Leon Uris (70 page)

As part of my neighborliness I would look in on Hilwa to see if she and her children were getting enough rations, and I personally saw to it they got proper medical attention when they were ill. We became good friends.

In our world, where almost everything about sex is dangerous, forbidden, and secret, most young men have their first worldly experience with a widow or a divorced woman. What I did not realize was that the widows were just as eager to have sex as the men. This mutual need came as a revelation!

All the time I believed I was seducing Hilwa, she was seducing me. When she told me she had a special present for my eighteenth birthday, I thought surely it was a little gift, perhaps a cap or something she had embroidered.

The first taste of pomegranate was not what I had dreamed it would be. Although Hilwa had four children she was naïve, almost innocent, about making love. She was filled with the usual fears and taboos from childhood. These fears got into the bed with us. Between guilty weeping and strange outbursts of giggling, it was a disjointed and embarrassing experience.

Fortunately, our relationship overcame that first night. Hilwa would discreetly nod to me in passing when it was a safe time for her. The visits became frequent and things got extremely pleasant.

I felt deep down that something was wrong with the way we were going at it. The spirits told me we should not be in such a hurry. We needed discipline, like fasting during Ramadan. When I discussed the matter, Hilwa would blush and look away. We tried. We were rewarded.

Then Allah bestowed upon me the greatest of all honors. One night she confessed that I was a much better lover than her late husband. She complimented me many times about my gentleness and she became less afraid to talk things over and to explore hidden places.

It became very comfortable, too comfortable.

We lived in packed quarters, so my comings and goings began to be noticed. Several times I could not attend to her when she wanted me and she became upset and demanding. I began to squirm. Now that the novelty was gone, I feared her growing possessiveness.

Frankly, I was relieved the night she broke down and wept that we would have to stop seeing each other, for she had a legitimate and serious suitor. I feigned terrible sadness, I beat my chest, I even pretended to be jealous. But when I left, I could have screamed out for relief.

Having thus added this new dimension to my character, I continued to pursue the matter. As a teacher in the Wadi Bakkah School, I knew that a number of my students had widowed mothers and sisters. I made it a point to call on each of them to discuss their sons’ scholastics.

Amazing how quickly a prowling wolf is given the scent. It was purely astonishing to learn how many women wanted to do it and even more astonishing to see how much I became in demand.

I do not wish to boast like other men, but I was assured by almost all of my widow friends that I was among the greatest lovers in the world. I’m certain that the patience and tenderness made me different.

Although it was difficult, I kept it to myself. I did not wish to dishonor these women, nor did I wish to share them. I accepted my manhood modestly.

After the departure of Per Olsen my father seemed content to go along with the bureaucracy. Until the collapse of the Jericho Project, he never allowed us to take advantage of our position. Now our family of nine, including Fatima and Kamal’s new infant, acquired fourteen ration cards. Ibrahim requisitioned building materials and had a nice home constructed for us closer to the highway.

Per Olsen’s replacement was a tiny man from Burma named Ne Swe. Father did not underestimate the man’s capabilities because of his size. Ne Swe was also shrewd enough to realize that life would be simpler and smoother with Haj Ibrahim on his side. He had come from a land where exchanging favors was as much a way of life as it was to us. They got along famously from the beginning.

Until now Ibrahim scarcely ever mentioned the old villagers of Tabah or tried to contact them. Oh yes, he would often speak of his longing to return, but rarely spoke of people by name. For some strange reason, I think he bore guilt over having to split from them, although, Allah knows, it was not his fault.

‘No shepherd loses his flock for whatever reason,’ was all he managed to say on the subject.

Our fine new home meant that Ibrahim was settling down and coming to terms with the exile. But Tabah would not go away, and the more settled be became, the more he wondered about his old friends. He finally asked me to find out.

Because of his position, he could send letters of inquiry on their whereabouts through UNRWA. In addition, Ibrahim also had two married daughters, my sisters, who had fled with their families. We had been out of contact for years. I wrote letters asking after them as well.

