Mona

by Dan Sehlberg

  The driver looked at him in the mirror and nodded.

  ‘Not worry. Almost there.’ Eric sat totally still with his eyes fastened on the headrest of the passenger seat. Almost there.

  They were careful to keep their distance from the Skoda with 103 taped on the back. There was no reason to get too close; the receiver in Larry Lavon’s lap showed a strong signal, and on the digital map they could easily follow the blue dot as it slowly moved along Highway 4. Larry looked at Micha Begin, who kept his eyes on the taxi a hundred metres ahead of them.

  ‘They are definitely on the way to Erez. Are they going into Gaza? But the crossing is closed to civilians, right?’

  Micha nodded and slowed down so he wouldn’t get too close.

  ‘It’s closed. Maybe they’re just going to meet someone in Erez.’

  Larry didn’t say anything as he studied the dot blinking on the screen.

  ‘They’re going to Gaza. I’ll contact Central and ask for permission to go in if that turns out to be necessary. Not that I understand how it would happen — the border is closed.’

  Micha didn’t answer. They passed a warning sign. It was time to slow down; the soldiers at the blockade did not appreciate fast-moving vehicles. The Skoda slowed down, too, and the distance between them decreased. Rusty cars stood abandoned along the road, and several people were on foot — illegal workers who were hoping to cross the border to get home. Large signs in Hebrew, English, and Arabic stated that the crossing was closed to all civilian traffic. The Skoda turned into the large parking lot before the first guard post. An Israeli tank stood at the entrance, and about thirty cars were parked in the lot. All of them had Gaza licence plates — cars that hadn’t had time to make it over when the border was closed, and that now sat in the heat, waiting for a different future.

  They stopped at the edge of the parking lot and turned off the engine. Along the road, up by the border, concrete barricades lay in uneven rows like giant Lego blocks. At the end of the road, an enormous door of blue steel rose up. This was the gateway to Gaza. Both sides of the steel structure were edged by concrete and barbed wire, and a grey watchtower rose out of the tangle of fences like a stripped tree trunk emerging out of brushy weeds. The Skoda stopped not far from a white van at the far end of the parking lot. Micha leaned forward over the steering wheel, and squinted at the taxi.

  ‘What are they doing?’

  Larry put the receiver down on the floor. The blue dot was now standing still on the screen. He straightened up and followed Micha’s gaze over the shimmering asphalt. Two men got out of the car. One was fat, and the other, thin — the driver and Eric Söderqvist. The fat man walked over to the van while Söderqvist stayed by the car with a black bag in his hand. Micha repeated his question.

  ‘What are they doing?’

  There was a faint odour of burned rubber in the air. The reddish-brown sand puffed up as dust as soon as he moved, and there was a slight breeze. Eric looked over at the white van where his driver stood talking to someone he couldn’t see. Then he let his eyes wander along the tall fence, the tightly wound barbed wire, and the black girders that reinforced the structure every three metres. The next row of barbed wire and girders began a few metres inside the gate. The customs station itself looked more like a large bunker of heavy concrete, and it had small, barred window openings. He looked at the enormous blue-steel gate; it must have been five metres high and eight metres wide. Hopefully, he wasn’t going into Gaza; it didn’t even seem like a possibility. Maybe he would get to stay in Israel after all. His throat was dry and his stomach was empty. A jarring screech cut through the heat of the sun, and a door at the lower edge of the gate opened. Two Israeli soldiers came out and closed the door behind them with a dull bang. About twenty people in greyish-brown rags, many of them barefoot, sat a few metres to the right. One of them held up a sign, but he couldn’t see what it said.

  ‘Hey, mister!’ The fat driver waved.

  Eric started to walk over to him. Things crunched at his feet, and an empty beer can clinked when he kicked it with his foot. A man stood beside the van, putting a large white sign on it. It said ‘Press’ in black letters. All of the windows were tinted so it was impossible to look in. As Eric approached the taxi driver, a man leaned out through the window on the driver’s side of the van. He had curly, brown hair, and was wearing small, round glasses and a white T-shirt.

