The Jerusalem Assassin

by Joel C. Rosenberg

  This was a carefully constructed opening line, designed to suggest that Ziad and his team had no reason to be so angry that the U.S. Embassy was now located in a section of Jerusalem to which the Palestinians made no formal claim. It wasn’t East Jerusalem; it was West—close to the line, to be sure, but not over it. Again the chairman did not respond, so Evans moved on.

  “The president wants you to know that after two years of meticulous work, his peace proposal is finally complete. He wants you to be the first to see it, and thus you’re the first leader in the region I have come to brief.”

  Now Ziad nodded, almost imperceptibly.

  “I can tell you that the president wholeheartedly believes you will welcome his proposal, which he hopes can serve as the starting point for robust negotiations and lead to a final, fair, and comprehensive settlement of the conflict between your people and the Israelis.”

  The tension in the room was palpable and intensifying.

  “Before I walk you through the particulars of the plan, the president wants you to know right up front that two of the central concepts in his proposal are ones that you and your government have insisted upon from the beginning,” the NSA continued. “First, the president is ready to help the Palestinian people establish a sovereign state—a real state with established borders, a flag, an anthem, a recognized government, passports, embassies, and so forth—based on the formula of land for peace, as stipulated in U.N. Resolutions 242 and 338, so long as both parties negotiate in good faith and come to a conclusion satisfying to both sides. And second, as the president has stated repeatedly, he stands ready to help the Palestinian people establish the capital of the state in East Jerusalem. Furthermore, he would be happy to open an American Embassy in such a Palestinian capital as part of an overall effort to pursue strong U.S.-Palestinian relations.”

  The general clearly expected a reaction to this, and he paused for it. Ziad, however, remained silent and stone-faced.

  “Mr. Chairman, our internal polling shows that two out of three Palestinians believe their society is going in the wrong direction. Well over half say their financial situation is worse than last year. The same percentages fear their dream of having a sovereign Palestinian state is further away than ever. And yet there is a ray of hope. A solid majority of Palestinians say they support resuming negotiations with the Israelis, and President Clarke believes the time is now.”

  Evans turned to his colleague Dr. Davis, who drew several items out of a large legal briefcase.

  “On Tuesday, December 16, President Clarke will arrive in Jerusalem and address the American people and the world from the Haram al-Sharif,” the general continued, referring to what the Israelis called the Temple Mount. “He will lay out the core principles of his peace initiative. He will also call for the commencement of immediate bilateral negotiations at the Camp David presidential retreat center, beginning on Wednesday, the seventh of January. Simultaneously, the president’s 247-page plan will be posted on the White House and State Department websites in English, Arabic, Hebrew, French, Russian, Spanish, and Chinese so that anyone interested may study it carefully.”

  Davis handed Evans three black three-ring binders, each with the presidential seal embossed in gold leaf on the front cover. Evans proceeded to give one to Ziad and one to the foreign minister while keeping the third for himself.

  “For the purposes of our discussions, I have brought you both a still-classified copy of the president’s proposal,” the general explained. “When we finish today, I will need to take your copies with me. But I assure you that multiple copies will be delivered to you next month, a few hours before the president begins his address.”

  Davis fished out of her briefcase two envelopes bearing the seal of the White House with each man’s name handwritten in calligraphy.

  “I have also brought you both personal invitations from the president to attend the summit he is planning for January,” Evans added. “He would be grateful for your reply no later than December 1. Now, before I begin walking you both through the plan in detail, are there any initial questions I can answer?”

  33

  GENERAL INTELLIGENCE DIRECTORATE, RIYADH, SAUDI ARABIA

  “How long ago did this come in?” the watch officer asked.

  “Within the hour,” said his deputy. “I brought it directly to you as soon as it was translated.”

  “And you’re absolutely certain of the source?”

  “The source? Yes. The accuracy of what he’s telling us? No.”

