The Screaming Eagles (25 page)

When my therapy ended, the psychiatrist told me if I found a situation similar to what caused the inner recesses of my mind to explode with remorse and implode with guilt, I should confront that situation immediately by talking aloud to myself and re-live in detail what had happened. Failing to do so might trigger the nightmares once again.

The nightmares disappeared over thirty years ago and have not returned except for an incident many years ago after I lost all my money in Iran and arrived here in Chicago flat broke. I was able to soon snap out of my depression and forgot about it until about nine months ago when I experienced a mild panic attack in the police station the day I went into the terrorist’s hotel room and discovered the plot to attack the jumbo jets. As a safety measure to ensure that after so many years I don’t have a relapse, I am going to describe to you the sequence of events that started a long time ago. I have to do this if I am to help you, but I also have to do this for me.”

Michael got up from his chair and started pacing back and forth without speaking. Turmoil was written all over his face. He was fighting for control. Jalal watched him carefully as he stopped pacing. Michael put his hands in his pockets and stood facing Jalal. Jalal was aware of coffee stains on Michael’s shirt. They’d not been there a few minutes before.

“When Israel realized that they were going to be attacked by twenty Arab nations, Moshe Dayan secretly prepared to launch a surprise pre-emptive attack, hoping to catch both the Russians and Arabs off guard. Kurds are surrounded by enemies in exactly the same manner as the Israelis are. A great deal, of secret information was shared in those days by both our countries as we cooperated to defeat our two common enemies, Syria and Iraq. My assignment was to gather information on Syrian and Iraqi troop movements as they were preparing to launch a two pronged attack on Israel’s northern border settlements along the Golan Heights and the towns of Safad and Afula. I was flown into Kurdistan, and made my way to your village in the Zagros Mountains. I arrived a few weeks after the president of Egypt, Gamel Abdul Nasser, openly appealed to all the peace loving nations of the Arab world to unite and once and for all free Palestine and not stop until all the Jews were thrown into the sea. From there he said, we could swim to the countries that we’d emigrated from. This was Nasser’s call to arms and every Arab nation promised him their armies for this, the final battle to liberate Jerusalem and erase the defeats of the previous wars. Israel was well equipped with sophisticated radar equipment and spy planes; however, a number of branches of our intelligence, needed accurate ground sightings.

Dara had a network of secret agents in Syria and Iraq and in the first few weeks I was able to gather a considerable amount of troop movement information, but more importantly, I was able to identify the designated supply lines as their armies would prepare to move forward. Once their armies began attacking, they had to receive a constant supply of new equipment, ammunition, gas, spare parts, medical supplies and food. Dara’s people, most of whom lived in villages along the routes selected, were able to pinpoint precisely which roads and railways would be used. I was also able to report the alternate routes they would use if a supply route was bombed. More importantly, we identified where supplies were being off loaded and warehoused. They would obviously move the supplies under cover of darkness so I mapped out areas of desert where they would not be hidden. We pinpointed those areas as well as each of the bridges they would have to cross. Eventually they would be forced to break cover to get supplies to their troops. They could not hide in forests indefinitely until our planes flew away. They stockpiled ammunition in hospitals and schools in many of the villages. Dara introduced me to the farmers he could trust whose farms were near roads or railway lines. I supplied them with two-way radios and taught them how to use them. Convoys of trucks and trains could hide in the forests or tunnels under the mountains, but once they moved, even at night, the farmers would hear them. This was when we needed to be informed. Dara would then signal to us and our bombers would be sent to destroy them. Using codes which I changed each day, I relayed this information back to Tel Aviv by radio.”

Jalal interjected, “I know that area well. My cousin Hamid, who I’ll tell you about later, came from there. Did my father tell you that my aunt lived there?”

I don’t remember, Jalal. Dara might have. When our war against the Iraqis was over, Dara kept the radios and the farmers informed him in the same way anytime the Iraqis came to harm your people.

