Saving Sophie: A Novel

by Ronald H. Balson

  “Aaah! You and your threats. You are a foolish woman. We will talk of this again next month after my business is concluded. But I have to tell you, it will be done this summer, so you’d better get used to it.”

  Al-Zahani stormed from the room. “Bashir, get my car.”

  Al-Zahani parked three blocks from the group’s apartment and took an indirect route to the back door, where he was once again greeted by the teenager in the soccer shorts.

  “Am I the last to arrive, Dani?”

  “Everyone is upstairs.”

  “Thank you, Dani, you’re a good boy.” Al-Zahani took one last look around, opened the door, and climbed the steps to the apartment.

  “Once again the famous doctor keeps us all waiting because he is so much more important than we are, so indispensable to the operation,” Nizar said with exaggerated facial expressions.

  Al-Zahani spun around sharply.

  Fa’iz spoke softly, “Stop. When will you stop acting like children? April sixteenth is rapidly approaching. What remains to be done?”

  “The strain is slow to replicate,” al-Zahani said. “Although the required concentration per IV bag is small, we have only fifteen hundred sixty bags under refrigeration. We are working day and night at the lab.”

  “Fifteen hundred?” said Nizar. “We are going through all this to infect maybe a few hundred people? We might as well throw firecrackers at them.”

  “Soon there will be more. We are going faster now. We can make forty a day. Before long, maybe fifty.”

  “Everyone here knows I have lost all patience with you, Arif,” Nizar said. “But I ask this question sincerely: How do we know your solution will work?”

  “I’ve tested it. It’s virulent and unstoppable. It’s a superbug, resistant to all known antibiotics. What’s more, because of the incubation period, the pathogen is undetectable for several days, and when the victim does become sick, it’s too late. The bacteria have done their work. Hemorrhagic fevers. Internal organs are damaged beyond repair. It is the most terrorizing weapon ever developed because people waste away before their loved ones’ eyes. They are the walking dead. It will strike such fear, such panic, such horror, in the hearts of the public that they will bow to our wishes. I call it Canaan’s One-State Solution.”

  “Is it like Ebola?”

  Al-Zahani shrugged. “Ebola is a virus. Our strain is bacterial and will be injected directly into the body through an IV in a hospital. It’s not airborne and must enter the body through injection. But the effects are similar. Backaches, headaches, nausea in the beginning. Then bleeding from the nose, eyes, and rectum. Coma. Shock.” He shrugged again. “Similar.”

  Nizar held up his index finger. “But you have tested it on lab animals, right? Rats?”

  Al-Zahani nodded. “Yes, several different subjects. The results are all the same.”

  “But, rats. Not humans. How do we know it will work, and how fast it will work?”

  “There is no reason to suspect it will not perform just the same.”

  Nizar stood and faced the group. “There are many variables to consider. The level of concentration necessary per subject, the weight and age of the subjects, and the fact that humans, even Israelis, are not rats, am I right?”

  Al-Zahani nodded. “I have considered those criteria and more.”

  Nizar looked to the elder. “Fa’iz, we are foolish not to do a trial run on a human subject. The success of our whole operation depends on it.”

  “Nizar is right,” Fakhir said. “Myself, I would like to see how it works.”

  “This is not a new cell phone, Fakhir,” said Ahmed, leaning against the wall. “To see how it works you must kill someone.”

  Al-Zahani agreed. “First, why waste a perfectly prepared IV? We only have fifteen hundred sixty. Second, it’s medically immoral to use a human subject as a guinea pig.”

  Al-Zahani’s comment brought laughter to several among the group. “Immoral to kill one, but perfectly acceptable to kill a thousand?”

  “An operation this globally significant cannot end in embarrassment because we failed to properly test the solution,” Nizar said.

  “Maybe you’d like to volunteer?” al-Zahani replied.

  Fakhir chuckled. “Why did I know that was coming?”

  Fa’iz held up his hands. “Nizar is right. The solution must be tested. We must find a martyr.”

  “What about old Jabir? He is dedicated to jihad.”

  “He is the perfect subject,” Rami said. “We have no doubt of his commitment, and he is old, weak, and suffering from cancer. He will die soon anyway. It will be a blessing for him to give his life to the cause.”