Several months passed before we received answers. Our villagers were still more or less intact and living in a camp outside Beirut called Shatilla. My sisters were also in Lebanon, in a camp near Shatilla called Tel Zatar.

After receiving their letters we plunged into a spell of nostalgia. The women asked me to read the letters over two or three times a day, and they wept each time. We learned who had married, who had children, where people worked, who was the temporary muktar looking after them. They complained. Although the Lebanese treated them with contempt and cruelty, there were jobs and Beirut was certainly better than Jericho.

In the next exchange of correspondence they appealed for Father to join them and lead them again. Ne Swe did not want to lose Father, but realistically felt there was a possibility of transferring him to Beirut.

I was elated and soared to paradise! In Beirut there was the famous American University but none in Jordan or on the West Bank. The thought of becoming a university student was a dream I had never dared to dream.

When we spoke about moving, at first our voices were firm and our spirits were high. We would see family and old friends! We would be a people again!

I came down faster than I went up. Each day Father’s will became less passionate, less resolute. To move all of us to Beirut would be a monumental task. Ibrahim was now at peace with the Jordanians. He was in a position that required little work and carried much influence and privilege, and our living conditions were decent.

Why move to the unknown? In Shatilla he would have to fight long and hard to establish himself and acquire the same status he now had. In truth, Father was weary. The flight to Jaffa, to Qumran, to Zurich, Jamil, Charles Maan, the Jericho Project had all taken pieces of his spirit.

This powerful man who had only played around the fringes of fantasy now dipped into it. Oh, I pressed hard for Beirut, but he became dotty about it, irregular in his reasoning.

I continued to write letters to individual villagers and to my sisters, but it was strange: I couldn’t remember their faces too well. Even Father was unable to keep straight the relationships between the clans and families of Tabah.

At the end of a few months, Beirut was a mirage.

On the days Father had his private meetings with Ne Swe I translated for him to make certain there were no misunderstandings. Father would wait for me at a café across the road from the school. When classes were over, we would stroll to UNRWA headquarters. On these walks I began to notice the changes in him. He had become very diplomatic and pragmatic, avoiding trouble, keenly playing the tribal game. Shrewdness had replaced anger.

I was surprised to see him in the doorway of my classroom one day. He was visibly distressed, an emotion he never displayed in public. He nodded. I quickly received permission to leave and followed him from the school.

Out on the road he stopped and gripped me. I believe I actually detected fear in his eyes.

‘I have received secret information from Amman. In two weeks the Jordanians are going to order all boys of military age to register for a draft into the Arab Legion.’

‘Oh my God,’ I said shakily.

‘You are safe,’ Father said, ‘but they will take Omar.’

I am ashamed to admit I was more relieved for myself than sorry for Omar. After the murder of Abdullah, and the exile of Talal, the regency rule around his grandson, young King Husain, had taken firm hold. Once again the Jordanians pressed forward with their obsession to annex the West Bank. Putting Palestinian boys in Jordanian uniform was a cleverly thought out trick. It would give the impression that the Palestinians were loyal to the king. Furthermore, if there were riots and troubles, Palestinians in the Arab Legion would be used to do the dirty work. We would have the blood of our own people on our hands while Jordan would be clean.

Father was badly shaken. Why? He was no longer a political threat. He was at peace with the Jordanians. Surely he would know how to get Omar exempted. I could not comprehend his reaction.

Ne Swe greeted us in a manner that reflected Father’s urgency. I explained to him that Father had been tipped off by a Jordanian minister.

‘Father says we must arrange immediate travel papers for Omar to get into Lebanon.’

Ne Swe blinked a bit, realizing the quagmire of bureaucracy and bribes he had to wade through and the pressure of time. He thought hard. ‘The quickest way is to hire Omar for an UNRWA job in Beirut.’

‘Can that be done in time?’

‘It is possible.’