Any way, I stayed in your house and remembered you as a small shy boy who usually was asleep when your father and I returned late at night and left before dawn. Your father and mother were the first Kurds I’d ever met. Your parents were very much in love with each other. Arabs in Israel or other Middle Eastern countries I’d visited were never demonstrative with their spouses in public, but your parents were unlike the usual Arab couple. There was an aura about the way that they interacted, it surrounded them and their love for each other was there for anyone to see. Your mother would always be waiting for Dara when we returned, no matter how late at night. I sensed in her, a sadness that she anticipated he would be killed one day and every day was important for both of them.

One morning we prepared to leave as we usually did at sunrise. Your father told me to go ahead and that he, would catch up in a little while. I followed the riverbed until the narrow mountain pass, just south of your village. The pass was so narrow, we could only walk through one at a time. This was the route we walked each day to go down into the valley. I had been walking for about half an hour and Dara still had not caught up to me. This was unusual. I became concerned, thinking I had taken a wrong turn. I began, retracing my steps and was about to enter the narrow pass when I heard the hammer of a rifle click as it was eased back to fire. At dawn, which is the quietest time of the day, the noise echoed loudly off the walls of the canyon. I stopped, waited a few seconds then tiptoed to a large rock and saw two men with their backs to me aiming their guns towards the entrance of the pass. They were hiding behind a large bush.”

Jalal interrupted Michael.

“Were you the one who tackled the two men?” Michael nodded. “My mother told me that you’d saved my father’s life, but not when or where. I assumed that it was in another country, not outside our village. Everyone knew that an Israeli soldier had saved him. I didn’t know it was you. I wonder why my mother never told me? Continue please.”

“The men must have been hiding there when I passed them a few minutes earlier, for I had not met anyone as I walked along the path. Obviously, they’d not been waiting for me, for if I’d been the intended target I’d be dead. I realized that your father must be their target.

I was armed only with a knife, as your father was bringing the guns. I undid the straps of the radio I was carrying on my back and slowly lowered it to the ground. I unwrapped the antenna which I carried on my shoulder, unhooked my water bottle, food rations, spare clips of bullets and took off my watch. Unsheathing my knife, I quietly started to walk toward them. I looked down on the ground before taking each step so as not to break or move twigs or stones that might alert them. You Kurds are masters when it comes to stalking silently. When I saw the two men both suddenly tense, saw their shoulders and arms stiffen as they prepared to fire, I realized they would start shooting in a few seconds. Shouting Dara’s name as loudly as I could, I ran at them.

Startled, they both turned, guns swinging around toward me. The strap of one of the guns snagged on the bush so I jumped at the other man, hitting him in the chest with my head. We both fell to the ground. I stabbed him in the chest and pulled the knife out as fast as I could. Out the corner of my eye, I saw the muzzle of the gun aiming at me. I threw myself at the second man’s legs with my knife outstretched to stab his knee. I remember feeling a giant hammer hit my shoulder. Then I heard the roar of the gun and felt the pain as my shoulder seemed to explode. I had no sensation of being thrown backward by the blast onto the man I’d killed, but realized immediately as I lay on top of him that I had lost my knife. Panicking, I tried to get up, knowing that if I did not get up fast, I would die. I couldn’t move. There was a great stillness, a quietness all around me. I had never ever experienced such a deep quietness before and didn’t know why, but I knew that my life was about to end. Everything the man was doing was sharp and in jagged slow motion. All I could see was the gun inches from my eyes, and as I looked deep into the shaft of the barrel I wondered if I would see the bullet before it smashed into my face. My body was tense and trembling, my gut knotted with fear as I waited for that bullet. Then I lost consciousness.”

Michael paused. Abstractly he looked around the room, rubbed his eyes for a few seconds. “Have you ever been shot Jalal?”

“Yes. I know what you mean about the great stillness. In Kurdish we have a saying which when I translate means something like, the silence felt by a baby in its mother’s womb as it gently turns. We also call it the great peace. I too have experienced it one time. I know what you talk about. But let us not get side tracked. Carry on telling me what happened that day.”