  “For those reasons, he would not be a proper subject,” Nizar said. “If you’re going to run a test, you need to run it on someone young and healthy. Am I right, Arif?”

  Al-Zahani nodded. “I’m afraid so. Jabir would succumb too readily.”

  “If you infect one of our brothers, won’t you start an outbreak here in Hebron?” asked Ahmed.

  Al-Zahani shook his head. “I told you, it has to enter through injection. Essentially, it is not contagious.”

  Nizar spoke softly. “What about Dani?”

  Fa’iz looked directly at al-Zahani, who nodded. Fa’iz raised his finger and gave a sharp nod. “Of course, Dani is a perfect subject. He is young, he is strong. He is one of us. Dani, it is.”

  THIRTY-FOUR

  LIAM AND FOSTER SAT at a corner booth at Portillo’s. Liam had talked Foster into an Italian beef-and-sausage combo with sweet and hot peppers. Large bag of fries. Several paper napkins.

  “You eat this stuff very often?” Foster said, wiping his mouth. The crown of his head was sweating from the hot peppers.

  “Every chance I get.”

  “How did the morning session go?”

  “Dizzying.”

  “You mean the volume of the information?”

  “Well, that, and she was practically sitting on my lap in that little office.”

  “You’re a lucky man. Lot of guys in the department would pay big money for that privilege.”

  Liam smiled and nodded. “Kayla’s an impressive woman in a lot of ways. She certainly knows her history. She’s telling me more than I can absorb, but I’m also getting a good background on the al-Zahanis.”

  “We know a lot more about his father and grandfather than we know about Arif. His profile is scant. Kayla says he consorts with Fa’iz Talib, who’s an Agency watch-list favorite, but we’re not sure exactly how extensive this Sons of Canaan group is and where they operate. They’re careful about where and how they meet. So far we haven’t been able to infiltrate their organization. That’s why we’re hoping you might pick up some information, not only who the members are, but what they’re up to. Obviously, that’s why she wants you to go over there.”

  “I figured it was broader than the ransom exchange, but I don’t know if I’m comfortable being Kayla’s operative.”

  “Well, operative’s a little strong. Right now, we just want you to learn whatever you can.”

  “And you’ll give me names, starting points? People to contact?”

  Foster nodded. “Kayla knows people. Jamal Abu Hammad, for one. He’s an old-timer who owns an antiquities shop in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem. For a long time he lived in Hebron, and his grandchildren are still there. If something’s going on in Hebron, Abu Hammad is likely to know about it. His family is said to have ties to the al-Zahanis. But Abu Hammad won’t talk to anyone from the Agency. Not even Kayla. That’s why your cover is perfect.”

  “It’s not perfect. If Sommers already has a deal in the works, then why would he send me over there to find out about the deal?”

  Foster shrugged. “To find out about his daughter? To make sure the deal has no snafus?”

  Liam shook his head. “And what about the language barrier?”

  “That old fox speaks perfect English when he wants to. As to anyone else you need to talk to, K
ayla will go with you. She knows her way around.”

  “She speaks Arabic?”

  “Perfectly. Also Hebrew, Farsi, and Kurdish, and she can get by on Jordanian Levantine. But I think you’ll find that most people will talk to you in English, if they choose to talk at all.”

  “Getting back to my ‘perfect’ cover, what reason would I have to talk to Abu Hammad?”

  “You’ll figure something out.”

  Liam checked his watch. “I better leave. Professor Cummings will give me a detention if I’m tardy.”

  Foster blotted his mouth with his sixth napkin. “Quite a sandwich.”

  “Around here, we call it a sammich.”

  They shook hands, and Liam left to make his way back to the Federal Building. As he walked down Clark Street, his phone rang. He looked at the screen: 502 area code.

  “Hello, Deborah.”

  “Mr. Taggart, I want to talk to you again, but not on the phone.”

  “All right. Can you see me first thing tomorrow morning?”

  “Make it ten. I want to be sure Sean’s not at home.”

  Kayla was seated at her desk when Liam returned. “How was your lunch? You’ll have to take me to Portillo’s one day.”

  “How do you know where we ate?”