  The watch officer, dressed in military fatigues and combat boots, quickly exited the operations center and headed for the elevators. When one of the doors opened, he entered, inserted his passkey, and pressed the button for the top floor. As the door closed, he stood there alone, his mind racing. The implication of the message was chilling. So was the risk to the source they had code-named Kabutar, which in Farsi meant “pigeon.” If Kabutar were found out, he’d be slaughtered—that was, if he hadn’t already been found out and was even now being used to feed them disinformation. How much longer could they keep him in place? Then again, how could they pull him out? They had no contingency plans for this.

  Two minutes later, the watch officer was standing outside the immense corner office of Prince Abdullah bin Rashid, Saudi’s director of the General Intelligence Directorate, or GID. When the officer informed the prince’s aide-de-camp that he needed to speak with the man immediately, he was told the director was on an important call and had given explicit instructions not to be disturbed.

  “He will want to be disturbed for this,” said the officer calmly.

  The aide stared into the officer’s eyes, then told him to wait. He rapped twice on the door to the director’s office and entered alone. Thirty seconds later, he reemerged and nodded for the watch officer to enter.

  “I understand you have heard from Kabutar,” said the prince, standing behind his massive oak desk.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Just now?”

  “Correct.”

  “How long has it been since we heard from him last?”

  “More than a month—that’s why I thought you’d want to know immediately.”

  “Has anyone else seen the transcript?”

  “Just my deputy, the translator, and myself, per your explicit orders.”

  “Give it to me,” the prince ordered.

  The watch officer approached the desk and handed over the handwritten transcription. The prince read it quickly, then waved the man out of the room.

  WEST BANK, PALESTINIAN AUTHORITY

  Marcus remained expressionless.

  His eyes were trained on the eyes and hands of the two Palestinian bodyguards he’d been assigned to monitor. Thus far, the tensions in the room were as serious as any official meeting he’d ever witnessed. They were political tensions, the product of a seemingly unbridgeable gulf between two governments. They seemed unlikely to erupt into violence, yet all of Marcus’s training had prepared him to expect the unexpected.

  Ziad finally looked up. “General Evans, do you really expect my government to accept a proposal from an administration which has shown nothing but hostility toward me and my people?”

  “Mr. Chairman, with respect, we have shown no hostility toward you or toward the Palestinian people. Since the midnineties and the signing of the Oslo Accords, the American government has provided the Palestinian people more than $5 billion in economic assistance through USAID. Since 2012, we’ve provided another $1.7 billion in economic grants to improve Palestinian health care, water, sanitation, infrastructure, and security assistance. This is far more than any other country, including any Arab country. Does not this generosity attest to our respect for both you and your people?”

  “You know full well, General, that most of that aid predates the Clarke administration, the most hostile American White House we’ve ever encountered.”

  “To the contrary, President Clarke took office reaching out his hand to you in frie
ndship and cooperation. He immediately invited you to the White House and treated you with great honor. He followed up by coming to meet with you here. Secretary of State Whitney also came to meet with you repeatedly in the early months of the administration, as did I. It was your decision, Mr. Chairman, to cut relations with us and refuse to meet with any senior American officials, the president included, until the exception which you made today. Rather than show gratitude to the American people and our elected leaders as your single greatest benefactors, you chose a path of hostility and disrespect. Perhaps such actions were rewarded by previous administrations. But President Clarke asks me to assure you, as a friend, that those days are over.”

  “Disrespect?” Ziad fumed, leaning forward. “How dare you accuse me and my government of disrespect. Aside from your little preamble a few moments ago, your president has steadfastly refused to acknowledge the pain and suffering of the Palestinian people, refused to acknowledge our universal right of self-determination under the U.N. Charter, and refused to unequivocally declare his support for a Palestinian state, though he has been pressed on this issue time and time again. What has he done instead? He has slashed economic assistance to the P.A., slashed funding to UNRWA, unilaterally moved the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, publicly declared Jerusalem the capital of the Jews, and repeated over and over again that Jerusalem is ‘off the table.’”