  ‘Söderqvist?’

  ‘That’s me.’

  ‘Multo bene.’

  The man extended a hand.

  ‘Gino Lugio.’

  Eric shook the man’s hand and then just stood there, unsure of what he should do. The man who had fastened the sign to the van pulled open the side door and climbed in. Gino nodded at Eric.

  ‘Dai, you hop in, too. We have to get going.’

  Eric grabbed the handle above the door and climbed in. It must have been fifty degrees in there. There were three casually dressed Europeans in the van: one woman and two men. In the back was a stack of silver-steel cases, and coils of black cable were crammed in between the cases and the wall. The woman was writing in a notebook, and the men were reading together out of a wrinkled issue of Corriere della Serra. Before Eric had time to sit down, the engine started, and the door closed behind him. He sank down onto a seat beside the woman.

  Instead of driving off, Gino stood up and came over to him. He crouched, swaying a bit until he got his balance. He smelled like smoke and coffee. His brown curls fell across his face, making him look younger than he must have been. He spoke English well, but with an unmistakeable Italian accent.

  ‘Mr Söderqvist, we know you’re a Swedish doctor who wants to help in Gaza. We think that’s great. There are a lot of people suffering over there. But the Israeli authorities won’t let any civilians cross the border, no matter how noble their mission might be. So you can come with us, but you have to do some acting. Capice?’

  Eric tried to collect his thoughts. His mind was going in too many directions at once. They were Italian. It said ‘Press’ on the van. The boxes and cables in the back suggested a TV team. Doctor Söderqvist? Sure, he was a doctor, but not a medical doctor. Were these people working with the terrorists? He looked at the woman beside him; she had stopped writing, and looked back at him. She seemed worn out — like a person who had seen and experienced too much. Maybe the TV thing was just a cover. But they didn’t seem like extremists; they seemed like journalists. Like Jens. He looked at Gino, who was crouched in front of him, swaying.

  ‘Who are you?’

  The man smiled and threw his hands out theatrically.

  ‘We are the eyes of Italy. The Rai Uno action team.’

  He laughed, but the others remained silent. The men didn’t even look up from the paper they were reading. There was a bag of purple sweets between them on the seat, which they kept dipping into.

  The woman explained. ‘The news on Italy’s biggest TV channel.’

  Gino went on: ‘We’ve got the opportunity to do a much-coveted interview in Gaza City. And therefore we have promised some … friends … to bring you into the country. They’re going to meet up with you about ten kilometres from the border. But first we have to make it through the border station. Erez closed completely a few weeks ago. In the past few days, since the attack in Tel Aviv, practically no one has gotten in. We have special permission and good contacts in the local police, but nothing is certain.’

  ‘And what do I have to do?’

  ‘Nothing. With any luck, you won’t have to talk. You’re a sound technician. We had to leave the real technician at home in order to bring you, because our visa is only good for the exact number of members as named. We’ll have to hope that the border guards don’t speak Italian. Just sit there and don’t speak, and try to look like you’re from Milan.’

  He handed over a red passport with gold t
ext: Unione Europea Repubblica Italiana. Passaporto. Eric took it and studied the photograph. It was of a man with coarse features — a flat forehead, bushy eyebrows, and a wide nose. His name was Enrique Vettese, and he didn’t bear much resemblance to Eric. It seemed totally unrealistic that he was meant to pass as the man in the picture. Impossible. He gave Gino a sceptical look.

  ‘Will they really fall for this? We’re talking about the Israeli border police here.’

  ‘Maybe not. In that case, we’re all out of luck. We’ll have to pray to the Madonna that everything goes well. Maybe the guard is tired, or in love, or about to get sick.’

  He gave a quick smile and climbed back into the driver’s seat. Then he called out, without turning around, ‘Don’t forget to give back the passport when you leave us. Enrique won’t be happy if you keep it. He’s already mad that he didn’t get to come along to Gaza.’