  “I’m a spy. We have satellite surveillance.”

  “What?”

  Kayla laughed. “I just got off the phone with Harry. We were coordinating my travel to Israel next week.”

  Liam smiled. “You might actually have a sense of humor.”

  “Oh, you’d be surprised.” Kayla turned her attention to the monitor and showed the afternoon’s first slide. “Do you remember Mufti Haj Mohammed Effendi Amin al-Husseini from this morning?”

  Liam nodded and shoehorned himself into his seat beside Kayla. “The mufti of Jerusalem, fomenter of riots and strikes. Bad dude, snuck off to Lebanon in drag. Joined there by his henchman Grandfather Ibrahim.”

  Kayla raised her eyebrows. “You did listen!”

  “Believe it or not.”

  “As I told you this morning, Amin and Ibrahim went into exile in Lebanon, but they used it as a base to incite further riots. It didn’t take long for the French to issue an arrest warrant, and the two troublemakers were forced to escape from Lebanon into Iraq. They stayed there for two years. In 1941, Amin sponsored a pro-Nazi coup and tried to overthrow the British-run government. When Britain restored order, Amin and Ibrahim fled to Tehran, where they were welcomed by the pro-Nazi shah.”

  “So, they became Nazis?”

  “Dyed-in-the-wool. It suited their purpose. British agents nearly caught up with Amin and Ibrahim in Iran, and once again they had to flee, this time to Italy. Because they were constantly on the move, Ibrahim kept his family—Hamid, Mariam, Arif, and Safiya—back at their home in Haifa, and that’s where Arif al-Zahani grew up.

  “While in Italy, Amin courted Mussolini. His purpose was to convince Il Duce to support the creation of an Arab state in Palestine, with Amin in charge, naturally. In return, he promised to supply Arab military support for the Axis. Mussolini was open to the idea, but wasn’t in a position to make it happen. So, Amin and Ibrahim then traveled north and sought out the world’s number one anti-Semite.”

  “Hitler.”

  “Correct. Amin and Ibrahim traveled to Berlin. There they met and ingratiated themselves with Hitler, trying to get his backing for a Palestinian state, again with Amin as supreme leader. Hitler admired Amin’s blue eyes and told him he must have Aryan blood.” She tapped the keyboard for a picture of Hitler and al-Husseini sitting together in animated conversation.

  “‘The Arabs are Germany’s natural friends,’ Amin said to Hitler, and he offered to train Muslim armies for the Reich. In exchange, Hitler told Amin exactly what he wanted to hear: once Germany defeated Russia, the next step would be the destruction of the ‘Jewish element residing in the Arab sphere under the protection of British power.’ In fact, Hitler told him, ‘The Jews are yours.’

  “Amin and Ibrahim found an apartment in Berlin. Between 1942 and 1944 they assisted Hitler by recruiting Arabs for the Waffen-SS, and training Bosnian Muslims for the Nazi infantry. Amin’s Bosnian Muslims were responsible for the death of ninety percent of Bosnia’s Jewish community. Amin and Ibrahim met often with Himmler and Ribbentrop, and there’s a strong basis for believing they toured the death camps with Eichmann, who treated Amin as a close friend. Al-Husseini’s name was mentioned often at the Nuremberg trials, but by then he had escaped to Egypt, where he was welcomed by King Farouk.

  “After the war, Amin and Ibrahim ended up in Gaza, once again heading up a group of militants. This time it was the al-Jihad al-Muqaddas, the Army of the Holy War. We know that group today as the Muslim Brotherhood. And it didn’t take long for Amin and Ibrahim to latch onto another cause. By the end of 1945, there were a quarter million Jews living in displaced persons camps throughout Germany, Austria, and Italy. They were the survivors of the Holocaust. They called themselves Sh’erit ha-Pletah, the ‘surviving remnant.’

  “Overwhelmingly, the displaced persons, the DPs, wanted to emigrate to British Mandatory Palestine, but Britain had strict immigration quotas forged by Neville Chamberlain’s 1939 White Paper. Quotas in the US, Britain, and Canada essentially closed all those doors, as well.