  “West Jerusalem is off the table,” the general said quietly. “East Jerusalem, on the other hand, is most assuredly on the table.”

  “That’s not what the president has been saying.”

  “With respect, Mr. Chairman, that’s exactly what he’s been saying. I have talked about this with him at length. He has stated clearly that the precise boundaries of Jerusalem are subject to negotiation. On this point he could not have been clearer. Indeed, every final status issue is on the table, but only if you come back to the table.”

  “Why should I come back to the table?”

  “Because you’ll never get what you want—what your people want and deserve—if you don’t.”

  “I’m a patient man,” Ziad said. “We are a patient people. We can wait. Time is on our side.”

  “No, my friend, it’s not. You and your predecessors have said no to every single proposal for a Palestinian state since 1947. What do you have to show for it? You’ve lost control of Jerusalem. You’ve lost control of Gaza. Seventy percent of your own people want you to resign immediately. And why? Because a third of them are unemployed. Most of them live in poverty. Far too many of them live in squalor. Meanwhile, the Israelis have become a global technological superpower. They have the most vibrant economy in the region. The most powerful army. With every year that goes by, Israel grows stronger and the Palestinians grow weaker. The train is leaving the station. If you don’t get on board now, it may very well pass you by forever.”

  34

  “I won’t dispute your facts,” Ziad countered. “But I entirely reject your analysis.”

  “I’m listening,” said the general.

  “In 1947, the total Arab population of Palestine was about 1.2 million,” the chairman began. “Today, there are 2.5 million Arabs living just in the West Bank alone. There are another 1.7 million in Gaza. There are yet another 1.6 million Arabs living in Israel. That means there are some 5.8 million Arabs living in Palestine. That, my friend, is a 483 percent increase in our numbers since 1947.”

  “And?”

  “And given that there are only about 6.5 million Jews in Israel today, we Arabs comprise no less than 47 percent of the total population living between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea. Forty-seven percent. Given our birth rates, plus the number of Palestinians living outside the land who long to return to the homes of their parents and grandparents, the demographics are working in our favor—soon we will outnumber the Jews. They can try to ignore us—you can too—but we have rights, and mark my words, they will be honored.”

  “How?” asked the general.

  “What do you mean, how?” Ziad snapped.

  “How will your rights be honored if you refuse year after year to come to the table to negotiate a comprehensive and final treaty?”

  “You forget, sir, that every offer made to date has been better than the one before.”

  “Meaning what?”

  “At Camp David in ’78, Sadat and Carter abandoned us,” Ziad insisted. “At best we were offered limited autonomy, not our own state. But this was ridiculous, so of course we refused to dignify such a travesty.”

  “What about in Oslo?”

  “What about it? We were offered what we have now—the formation of the Palestinian Authority, on the road to a full state. And we said yes in good faith. It’s the Israelis who haven’t kept their end of the bargain.”

  “What about Camp David in 2000?” the general asked. “Prime Minister Barak offered you all of Gaza, 90 percent of the West Bank, and a good portion of Jerusalem.”

  “He wasn’t serious, and it wasn’t nearly enough,” Ziad insisted. “Besides, he was a weak leader, and his government fell soon thereafter.”

  “In 2005, Prime Minister Sharon gave you all of Gaza. Why didn’t you engage in peace talks with him right then for the rest of your claims?”

  “Sharon handed us Gaza on a silver platter, for nothing. We didn’t have to give him anything. So we took his offer, of course. We’re not idiots. But do you really think the man who orchestrated the massacres at Sabra and Shatillah was going to negotiate a final agreement in good faith? Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Fine, then what about Olmert in 2008? He offered you 95 percent of the West Bank and half the Old City—the Muslim and the Christian Quarters. Your government didn’t even reply.”

