Ishmael Covenant

by Terry Brennan

  Royal Palace, Amman, Jordan

  July 20, 12:17 p.m.

  “So, we come to this historic moment of peace,” said King Abdullah, “a moment that many thought would never occur. A moment when all the sons of Abraham are joined together in the unity of the Ishmael Covenant … a covenant era that will heal wounds, end conflict, and usher in a new age of cooperation, security, and prosperity. The details of the two documents that create this covenant will be distributed after the signing. But these are the salient points.”

  Glancing up from behind his wire-rimmed glasses, King Abdullah looked directly into the camera. Furrows of wrinkles radiated from his deeply set eyes, fleshy bags drooping down to his cheeks. His beard was white, and his back was stooped, but his eyes … his eyes burned with the fire of a thousand suns. Abdullah was a king.

  He picked up a piece of paper that rested on the table to his right, between him and the prime minister of Israel, David Meir.

  “First, the Arab nations seated here today,” said Abdullah, “will join with our brothers in Egypt, who years ago took this step, in signing a Declaration of Peace with the state of Israel. This Declaration of Peace specifically recognizes the validity of the state of Israel and opens the door to full diplomatic recognition and relations between all the nations represented here. Second, the nations seated here today will enter into a mutual defense treaty with Israel, encompassing the entire Middle East in a blanket of security and cooperation, each of us pledging to defend each other from any act of aggression.”

  King Abdullah sat in the middle of the assembled leaders. Meir was on his right, King Hussein II of Jordan on his left. Spread out on either side were the rulers from Egypt, Oman, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Qatar, along with the head of the Palestinian Authority. Abdullah turned to his right. “Mr. Prime Minister, all of us extend to you our thanks for accepting this covenant and for your courageous willingness to also take this bold step for peace.”

  Meir inclined his head toward King Abdullah. “Thank you.” He turned immediately to address the cameras directly. “Two generations of Israelis have lived in hope for such a day as this, a day when Israel’s borders and its future are secure not only by means of its military strength, but also by means of its peaceful coexistence with its neighbors. One of the critical points that allowed this peace covenant to become a reality was a willingness of former adversaries to work together—particularly the emissaries of Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority. As part of the peace covenant, both Israel and Jordan have contributed territory for the creation of an independent state of Palestine. Jerusalem remains united under the sovereignty of Israel and will become our nation’s capital, but the territory provided to Palestine includes a corner of East Jerusalem to become the Palestinian capital. Within twelve months, if all the elements of the covenant are ratified and working effectively, Israel will begin dismantling its West Bank separation barrier. And there is also a significant concession on the part of Jordan that will satisfy the hope of many religious Jews.”

  Meir looked to his left, past the Saudi monarch, to Jordanian King Hussein II.

  Western-educated and relatively young compared to his counterparts, Jordan’s king was a handsome, dapper man of the twenty-first century. Clean shaven, wearing a suit of Indian silk tailored in London, Hussein II looked more like a Hollywood movie star than a Middle Eastern monarch. Today he also wore a somber and solemn countenance.

  “With great hope, and in recognition of the courage displayed by King Abdullah and Prime Minister Meir,” the king announced, “the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan will renounce any claim to territory that came under the control of Israel as a result of the sixty-seven conflict, some of that territory which will now become Palestine. Jordan will also remove the authority of the Waqf as the ruling body over the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, creating a new authority of joint responsibility with Israel. Lastly, in association with my Arab brothers, we have offered Israel the opportunity to erect a platform adjacent to the Temple Mount, attached to the Mount at, or near, the Eastern Gate. This new platform is intended to be used for construction of a place of worship for the Jewish people … a temple in Jerusalem.”

  The Cardo, Jerusalem

  July 20, 12:19 p.m.

  His partner rested his back against the side of the constricting passage, the large, canvas bag at his side. His clothes were now even darker from the perspiration that poured off his body. The leader had spread a letter-sized piece of paper on the floor of the passage and was intently examining its contents, looking up every few moments and shining his Maglite into one section of the darkness and then another.