There was a large United Nations complex in Jerusalem on the Hill of Evil Council. There Ne Swe could make direct radio contact with UNRWA in Beirut. The world of favors and the system was already at work. Father seemed much calmed as we made for home.

The instant we entered our house I realized why Father had been on the brink of panic. I saw Jamil’s photograph with the little vase of flowers and the burning candles. Jamil’s hand had reached out from the grave.

Colonel Farid Zyyad was a patient man with a long memory. Ibrahim feared that Zyyad’s thirst for vengeance had not been fully appeased by Jamil’s death. Once Omar was taken into the Legion, Allah only knew what could happen to him. It would be too much for Haj Ibrahim to lose two sons in such a manner.

The necessary papers were in our possession within the week. We had quietly traded to get a new suit of clothing and shoes, obtained enough American dollars, and plotted the safest route to Beirut. Once there our clansmen would take him in at the Shatilla Camp.

In the blink of an eye, Omar was off to Lebanon.

Omar’s tale was much the same as Jamil’s. He had been scarcely noticed by the family all of his life. Of us all, he had been the most taken for granted, a sweet, simple, hardworking boy with no special attributes. Yet the weeping and wailing that followed his departure made one believe we were losing the son of Mohammed. Before he left, our photographer friend, Waddie, took his picture. After he was gone it was placed alongside Jamil’s.

It wasn’t the loss of Omar that really devastated Father. It was the loss of his ability to protect his family. Even more, it was the growing loss of his family.

We had changed from simple farmers living out a cycle of planting and reaping into a destitute people in our own land. Now we were beginning to change again. The sons were leaving the camps as soon as they were able. We were starting to become the wanderers of the world.

Omar’s departure hit hard on Ibrahim. It was foremost for a man like the Haj to control his own destiny. Most of the time he had succeeded, even under great adversity. But my father had also taken losses a proud man could scarcely bear. He had lost his village and his clan. Now he was taking the most devastating defeats of all: the loss of one son after another. And the losses were out of his hands, beyond his powers.

For me, it was to be one of the most crushing moments of my life. I realized I was all that was really left for my father. He depended on me, leaned on me more and more. He treated me as a man and, at times, almost as an equal.

Every time I thought of my own departure it ended with a terrible depression. It would be unthinkable for me to leave so long as my father and family remained. How could I live knowing I was a traitor to my father?

Ibrahim repeated over and over that the seed of the Soukori clan would have to survive through me. I was his chosen. That was what I had wanted and fought for. Now, I would never be able to go with his blessing. All dreams, no matter how vague and unreal, suddenly shuddered to a halt.

Haj Ibrahim slowly began to shift his views. For the first time he took up the theme that the Zionists were the cause of all our troubles. No longer able to combat or cope with the evils of our society and leaders, he made convenient rationalizations about the enemy over the border.

There had been an officers’ rebellion in Egypt that disposed of a decadent monarch. An Egyptian republic had been declared. The driving force behind the coup was a commander named Gamal Abdel Nasser. He had been a soldier in the war against the Jews and had been humiliated by capture. His hatred of Israel was the most potent in the Arab world, and that was saying a great deal. He fanned the flames of Arab nationalism. He would rally us all under his banner.

The Arab radio was always in competition for the minds of the West Bank refugees. Nasser stormed into their imaginations. He would liberate them. He would return them to their homes.

Bit by bit the words of Nasser penetrated my father’s mind and started to cloud his once great ability to reason.

W
E RECEIVED A MESSAGE
through the UNRWA radio in Jerusalem that Omar had made it safely to Beirut, had joined our clan, and had been given the promised job. Like all the sons who had left, he would send his salary home.

In the end we were to realize that perhaps Omar need not have left. The Jordanians ordered the military registration and made up all-Palestinian units of the Arab Legion. Although under the command of British officers, these battalions were soon noted for their lack of discipline, massive desertions, and general troublemaking. They refused to quell refugee disturbances and showed no loyalty whatsoever to the Jordanian king. The British soon considered their combat value as nil.