  He put the van into first gear with a pop, and it gave a lurch and started rolling. They turned around and left the parking lot in the direction of the blue-steel gate. The woman beside him had returned to her notebook. One of the men across from him commented on something in the newspaper, and the other laughed. So he was going to Gaza — the worst possible outcome. Either that, or they would get stuck at customs. He realised that he was hoping to be found out, hoping that the guards would see through the lies, discover his fake passport, and stop them. There would be a lot of bureaucracy, and then they would be refused entry — and be saved.

  The van stopped. Now they were just outside the gate, which rose many metres above them. It didn’t look like it could be opened, not even if someone really wanted to. It was too heavy, too large, too absolute. A young Israeli guard with a bored expression came up to Gino, and they spoke in English with low voices. When Eric looked at the blue-painted steel that filled the windshield, he saw the remains of some graffiti. He tried to follow the faint lines, but he soon lost them. Someone had graffitied the gate, and the soldiers had scrubbed it clean. But what did it matter if there was graffiti here? On this manifestation of complete failure? Spray paint on a gigantic block of iron that only kept people out or in, that closed off all hope? And who had decided that the gate should be blue? Was it less threatening that way? A more natural part of the scenery? Could an eight-metre-wide steel wall be a natural part of anything?

  He became conscious of a discussion going on between Gino and the soldier. There was something about their voices that made him look up.

  ‘Stay here.’

  The soldier left them and walked quickly over to the customs station forty metres away. He went by the motley group with their signs. Gino turned around and looked at Eric.

  ‘There’s some problem. They weren’t informed that we were coming. We have our visa, but he still doesn’t want to let us in.’

  ‘What do we do now?’

  ‘Wait.’

  His clothes were sticking to his body, and the bus smelled like sweat, perfume, and old, mouldy fabric. Eric tried to find the most comfortable position possible on the hard seat. He sneaked a look at the woman. She was wearing jeans, a burgundy blouse, and tennis shoes. She was thin — too thin. Her ankles looked like they might break at any moment, and her fingers were long and knobby, like a skeleton’s, with no nail polish. She noticed him looking at her, and looked up from her notebook. He hurried to say something, anything.

  ‘What are you writing?’

  She studied her notes.

  ‘Questions. In just a few hours I’m going to interview Nizar Aziz.’

  The way she said the name implied that he should know who that was, which he didn’t.

  ‘And what is he up to these days?’

  She was startled by his ignorance, but she collected herself.

  ‘He’s still the leader of Hamas’s military. There’s been a rumour that he’s dead, but now I’m going to meet him.’

  ‘Well, that’s fantastic. Congratulations.’

  ‘Yes, it really is. Big thanks to you.’

  She crossed something out in her notebook. He frowned.

  ‘Why are you thanking me?’

  ‘We got the interview thanks to you. We’re smuggling over a famous Swedish ophthalmologist, and in return we get a half-hour interview with Nizar Aziz.’

  Eric tried to make the connection. He knew that Samir Mustaf was part of the Lebanese Hezbollah. But where did Hamas fit in? Why would Hamas offer an interview in exchange for a Swedish professor? Or a Swedish doctor, if that was who they believed he was?

  ‘How is the relationship between Hamas and Hezbollah?’

  ‘It’s so-so. There have been times when they’ve co-operated, but the relationship has always come crashing down. Each accuses the other of being too weak, too friendly to Israel, too populist, too right-wing, too left-wing.’

  A distant rumble, which he first thought was thunder, quickly became more intense, and was on top of them with a boom so loud that the van vibrated. Then the roar faded and died out. The woman looked unconcerned.

  ‘Israeli F-16s.’

  She bent forward and stuck her notebook into an army-green bag on the floor. Then she looked out the window.

  ‘This might take a long time. Normally, Erez is a crossing for pedestrians. Palestinians with visas used to be able to cross by car; but starting a few years ago, everyone had to walk. They leave their cars on the other side of the gate, knowing that they’ll be bashed in or stolen. What choice do they have? People say Hamas wrecks the cars. They don’t like it when citizens of Gaza enter Israel.’

  ‘So what makes them go?’