  “There,” he whispered, pointing into the darkness with his light. “Fifteen meters farther on. There will be metal beams forming a corner. That will be the first location.”

  The other man nodded his head, pushed his body up from his seated position, grabbed the bag, and nearly dragged it behind him as he pushed farther along the passage.

  Royal Palace, Amman

  July 20, 12:32 p.m.

  With a flutter of royal robes, King Abdullah stretched out his arms and reached toward the first of the two documents facing him on the table.

  His heart racing, Israeli prime minister David Meir tried desperately to control his breathing and keep his hands steady. He hoped the perspiration he felt under his arms was not also visible on his face. Meir’s world came to a stop as King Abdullah took the ornate, gold-plated fountain pen—an identical twin sitting before each of the rulers at the table—hesitated for a moment and, with the flourish of a stage actor, inscribed his name and the power of his position to the Ishmael Covenant … peace in the Middle East.

  Turning to his right, Abdullah caught Meir’s eyes and held his gaze. He held the document in his left hand and reached out his right toward the Israeli.

  “Today, let us bury the past,” said Abdullah.

  Meir accepted the handshake and then the treaty. “And let’s pray the past doesn’t follow us into the future.”

  Meir felt the king’s hand stiffen. In the fleeting moment of a heartbeat, a hardness crossed the king’s face that made Meir feel as if he had been violated. The moment passed. Meir knew most of the civilized world was probably watching his every action.

  Uncertain whether he would celebrate or regret his action, the prime minister of Israel took the pen before him and scrawled his name across the bottom of the page. May God help us now.

  37

  Hurva Synagogue, Jerusalem

  July 20, 12:34 p.m.

  Herzog sat in the office of the rabbinate on the west side of the Hurva Synagogue, in the shadow of the building’s huge dome, his elbows planted on the top of his desk holding up his throbbing head. What had started so hopefully had quickly become torture for the council, so much so that the members of the rabbinate had asked for a break. After applying every type of kabbalistic code they knew, the rabbinate were no closer to understanding what was written on the paper that had caused so much trouble.

  They had measured the writing of the Vilna Gaon against three types of Torah codes known to be used by kabbalists—Temurah, Gematria, and Notarikon—and had yet to find the correct cipher. Temurah involved re arranging letters or words: replacing the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet with the last letter, the second with the next-to-last, and so on; replacing each letter with the preceding letter; or replacing the first letter of the alphabet with the twelfth, the second with the thirteenth, and so on. Gematria involved assigning a numerical value to each Hebrew letter, and Notarikon used the first letter of a word or the final letter to stand for another.

  Nothing worked. The words of the Gaon remained a mystery. Herzog didn’t know what to try next.

  He could smell the coffee before the cup was placed on his desk, just inches from his drooping head. His long-time assistant, Chaim, moved to a side chair, a cup of coffee in his hands as well.

  “You’ve tried everything you know?” asked Chaim.
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  Herzog raised his head and nodded as he reached for the steaming cup.

  “Then perhaps you should try something you don’t know.”

  The cup suspended in his hands, the chief rabbi raised his eyes and looked to the right at his aide. “What do you mean?”

  “Well, you have looked at the kabbalistic Torah codes that you expected the Gaon to use, to no avail. So were there other codes available to the Gaon in his time that were not connected to kabbalah?” Chaim drained his coffee cup and set it aside. “I met an American Jew a few years ago, David Kahn, who wrote a book called The Codebreakers. He told me that people have been writing in codes since antiquity. Even Caesar had his own cipher. What else would the Gaon have access to that he could expect others would know about in the future? This is a coded message that the Gaon expected to be deciphered. So there must be a way. What were the ways available to him in his time?”

  Herzog was on his feet, the dropped cup spilling coffee across his desk. “Chaim, google sixteenth- and seventeenth-century ciphers and cryptologists. Then call the rabbis together,” he said as he headed for the door. “We’re not done yet.”

  The Cardo, Jerusalem

  July 20, 12:46 p.m.