“When I awoke, I don’t know when, I felt that there was a hot knife being turned again and again in my shoulder. The knife seemed to turn in every part of my shoulder and though I tried, I couldn’t move it. I realized that I was strapped down onto a bed. I opened my eyes and saw your father looking down at me. There was another man standing next to him holding a scalpel covered in blood. Your father lifted my head and told me to swallow some liquid that would deaden the pain. I drank the liquid as fast as I could swallow, trying not to taste the foulness for it smelt like rotting wood. As I drank the liquid, fearfully I saw the man waiting next to your father. I looked at his face but he was looking at my shoulder and did not see how afraid I was of his scalpel. Within seconds I fell asleep.

I remember that a fly woke me up. It buzzed around my face louder and louder, wings beating about my eyes until I felt it land on my upper lip. I didn’t know where I was; then suddenly I remembered the barrel of the gun. I moved my head, tried to open my eyes, and the fly flew away. The effort was too great and I did not feel that I had sufficient strength, so I stopped trying to open my eyes and fell asleep again still worried that the gun was pointing at me. When I awoke, I felt no pain. I opened my eyes and saw it was still daylight. Something had awakened me and I did not know what it was. I tried to drift off to sleep again, when all of a sudden I heard screams. Alarmed and confused I sat up, my shoulder was only a dull ache. I got off the bed and stumbled to the door. Outside I saw Dara surrounded by his soldiers. I heard the scream again.

I shouted to your father asking him what was going on and why were all the villagers standing around in front of the house. The villagers standing near to me nervously moved away as your father walked over to me. Before I could say anything further, he took my face in his hands and kissed me on the forehead then on both cheeks. Your father thanked me for saving his life and said that he was able to capture the assassin just before the man was about to shoot me.

He’d brought the man back to the village and could have executed him there or set him free in exchange for one of your soldiers that had been captured. Your father, however, had decided the captured man would be extremely valuable if he could find out from the man who in the village had betrayed him. If he didn’t find out, his enemies would try to kill him again. He had no idea who planned the ambush and was certain that neither of the two assassins were the mastermind. Someone wanted him to die and the only way he could be sure was to make the assassin talk. Your father had ordered the whole village to watch and see what he was going to do to the traitor. The people of the village had formed a large circle around the man lying on the ground. They were watching him as he was being tortured. He told me that somewhere in the crowd the accomplices were now watching, knowing that they would eventually be named. He had stationed his loyal soldiers and personal friends to seal off the surrounding perimeters of the village so as to stop any of the guilty from escaping. He had selected another group of soldiers to stand behind the assembled people. Dara had confiscated all the weapons of the villagers whose loyalty he was not sure of and seized any weapons that were found hidden when he conducted surprise house searches. Your father’s second in command, your uncle Mustaffa, had the assassin staked out in the sand and would continue to make small cuts about an eighth of an inch deep and an inch wide on the man’s body. He then would pull the skin and flesh down slowly, tearing it away from the man’s body. The key was to pull it down in strips little by little so the pain could continue longer.

The pain must have been excruciating. Dara knew how bad the pain was, because the Iraqis had tortured him in this manner when they captured him. Luckily, his soldiers had rescued him as they were pulling down the third strip on his chest. He said that the burning sensation all around the tear hurt like no pain he had ever felt before.

Dara instructed Mustaffa to tell the assassin that he would die and could not bargain for his life, but, if he would name all the co-conspirators quickly, he would be shot and not skinned. This was said loud enough so that those watching could hear. Shooting him would be the only mercy he would receive. The assassin had already named one person. Dara had captured the man and he was now tied up watching the man being skinned. The captured man knew what fate would await him. Hearing the screams of the man being tortured would make him talk quicker so that he would be shot instead of being tortured.

Dara still needed to torture the assassin a while longer in case there were more persons involved. When the pain was too severe, he would tell Mustaffa everything that he knew. Then and only then would they shoot him.