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Isaac's Beacon

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by David L. Robbins




  Praise for Isaac’s Beacon

  “David L. Robbins takes us from Hitler’s camps through the British Mandate in Palestine, onto a rocky kibbutz, and into the dangerous Irgun. A profound and pivotal novel of the birth of the State of Israel, with all its adventures and tragedies on display. This is Robbins—historian, humanist, and master novelist—at the top of his game. An epic and timeless work.”

  —William S. Cohen, former U.S. Senator, Congressman, and Sec. of Defense

  “Isaac’s Beacon stands alongside the great fiction epics of Israel by Leon Uris and Herman Wouk. Robbins has written an instant classic.”

  —Jeff Shaara, New York Times Bestselling Historical Novelist

  “Robbins has written his most ambitious book yet. A beautifully paced and utterly gripping powerhouse of a book. Extremely timely.”

  —Alex Kershaw, New York Times Bestselling Author of The Liberator and The Longest Winter

  “Isaac’s Beacon is a masterwork by a truly masterful writer.”

  —Tom Robbins, New York Times Bestselling Author of Even Cowgirls Get The Blues and Still Life With Woodpecker

  “The best historical novels not only illuminate the past, they define it. Isaac’s Beacon is one of those novels. Riveting, morally complex, fiercely intelligent, and as empathetic as it is sweeping in scope, Robbins guides readers through war-torn chaos to moments of rare, magnificent beauty. I feel like a better person for having read it.”

  —Dan Mayland, author of The Doctor of Aleppo

  Also by David L. Robbins

  Souls To Keep

  War of the Rats

  The End of War

  Scorched Earth

  Last Citadel

  Liberation Road

  The Assassins Gallery

  The Betrayal Game

  Broken Jewel

  The Devil’s Waters

  The Empty Quarter

  The Devil’s Horn

  The Low Bird

  You Are Your Own Always (collection of essays)

  For the stage

  Scorched Earth (an adaptation)

  The End of War (an adaptation)

  Sam & Carol

  The King of Crimes

  A WICKED SON BOOK

  An Imprint of Post Hill Press

  ISBN: 978-1-64293-829-6

  ISBN (eBook): 978-1-64293-830-2

  Isaac’s Beacon:

  A Novel

  © 2021 by David L. Robbins

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover design by Matt Margolis

  Interior artwork by Tiffani Shea

  This book is a work of historical fiction. All incidents, dialogue, and characters aside from the actual historical figures are products of the author’s imagination. While they are based around real people, any incidents or dialogue involving the historical figures are fictional and are not intended to depict actual events or commentary. In all other respects, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is purely coincidental.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author and publisher.