  The fourth and last charge of Semtex explosive was lifted into a gaping crevice in one of the large foundation stones that disappeared up into the rough-hewn rock ceiling at the end of the narrow passage. The leader looked at the plastic being pushed into the hole and wondered … worried.

  His voice was urgent, but low. “Is this enough? Will it work?” asked the leader.

  “More than enough,” said the bomber. “Crack the spine of the building with the first two. The others will shatter the foundation. Then it simply implodes.”

  The leader nodded. “Good … we don’t want to fail.”

  US Embassy, Tel Aviv

  July 20, 12:51 p.m.

  As the TV cameras moved from face to face and signatures were added to both the covenant and the mutual defense pact, Ambassador Cleveland stood up from the table at the front of the cafeteria and turned to face his staff. “All right, let’s get to work. You all know your assignments. I want to know anything and everything that even smells like it’s connected to this treaty. Jarrod, send out the embassy alert. Make sure all US citizens are warned to watch for communications from the embassy. Let’s go.”

  The Cardo, Jerusalem

  July 20, 1:02 p.m.

  The leader edged open the heavy wooden door, first pressing his ear against a sliver of space, listening for any sounds from the shops in the underground passageway. After thirty heartbeats, he leaned only some of his weight against the door’s bulk. Other than a creak from the rusty hinges, there was no sound. He looked around the edge of the door. The shops remained closed. They had, perhaps, ten more minutes.

  Hurva Synagogue, Jerusalem

  July 20, 1:03 p.m.

  Israel Herzog began calculating the odds. Would he truly live to see Messiah?

  He looked once again at the copy of the prophecy in his hand. Possible. Perhaps more than possible.

  Messiah. The end of days. The culmination of history. He read the translation of the prophecy for perhaps the hundredth time.

  “You are wondering if it will be in your lifetime?”

  Herzog looked up at his colleague, the other chief rabbi of the Rabbinate Council of Israel. “I’m wondering,” said Herzog, “if it will be tomorrow. And I’m wondering if any of us are ready.”

  The rabbis, coleaders of the council, one Sephardic and the other Hasidic, sat in a corner of the rabbinate offices on the western flank of the Hurva Synagogue in Jerusalem. On a table across the room sat two boxes, one wooden and one metal, the metal box covered by the still bloody fleece of a perfect lamb. It was the metal box—the box of power that had brought so much death—that had finally surrendered the prophecy and helped the council members decipher its meaning. Now they had to live with its promise.

  And Herzog needed to fulfill his promise. “I need to call Agent Mullaney.”

  “What will you tell him … how will you explain what we have discovered,” asked his colleague as Herzog approached the table.

  Herzog looked at the slip of paper in his hands. Amazing how such a thin fragment of paper could assign such massive, oppressive weight to his shoulders. He held a message that, if true, could alter history.

  “I will tell him the truth,” said Herzog, tearing his eyes away from the explosive message he held in his fingers. “I just don’t know how much of the truth I’ll tell him.”

  US Embassy, Tel Aviv

  July 20, 1:08 p.m.

  Mullaney was walking down the hall on the third floor of the embassy, approaching his office, when his phone rang. His caller was abrupt, his voice breathless.

  “Agent Mullaney … this message was not in the same code as the first prophecy,” rattled off Rabbi Herzog. “If anything, it’s even more difficult and esoteric than the Torah codes the Gaon used in other prophecies. Nearly impossible for anyone other than the council to decipher. At first, we were completely mystified. We tried every Torah code we knew and came up with gibberish. In very short order, we were stopped dead in our tracks.”

  “I’m sorry to hear—”

  “No … wait … we succeeded,” Herzog ran on. “The Gaon left us a clue that opened a door that only we would see. Once we pierced that door, the message revealed itself like a budding rose. Agent Mullaney, I must see you so I can share with you what we discovered. When can we meet?”

