maybe both. The others, Judith, Rana, and the children all came up to hug them. Rana expressed that Ilias had watched little Sabria grow up and play with Jamal. Both would so have loved to see her marry this wonderful young man. Well, Caleb thought, maybe not Jamal. But he remembered the fun-loving guy who gave his life for his people.
Butrus shouted a toast to the couple. Only a few had glasses of wine they had brought. Others had water in paper cups. At the height of the festivities with singing and dancing as darkness fell, Caleb and Sabria slipped away walking down to the beach where Butrus had erected a special tent that would be their new home. Caleb knew they would probably have to move it later, but for tonight it would serve as the beginning of their honeymoon. Butrus had done so much for them, a very special friend, a Muslim whose love he had expressed in such practical terms. The tent itself, a special gift to them both.
Caleb picked Sabria up and carried her through the tent opening. Beside the bed of blankets and pillows a candle lantern cast its flickering glow reflected off the ceiling panels. He put her down and began the embrace they couldn’t accomplish before a crowd of celebrants. Her long hair fell over his arms in that enchanted moment. He felt her soft body press into him.
“Oh, Caleb, we have survived,” Sabria whispered. “God has seen us through everything. We are one, together at last.”
Appendix:
The Past is Prologue to Understand the Present
CREDITS
The author notes key events in the modern history of Palestine and Israel with broad reference to two books:
1.
Ilan Pappe, University of Haifa, A History of Modern Palestine, Cambridge University Press, 2004
2.
Ilan Pappe, University of Exeter, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, Oneworld Publications, London, 2006.
Pappe is a Jewish history professor at Exeter in the UK who had access to the released Israeli military archives previously hidden to scholars’ inquiry. With “endnotes” he documents them extensively. Direct quotes are from Pappe in italics.
THE WEST DECEIVES THE MIDDLE EAST
At the time of World War I (1914-18), the negotiations on Palestine’s future after 400 years of domination by the Ottoman Empire of Turkey, produced three major misunderstandings:
1.
The first started with the Husayn-McMahon correspondence. This ruler of Mecca and Medina, Sharif Husayn, was promised by the British protection from the Turks and support in principle for the Hashemite Kingdom’s right to rule Mecca and the Arab lands. This for their alliance and assistance in defeating the Turks. “In further correspondence between Hus
ayn and Henry McMahon, the British High Commissioner in Egypt, . . . 1915-16 . . . Britain vaguely described areas in the Middle East that would become independent under his (Husayn’s) family’s rule after the war.” (Book 1, pg. 65)
2.
Unknown to the Arabs, “When the war finally began, France and Britain moved to implement their plan to take over the Arab Middle East. In a meeting in May 1916, Sir Mark Sykes of the British Foreign Office and his counterpart in the French Foreign Ministry, George Picot, divided the Arab Middle East into two spheres of influence and into new political entities.
“This division broke promises made by the British government to Sharif Husayn. (He) . . . wished for . . . an extended reign for himself and his four sons . . . representatives of the embryo Arab national movement, over all the Arab former provinces of the Ottoman Empire. The British agreed in principle, but cautioned Husayn that in certain areas, which they defined vaguely, they had to consider other interests, such as those of the French and the non-Arab minorities . . . the major criteria in the Sykes-Picot agreement.
“ . . . Husayn . . . later learned that the Sykes-Picot Agreement removed a sizeable chunk from the area that . . . had been designated part of a future Hashemite kingdom. Quite a few historians agree that Husayn was cheated. T.E. Lawrence (British officer known as Lawrence of Arabia) shared the Hashemite’s sense of humiliation, and tried in the last stages of the war . . . to enthrone one of Husayn’s sons, Faysal, as king of Greater Syria (to include Transjordan, Palestine and Lebanon as well as Syria.) This attempt was foiled by the British Foreign Office . . . .So Britain allowed French troops, in accordance with the Sykes-Picot Agreement, to land in Lebanon in 1918 and from there invade Syria in 1920, expel Faysal’s small army, and end his short-lived kingdom.” (Book 1, pg. 66)
The Hashemites ended up with “Transjordan” led by another son, Abdullah, which later became simply Jordan, the “East Bank” of the River, with the family still in power today through King Abdullah II in a constitutional democracy.
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