  ‘Many of them lived on this side until Israel was created. I’m sure you saw all the deserted brick houses on the way here — residences with overgrown gardens and broken windows. Those are the former homes of the Palestinians. Some of them still have relatives in Israel. Others work in construction, in the harbours, or on plantations. But that was before. Now they’re no longer allowed out of their prison.’

  ‘Prison?’

  ‘Gaza is the world’s largest open-air prison. One-and-a-half million prisoners live there. There are only two cities, but there are eight refugee camps. We’re doing what we can to show the world what’s going on, but the world would rather watch colourful game shows. It’s a losing battle.’

  ‘But you haven’t given up?’

  She smacked her thigh. ‘Never. As Gino said, we’re the Rai Uno action team. Always ready to go.’

  One of the men put up his hand for a high five, and the woman leaned forward and hit it with a crack. Suddenly, the young soldier was back, this time along with an older officer. The officer stopped and spoke quietly with Gino through the window while the younger soldier went to the side of the van and pulled the door open.

  ‘Out! Everyone out!’

  The soldier’s voice was aggressive. They tumbled out, grimacing in the bright sunlight, and stretched their stiff joints. The woman and Gino conversed in a subdued tone. The two men who had been sitting across from Eric seemed to be discussing their baggage. If he was reading their body language correctly, one wanted to take out the cases of equipment while the other preferred that they remain in the van. The officer left them and disappeared back toward the customs station. The soldier collected their passports and also received a bundle of papers from Gino. Just as he was about to leave, he stopped and turned to them, opened each passport, studied each photograph, and looked for its respective owner. Eric felt a lump in his throat. What if the Mossad hadn’t informed them that he was under their protection? He would never be able to trick the Israeli border police. Was Rachel somewhere in the shadows, protecting him? It didn’t seem very likely. Did he even want to get through? Was it better to be revealed? The soldier looked at him, at the passport, and back at him. Then he muttered something, and took the passport aside.

  ‘Wait here.
’

  The soldier walked quickly across the concrete pavement. The woman placed a hand on Eric’s shoulder.

  ‘Calma. Relax. Your shoulders are up to your ears, and your face is as red as a tomato. Take it easy.’

  ‘It’s all gone to hell. Didn’t you see what happened?’

  ‘We’ll have to wait and see. Maybe we’ll get through anyway. Maybe you’ll be left behind. Maybe we’ll all be left behind. That would be a damn shame. I’m really looking forward to the meeting with Nizar Aziz. But let’s not give up.’

  Gino walked up to them with a wild look in his eyes. He had the earpiece of his glasses in his mouth, and seemed to be about to eat it up.

  ‘Cazzo!’

  The woman placed a hand on his shoulder. ‘Ginito. You need to calm down, too. What can we do? We have to deal with shit as it happens.’

  There was no shade where they stood, and the heat seemed to come as much from inside his body as from outside, like in a microwave oven. Eric was insanely thirsty. He looked at the woman beseechingly.

  ‘Do you have anything to drink?’

  She nodded and climbed into the van, rooted around, and came back with a plastic bottle of Neviot.

  He thankfully took the bottle, fumbled with the cap, and took a big gulp. The water tasted like old plastic, but it quenched his thirst. He held the bottle out to her, and she took a sip and handed it on to Gino, who was nervous and angry by turns. Eric studied the enormous gate again.

  ‘Why is it so tall?’

  She followed his gaze.

  ‘To protect it from car bombs. It wasn’t always like this. Before, it was just a kind of frame around the entrance. The gate was put up after the unrest during the past year, and the decision to close the border to civilian traffic.’

  Eric’s eyes moved along the concrete and barbed wire to the rows of empty, dusty cars, the trash blowing in the wind, and the gathering of people at the other end of the gate. He didn’t see any children, but several of them seemed to be teenagers. They all shared the same empty, expressionless gazes as they sat together on the ground, among bags of plastic and cloth. Several of them weren’t wearing shoes. Against the wall behind them was a sign in red Arabic script. He turned to the Italians.