“I remember Imad Mughniyeh very well. He did a lot of damage before he died. Did Reyshahri tell you anything more about the security guy?”
“He didn’t have to. I know the guy who ran security for Mughniyeh.” Kashmiri paused to let it sink in.
“You know him?”
“Well, we’ve never actually met, but I know all about him. He goes by the name Abu Salah. I don’t know his family name. He must be in his late sixties or early seventies by now. He’s a big brute of a man. Never smiles. One of Mughniyeh’s most trusted lieutenants. Fearless. Except for one thing . . .”
“What’s that?”
“He doesn’t drive. The story is, he was involved in a serious automobile accident when he was a teenager or maybe in his early twenties. Almost killed him. Crushed some ribs. Broke both his legs. And a couple of young passengers died in the wreck. He was the driver. He never got over it.”
“So how does he get around?”
Kashmiri shrugged, “He won’t get back behind the wheel himself, so he has a full-time driver. Always has.”
“Can you find out for me who his current driver is?” MacMurphy asked.
Kashmiri looked puzzled and hesitated to answer. After a moment, the light came on in his eyes. “Yes, perhaps I can.”
MacMurphy dispatched Kashmiri back to Beirut and gave him another $10,000 to cover his expenses. Kashmiri did not hesitate to take the money this time. He was totally on board with his new case officer and excited to be back in the game. The money didn’t hurt either. Even the wealthy can use a little extra cash.
Kashmiri was given only one requirement: learn the name of Abu Salah’s driver. MacMurphy viewed the driver as a prime recruitment target due to his access to Abu Salah and the places Abu Salah visited, such as the safe house where Yasmin Ghorbani was being held.
MacMurphy decided to remain in Cyprus until Kashmiri returned. He was excited about this potential lead. It was the kind of thing case officers lived for.
CHAPTER 13
The interrogations began two weeks after Yasmin Ghorbani’s abduction. It took the Ayatollahs in Tehran that long to decide on an interrogator, agree upon a course of action, and negotiate an agreement with Hezbollah.
The interrogator they chose was a forty-seven-year-old woman named Pouri Hoseini. She was attractive, smart, and a niece of former leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Hoseini Khamenei.
Pouri had a reputation of being a tough—some said ruthless—and skilled interrogator. She had initially risen swiftly through the ranks of the Ministry of Intelligence. But despite her high-level connections, she was denied advancement beyond the senior working level to management because of her gender. She accepted this as an unpleasant fact of life in the Islamic Republic of Iran but did not like it one bit.
Her entire upbringing was one of privilege in a society where privilege was frowned upon. Her family played the game of supporting the revolution and the Ayatollahs and Sharia law. But behind the closed doors of their family mansion, they watched bootleg American movies, listened to Western music, and eschewed all trappings of a strict Muslim culture. And they were not alone.
She married a like-minded man who held a relatively high position in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. They had two grown children, a boy and a girl, ages twenty and twenty-five. Overseas assignments in London, Brussels, and Paris with her family taught her what life was like outside of Iran.
Although she was happy enough with her life, she frequently thought about what it would be like to live in a free Iran, the way things were before the Ayatollahs ruled the nation.
A deferential Abu Salah led Pouri into the safe house. He unlocked the door to Yasmin Ghorbani’s room, ushered Pouri inside, and backed out, locking the door behind him. He gave little thought to the possibility that his prisoner might try to escape or attack Pouri. But just to be on the safe side, he propped a chair against the outside of the door and sat down to wait.
The small bedroom consisted of a rumpled, steel cot in one corner, an old card table in the middle of the room, and two wooden chairs. The only window had been blacked out with aluminum foil and barred from the inside. The bars appeared to be a recent installation. Street noises, traffic, beeping horns, and airline traffic ebbed and flowed into the room through the window.
Yasmin sat in one of the wooden chairs, facing the door, head down. Pouri regarded her from just inside the doorway. The prisoner wore filthy, faded blue jeans with fashionable tears in the knees and thighs and a sweat-stained, long-sleeved blouse with its buttons askew. Her hands were handcuffed in her lap. Her stare was unblinking and vacant.