  “Why should we?” Ziad asked. “This is my point exactly. None of them offered us 100 percent of the land we possessed before the ’67 war. None of them were willing to surrender the Haram al-Sharif, home of our most precious jewels, the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque. And what about the right of return? Are the Israelis really so arrogant as to deny all of our refugees their God-given right to return to the homes that were illegally and immorally stolen from them in ’48? But this is my point. The Zionists still deny us what is rightfully ours. Yet the longer we wait, the more they offer. So we will continue to be patient, knowing that Allah—and time—are on our side.”

  “Look, Ismail—if I may—please believe me when I tell you that I understand your anger. You don’t feel President Clarke is treating you fairly. I get that. And you don’t trust Prime Minister Eitan to negotiate in good faith with you. I’m sympathetic—I truly am—on both counts. After decades crisscrossing this region, I have come to understand and, I would say, appreciate your narrative, just as I have come to understand and appreciate the Israelis’ perspective. I readily acknowledge there is bad blood, and I’m not here to cast blame. It’s based on years of history between your peoples and between you two personally. I get that. I do. But you and I have known each other—and, I believe, respected each other—for a long, long time, since we first met at Camp David back in 2000 during the Clinton Peace Initiative. So I truly hope you will believe me when I tell you that Olmert’s offer in 2008 was the high-water mark. You and your people will never again receive an offer that generous from the Israelis. But President Clarke’s plan is a good one. It’s fair. It’s balanced. And it’s achievable. But only if you don’t reject it out of hand. Now, may I walk you through the particulars?”

  When the watch officer was gone, the Saudi prince picked up the phone and speed-dialed the private, secure number of the king’s chief of staff.

  It took nine rings before the man picked up. When he finally did, the prince explained both the content of the message and its source. The chief of staff began asking questions.

  When had the message come in? Were they absolutely certain the translation from Farsi to Arabic was precise? Was there any doubt as to who’d sent it? Could it really be true, or had the Pigeon been compr
omised? Why did the prince regard it as real? And what did he propose they do next?

  The prince had anticipated each question and answered with directness and precision. The chief of staff then told the kingdom’s top spy he could brief His Majesty the king and His Royal Highness the crown prince at precisely 3 p.m. “And call AG,” he finally instructed before hanging up.

  The prince paused a moment, took a deep breath, and then dialed a second number. Like the first, this call was also encrypted and completely secure. Unlike the first, however, this one was routed by the GID’s computers through multiple satellites, then through a maze of fiber-optic lines from Patagonia, to Mexico City, to Marseilles, through the island of Cyprus, and eventually to the private mobile phone of the director of the Israeli Mossad, Asher Gilad.

  “Asher, it’s Abdullah. Do you have a moment? We have a problem.”

  35

  PRIME MINISTER’S RESIDENCE, JERUSALEM—20 NOVEMBER

  It was just before 8 a.m. when Reuven Eitan stepped outside to the carport.

  The November air was chilly and damp. It had rained much of the night, not only in the Israeli capital but in Tel Aviv and up and down the Mediterranean coast. The driveway was wet and slick, and the Israeli leader, dressed in a new dark-blue suit, crisp light-blue shirt, and paisley tie, could see his breath.

  Now in his midsixties, Eitan had been serving in public life since his midthirties. His hair was grayer now and a good deal thinner. He had put on a few pounds since then; actually, more than a few. His face bore more wrinkles, and today he needed reading glasses, while his eyesight back in the day had been perfect. Beyond that, he mused, what else had really changed when it came to the ever-elusive hunt for a final resolution with the Palestinians? As far as Eitan was concerned, his neighbors—their leaders, anyway—were as intractable as ever. Yet they never seemed to pay a price for saying no to peace year after year, decade after decade. To the contrary, the world was obsessed by a process that never produced peace. It was a never-ending hunt that perpetually failed to find the Holy Grail, and the blame was always pinned on the Jews.