  “Everyone knew that the existence of the British and French Mandates were temporary and unsustainable. But, no matter what Britain envisioned for the postwar division of its territory, it was always rejected by Amin and the Arab leaders. They would have no part of sharing the land. They wanted it all. As a result, postwar Palestine was a cauldron of violence—from Amin and the Arabs, from Zionist paramilitary groups like the Irgun and the Haganah who wanted open immigration, and from the British soldiers themselves.

  “In the midst of the growing anarchy, Britain turned to the fledgling UN to work out the solution. An eleven-nation committee was established and known as UNSCOP, the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine. The members traveled to Palestine and concluded, not surprisingly, that the Arab objectives and the Jewish objectives could not be reconciled. But nonetheless, they proposed a division of the land.

  “On November twenty-ninth, 1947, the UN General Assembly voted and approved the Plan for Partition. The first portion dealt with the termination of the British Mandate and withdrawal of the British troops. The second part was the establishment of borders for two separate states—an Arab state and a Jewish state. The exception was Jerusalem, which was to remain under international control. Here is a map of what they devised.” A map of the partitioned territory appeared on Kayla’s monitor.

  “The UN’s division, though it appeared to resemble a jigsaw puzzle, was based almost entirely upon ethnic demography. There were Jews living in the Arab portions and Arabs in the Jewish portions, but the lines were drawn to reflect the predominant culture. But Amin, the Arab League, and all of the surrounding Arab countries flatly rejected the UN Partition Plan and would not accept borders for either a Jewish state or an Arab state, no matter what the borders were.

  “Ibrahim saw the future and it was violent. He knew that a partition would never be peacefully implemented, and he quickly acted to position his family for an upcoming war. He sent Hamid to Jordan and, using his contacts, had him enlist in the Jordanian Army as an officer. Given Ibrahim’s influence, Hamid rose rapidly in the ranks and soon became a squad leader. By the time of the 1948 war, he was commanding a company.

  “On May thirteen, 1948, the British pulled out of the mandate, and the next day, May fourteenth, David Ben-Gurion took to the airwaves and proclaimed the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel in the territories granted by the UN Partition Plan. The very next day, May fifteenth, the combined armies of the six Arab League States commenced a coordinated military invasion of Israel.

  “Israel was attacked from all directions. Egypt from the south and Syria from the north. From the east, Jordan marched its army across th
e Jordan River and occupied the entire West Bank including the eastern half of the city of Jerusalem. Hamid al-Zahani was in command of the Jordanian company that took Hebron. The territories captured by Jordan were referred to as the West Bank of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and remained that way until 1967. By the way, it was never referred to as Palestine. Use of the term Palestine was forbidden by the king of Jordan.

  “A cease-fire was negotiated and an armistice was signed in April 1949. Not a peace treaty, mind you, just an armistice—they agreed to stop fighting, leaving the armies where they were. Jerusalem, which was originally intended to be international, was split down the middle for the first time in its history, Jordan on the east, Israel on the west. As it had in ancient times, Israel declared Jerusalem to be its capital.”

  “What became of the al-Zahanis after the 1948 war?” Liam asked.

  “Well, I told you Hamid was an officer in the battalion that captured Hebron. The Arab population there hailed Hamid as a hero, and he stayed there to make his home. Ibrahim had him appointed commander of the Jordanian Army garrison in Hebron. Hamid built the house that Arif occupies today.”

  Kayla looked at her watch. “It’s getting late and I want to finish. We’ll jump ahead to the sixties because that was the era that launched the Palestinian movement. In 1964, the Arab League founded the Palestine Liberation Organization, which once again sought eradication of the Jews and the state of Israel. Ibrahim was a member of the inner circle from the very beginning.

  “For the PLO, its credo was armed violence. Since terrorism, shootings, and bombings were Ibrahim’s stock-in-trade, he was a valuable soldier in the cause. But his terrorist activities proved to be his undoing. When he attempted to bomb a Tel Aviv restaurant in 1965, a single shot from an IDF rifle hit the explosives in Ibrahim’s arms and he was blown to bits. There wasn’t enough to bury. Hamid, enraged at his father’s death, led a party of Arab regulars into West Jerusalem in a late-night attack, killing fourteen civilians at a movie theater. From then on there was a price on Hamid’s head.