Pouri walked slowly to the opposite chair and sat down. Yasmin looked up briefly and then let her eyes fall again toward her lap.
After a while, Pouri spoke softly in English, “Hello, my name is Pouri. What is yours?”
Yasmin looked up, puzzled. “Don’t you know my name? Why are you speaking English?”
Still very softly, Pouri replied, “Yes, I know your name. I know a lot about you. We have a very thick dossier on you. We have known about you for quite some time. And to answer your other question, I am using English because you are most comfortable in that language. You are American after all. And your Arabic is, shall we say, not perfect.”
Yasmin raised her head and carefully regarded her interrogator for the first time. Who was she? How much did she know? Yasmin resisted the urge to respond and remained silent. She retained a vague, puzzled look on her face as she surveyed the woman sitting in front of her.
Pouri was wearing a fashionable, maroon, flowered hijab headscarf, but aside from that, the rest of her clothes could have been purchased at K-Mart or The Gap. She wore tight-fitting blue jeans, black pumps, and a black sequined T-shirt with the word “Paris” and an Eiffel Tower emblazoned across the front in gold sequins.
She was actually quite attractive, which surprised Yasmin for some reason. Pouri was blessed with a nice, full-bosomed figure, slender hips, and long athletic legs. Her English was perfect and she spoke with a slight British accent.
Pouri broke the silence, “Come on, I’m not going to bite you. Actually, I am here to help you. You look like you could use a good bath and have your clothes laundered. Would you like that? What else do you need? A toothbrush? Hairbrush? Shampoo? Whatever you want, I can get it for you.”
Yasmin replied softly, “Who are you? What do you want from me? Why are you doing this to me?”
“Doing this to you? It’s what you were doing to us that is the real question. I know it’s not your fault; you were just doing your job. So, if you cooperate with me, I can help you.”
Yasmin studied the attractive woman and her pleasant smile. She hesitated to respond. Her training had taught her not to give away anything, but . . . “Obviously you are here to interrogate me,” she said, “But why? I have done nothing wrong.”
“Abida. Let us start with that. Abida Hammami. Is that your name?” Pouri’s voice was not quite so kind.
Yasmin shook her head. “You know it is. You have my passport. You have everything.”
“Please don’t lie to me. It will not go well for you if you lie to me. Your documents are false. The company you supposedly work for is nothing more than a front. You are a CIA spy. We know all of that. I just need you to fill in a few blanks for us.”
Yasmin fought to control her emotions. She was terrified and hungry. How much more did they know? Her hands shook uncontrollably. She tried to hide her fear but could not. “You don’t know that.” She was on the verge of tears. “It’s not true. Not true . . .”
Pouri stood up and made a circle around the small table, never taking her eyes off the shaking young woman. Such a filthy, scared, little girl, she thought. No need to get rough with this one. Not yet anyway. A little kindness will work.
She put her hands on the back of the chair she had just abandoned and looked down at the quivering figure in front of her. “Enough for today,” she said kindly. “I wil
l instruct Abu Salah to let you wash in the sink and to have your clothes laundered. I want you to feel good when I see you in the morning. Then we can start fresh. How does that sound?”
Yasmin looked up with tear-filled eyes and she nodded slightly.
Pouri Hoseini thought, This is going to be an easy one.
CHAPTER 14
Hadi Kashmiri reflected on his conversation with MacMurphy. Of course, the driver would know where Abu Salah went and therefore where Abida Hammami (if that was her real name) was being held. But, he was Hezbollah. He would never cooperate. Not willingly anyway.
Kashmiri shook his head. He didn’t quite understand what was in MacMurphy’s mind but was confident he knew what he was doing. So, Kashmiri decided to spread a little of the CIA’s money around to learn what MacMurphy wanted to know.
And he knew exactly how to do it.