  Mullaney looked at the clock on the wall of his office. The announcement of the Ishmael Covenant was less than an hour old, and already Hezbollah was firing rockets into the northern settlements of Israel; Hamas was orchestrating mass demonstrations—punctuated by the hurling of Molotov cocktails—in the ragged and dusty streets of Gaza. “I can’t come there, Rabbi,” said Mullaney. “There’s just too much going on since the announcement … I’m needed here.”

  “What announcement?”

  “The Ishmael Covenant,” said Mullaney, “The peace treaty between Israel and all its Arab neighbors: Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, and all the Gulf nations. You haven’t heard?”

  There was silence on the other end of the line.

  “Yes, there were rumors,” said Herzog. “Was an independent Palestine part of this covenant?”

  “Yes.”

  “And what did Israel receive in return?”

  “Recognition of its right to exist,” said Mullaney. “A mutual defense pact, linking the security of Jews and Arabs together. And permission to build a temple on a platform connected to the Temple Mount.”

  More silence. This time the silence sounded much more profound. Mullaney could almost hear Herzog’s mind twisting around the new information. “So … the third temple will become a reality. Interesting times we live in, Agent Mullaney. The signs of Messiah are everywhere. Which makes the information I now have in hand much more valuable to you … to all of us.”

  Mullaney could hear Herzog’s voice speaking to someone else. “All right. I’ll meet you at the embassy in Tel Aviv in two hours. And Agent Mullaney?”

  “Yes?”

  “Prepare yourself for another shock,” said Herzog. “What I’m bringing to you will radically alter the meaning of what was announced today. I’ll see you in two hours.”

  Hurva Synagogue, Jerusalem

  July 20, 1:09 p.m.

  Parking was a nightmare in the Old City of Jerusalem, particularly in the Jewish Quarter where narrow, twisting, cobblestone streets dominated the neighborhood, and buildings were pressed together tighter than a junior rabbi’s allowance. Herzog’s assistant, Chaim, exited the synagogue into Hurva Square, turned right, and worked his way south, around the synagogue. He slipped through the crowd of young office workers, wannabe musicians, and tourists who filled the square day and night, past Beit El Street, and into the serpentine shadows of Mishmarot HaKehuna Street. He avoided Ha-Yehudim Street that ran alongside the Cardo.
It was more direct, but endlessly clogged with tourists. His destination was the postage-stamp public parking lot, hard against the Old City wall, east of the Zion Gate.

  He didn’t understand why a rabbi … the chief rabbi … couldn’t secure a parking permit for space closer to the Hurva. And it was Chaim who always had to drop the rabbi off at the synagogue and then often waste an hour searching for a vacant parking place.

  He reached the black Toyota, unlocked the car, and opened the door. Things would be different if he were the chief rabbi.

  The Cardo, Jerusalem

  July 20, 1:11 p.m.

  They slipped out of the Cardo, crossed the Habad, and melted into the human flow of the Armenian Quarter. In the lee of the Assyrian Convent on Ararat Street, the leader withdrew a cell phone from the side pocket of his backpack. He quickly punched in the number. One ring … two …

  Hurva Synagogue, Jerusalem

  July 20, 1:11 p.m.

  Herzog handed the slip of paper to his coleader. “Keep this one here. Chaim and I will take the other copy of the message and deliver it to Agent Mullaney. While we’re in route to Tel Aviv, if you have any additional thoughts on what to divulge, call me immediately.”

  Such life changing—history changing—words. Herzog passed the slip of paper to his colleague. He wondered once again if he would truly live to see the arrival of the Jewish Messiah. Could that be possible?

  “Of course,” said Herzog. “We will need—”

  The Cardo, Jerusalem

  July 20, 1:11 p.m.

  The ground beneath their feet heaved as if the earth were giving birth.

  Two … three … four ticked off the leader as a series of lethal explosions hurled furious thunder down the echoing canyons of the Jewish Quarter. A short distance to the east, past the Cardo, a roiling eruption of smoke and debris propelled into the sky, immediately turning afternoon into dusk. A police Klaxon … then a second … ricocheted in the distance.