The moment he arrived back at his apartment in Beirut, Kashmiri called a few of his close friends, including his main contact at L’Orient-Le Jour and a couple other journalist friends. He invited them to dinner and drinks at the iconic Saint George Yacht Club and Marina located in Ain el Mreisse. Its restaurant and bar had been the equivalent of a Foreign Correspondents’ Club for local and foreign reporters since the 1930s. Although it had lost some of its luster since then, it was still a haven for correspondents, jet-setters, and spies.
To set the mood for the evening, Kashmiri told his guests he was celebrating a huge commission he had just received for arranging a real estate deal in Cyprus. He knew there would be several other journalists at the bar who would talk freely with a little encouragement and a toast or two in them. Thus, his pool of prospective sources would be substantial. Surely, one of them would have information on Abu Salah and his Hezbollah connections. He hoped that in a relaxed and alcohol-fueled environment, conversation would flow freely.
He was not disappointed.
Most people opened up to Kashmiri without realizing it. He was soft spoken and had a non-threatening cherubic look about him that put them at ease. He was also a good listener. One had to be a good listener to be good at elicitation. The trick was to guide the conversation with careful questions and to let other people talk. People love to talk when they have an interested listener to entertain. And they love to show off how smart they are.
During dinner, the conversation among the friends had been about general things that interested them all. Things like the economy, politics, women, and local gossip. After dinner, they headed for the bar on the circular terrace and joined up with several others, including two other local journalists and a foreign journalist from Le Monde in Paris. The newcomers had overheard Kashmiri’s journalist friends digging into local gossip and couldn’t help but ask a few questions of their own. Journalists. Always looking for the next headline.
Kashmiri ordered a round of drinks for the group and gently turned the conversation to Hezbollah and the terrorist acts it had committed over the years. When the name Imad Mughniyeh came up, as it always did when a discussion touched on Hezbollah in Beirut, Kashmiri ordered another round.
Meanwhile, the journalists engaged in a sort of competition, each one trying to outdo the other with stories about the murderous Mughniyeh and his cohorts and their exclusive knowledge of the events. Well-oiled with alcohol, they were on an enthusiastic roll.
Kashmiri waited for the right moment and then asked, “Remember that brute who was Mughniyeh’s security guy? What was his name . . . Abu Saba, Sabya, something like that?”
One of the journalists replied, “Yeah, Salah, Abu Salah. Miserable bastard.”
Kashmiri picked it up, “Right, Abu Salah. That’s his name. A real chickenshit. Did you know the asshole was afraid to drive? Big vicious animal and he was afraid to get behind the wheel of a car.”
His friend from the L’Orient-Le Jour chimed in, “I heard about that. He needs a driver to chauffeur him around. Maybe he’s just smarter than all of us!”
The crowd laughed and Kashmiri ordered another round of drinks.
One of the journalists asked, “Is he still around? He must be pretty old by now.”
Another journalist said, “Oh, he’s around alright. Still doing Hezbollah’s bidding. I saw him drinking tea in a café on Hamra Street a couple of weeks ago. He looked as mean and miserable as ever.”
Kashmiri laughed and interjected, “Did he have his driver with him?”
They laughed again and the journalist replied, “Yup, his black Mercedes was parked right at the curb in front of the café. He’s had the same driver for at least ten years. He’s a cousin, or nephew, or something like that . . .”
The L’Orient-Le Jour journalist broke in, “On Hamra Street? That makes sense. The driver’s father owns an English pub on Hamra Street. Near the American University. It’s called Wellington’s or something like that. It’s in the old Mayflower Hotel. Very nice. I think he’s related to the former Druze leader, Walid Jumblatt. His name is Sami something. Pretty well known and wealthy. But his son was a punk. Juvenile delinquent. A gang member, as I recall. Always getting into trouble. He ran away to Baalbeck out in the Bekaa Valley and joined Hezbollah. It was all over the gossip columns at the time.”
Hadi Kashmiri smiled inwardly. The son of Sami who owned Wellington’s Pub on Hamra Street was Abu Salah’s driver. He could figure out the rest.
He ordered another round and relaxed.
CHAPTER 15
MacMurphy looked out at a port on the southern coast of Cyprus. He was standing in his room on the twenty-seventh floor of the Golden Beach Hotel in Limassol. If it was on schedule, Kashmiri’s ferry from Beirut would dock in about ten minutes. A delay would be unlikely as it was a beautiful, sunny day with flat seas.
He was excited. Kashmiri had been typically cryptic during their phone call earlier that morning. Both men knew all telephonic communications between Beirut and Cyprus were closely monitored by at least three security services. But the enthusiasm in Kashmiri’s voice left little doubt that he would bring important information with him.
The knock on MacMurphy’s door came almost an hour later. A disheveled Kashmiri stood in the doorway wearing a sweat-stained, tan suit. His tie was opened and he was mopping his balding head. “I’m sorry, Mac. There was a long queue at the taxi stand so I decided to walk over from the pier. Not a good idea. It’s hot as Hades out there, and as you can see I’m not in the best shape.” He placed his hands over his ample stomach to demonstrate.
MacMurphy shook Kashmiri’s hand and closed the door behind him. Before he sat, the disheveled man blurted out, “His name is Walid Nassar. He’s forty-one years old and lives in Beirut. And he’s the son of an old friend of mine.”
Kashmiri related in agonizing detail the events that led to his uncovering the identity of Abu Salah’s driver. When he was through, and after MacMurphy had heaped enough praise on Kashmiri’s head to elicit large toothy grins from the man, the conversation took a strange turn.
They were sitting in comfortable chairs by the window of the suite and drinking heavily iced Cokes with a panorama of the beautiful Mediterranean behind them when MacMurphy said, “Tell me more about Walid Nassar’s family. The people he is closest to. Relatives and friends he sees regularly and respects.”
“Well, that definitely does not include his father. As I mentioned, his father, Sami, is a good friend of mine. He’s a Druze. Not a radical bone in his body. He’s completely estranged from his son.”
“How did Walid become radicalized?” MacMurphy leaned forward to emphasize the importance of this line of questioning.
“Sami had a younger brother. A terrific athlete. A football player. Not your kind of football. Our kind of football. You know, soccer. Anyway, he was a real tough kid. Rebellious. Always getting into trouble. Walid looked up to him. Admired him.”
Now MacMurphy was very interested. “So, this uncle . . . what’s his name?”
“Nabil. Sami could not spend much time with his kid because he was working all
the time at the restaurant, so Nabil kind of took over. Then Nabil fell in with a bunch of Hezbollah thugs. He was involved in some robberies, probably to raise money for Hezbollah, got caught, and spent time in jail. That made things worse for him. When he got out of jail he was not the same person.”
MacMurphy said, “He was radicalized in prison.” It was not a question.
“Yes, it was a shame. His family disowned him. He was in and out of jail for another couple of years until he and some other Hezbollah members robbed a company payroll and got into a firefight with the police. Two of his friends were killed and he was struck in the spine with a bullet that left him paralyzed from the waist down.”
“So, he’s in a wheelchair?”
“Yes. He was quite a womanizer before then. Now he can’t get it up. It left him a very bitter man from what I hear.”
MacMurphy gazed out through the hotel window to the Mediterranean, thinking. He ran his fingers through rapidly graying hair. “What kind of life does he have now?”
He’s looking for vulnerabilities, Kashmiri thought. But he’s heading in the wrong direction . . .
Kashmiri knew just enough about recruitment operations to understand MacMurphy’s line of questioning. “This guy is hard-core. You cannot recruit him. He’s a bitter, screwed-up man. He has no life and he owes his allegiance to Hezbollah. In fact, he’s on some sort of Hezbollah pension. They pay him a stipend every month because of the injuries he got in the line of duty. He owes his whole existence to them now.”
MacMurphy stood up and stretched his lean frame. The sun streamed through the windows. He pulled the sheer drapes closed and adjusted the heavy drapes to cut some of the direct sunlight. Then he plopped back down into his chair.
He leaned toward Kashmiri and said in a serious tone, “Here’s what I’m getting at. We need access to Walid, direct access. To do that we need to find someone who is close to him. Someone he trusts completely. Uncle Nabil seems to fit that bill perfectly.”
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