  Post Hill Press

  New York • Nashville

  posthillpress.com

  Published in the United States of America

  Contents

  The Characters of Isaac’s Beacon

  Glossary of Terms

  Chapter 1: Éva

  Chapter 2: Éva

  Chapter 3: Éva

  Chapter 4: Éva

  Chapter 5: Éva

  Chapter 6: Éva

  Chapter 7: Hugo

  Chapter 8: Hugo

  Chapter 9: Vince

  Chapter 10: Rivkah

  Chapter 11: Rivkah

  Chapter 12: Vince

  Chapter 13: Hugo

  Chapter 14: Vince

  Chapter 15: Rivkah

  Chapter 16: Vince

  Chapter 17: Hugo

  Chapter 18: Vince

  Chapter 19: Hugo

  Chapter 20: Vince

  Chapter 21: Rivkah

  Chapter 22: Hugo

  Chapter 23: Hugo

  Chapter 24: Hugo

  Chapter 25: Hugo

  Chapter 26: Vince

  Chapter 27: Rivkah

  Chapter 28: Vince

  Chapter 29: Rivkah

  Chapter 30: Rivkah

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32: Vince

  Chapter 33: Hugo

  Chapter 34: Rivkah

  Chapter 35: Vince

  Chapter 36: Hugo

  Chapter 37: Vince

  Chapter 38: Hugo

  Chapter 39: Vince

  Chapter 40: Hugo

  Chapter 41: Rivkah

  Chapter 42: Hugo

  Chapter 43: Rivkah

  Chapter 44: Hugo

  Chapter 45: Vince

  Chapter 46: Hugo

  Chapter 47: Rivkah

  Chapter 48: Vince

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50: Hugo

  Chapter 51: Hugo

  Chapter 52: Vince

  Chapter 53: Vince

  Chapter 54: Rivkah

  Chapter 55: Vince

  Chapter 56: Rivkah

  Chapter 57: Vince

  Chapter 58: Rivkah

  Chapter 59: Hugo

  Chapter 60: Hugo

  Chapter 61: Hugo

  Chapter 62: Vince

  Chapter 63: Vince

  Chapter 64: Hugo

  Chapter 65: Rivkah

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67: Hugo

  Chapter 68: Vince

  Chapter 69: Vince

  Chapter 70: Rivkah

  Chapter 71: Rivkah

  Chapter 72: Vince

  Chapter 73: Hugo

  Chapter 74: Vince

  Chapter 75: Vince

  Chapter 76: Rivkah

  Chapter 77: Rivkah

  Chapter 78: Hugo

  Chapter 79: Rivkah

  Chapter 80: Vince

  Chapter 81

  Chapter 82: Hugo

  Chapter 83: Rivkah

  Chapter 84: Vince

  Chapter 85: Hugo

  Chapter 86: Hugo

  Chapter 87: Rivkah

  Chapter 88: Vince

  Chapter 89: Hugo

  Chapter 90: Hugo

  Chapter 91: Rivkah

  Chapter 92: Vince

  Chapter 93: Hugo

  Chapter 94: Vince

  Chapter 95: Hugo

  Chapter 96: Vince

  Chapter 97: Hugo

  Chapter 98: Hugo

  Chapter 99: Hugo

  Chapter 100: Rivkah

  Chapter 101: Hugo

  Chapter 102: Rivkah

  Chapter 103: Vince

  Chapter 104: Hugo

  Chapter 105: Hugo

  Chapter 106: Hugo

  Chapter 107: Vince

  Chapter 108: Rivkah

  Chapter 109: Hugo

  Chapter 110: Rivkah

  Chapter 111: Rivkah

  Chapter 112: Vince

  Chapter 113: Vince

  Chapter 114: Rivkah

  Chapter 115: Hugo

  Chapter 116: Rivkah

  Chapter 117: Vince

  Chapter 118: Rivkah

  Chapter 119: Rivkah

&nb
sp; Chapter 120: Rivkah

  Chapter 121

  Acknowledgments

  For Rachel L., with thanks for being my first audience, marvelous editor, powerful role model, and incomparable friend.

  The Characters of Isaac’s Beacon

  (in order of appearance)

  Éva, a young woman who escapes Vienna at the start of the Nazis’ rise

  Gabbi, the younger sister Éva left behind in Vienna

  Mrs. Pappel, a Viennese woman who befriends Éva on the ship to Palestine

  Emile, an Austrian boy, friend of Éva’s and firebrand

  Rivkah Gellerman, the name of a deceased Jewish woman Éva takes as her own

  Hugo Ungar, a Jewish survivor of Buchenwald

  Vince Haas, German-born American reporter for the New York Herald Tribune, former U.S. Marine

  Capt. Beshears, U.S. Army officer in charge of Displaced Persons at Buchenwald

  Gideon, the American captain of the Berl Katznelson, an illegal ship to Palestine

  Julius, a Palmach fighter in Palestine

  Mr. Pinchus, the underground leader of the Irgun, a Jewish revolutionary force in Palestine

  Malik, an Arab gunrunner and poet, friend of Rivkah and Mrs. Pappel

  Yakob, redheaded Palmach fighter

  Dennis, news editor of the Herald Tribune, Vince’s boss in New York

  Dov Gruner Irgun, fighter captured by the British, sentenced to hang

  Judge, kidnapped by the Irgun in Jerusalem and held hostage to prevent the hanging of Dov Gruner

  Warden, the administrator of the Russian Compound prison near the Old City in Jerusalem

  Moshe Barazani and Meir Feinstein, underground fighters captured by the British and sentenced to hang together at the Russian Compound; Barazani fought with the Stern Gang, also known as the Lehi; Feinstein was an Irgun fighter

  Bill Bernstein, American sailor, second mate aboard the illegal Jewish ship Exodus 1947, killed during the skirmish when the Exodus was boarded at sea by British marines

  Judge Emil Sandström, Swedish chairman of the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine (UNSCOP)

  Uzi, the commanding officer of the Palmach force at Kfar Etzion

  Glossary of Terms

  (in order of appearance)

  The Mandate of Palestine – following World War I, the League of Nations gave Britain the mandate to administer the territories of Palestine and Transjordan, both surrendered by the Ottomans after the war

  Atlit – refugee camp north of Haifa, run by the British to hold undocumented Jewish immigrants before deporting them out of Palestine

  Buchenwald – complex of Nazi concentration camps built near Weimar, Germany; one of the first and largest camps to hold prisoners from across Europe and the Soviet Union

  Kibbutz – a Jewish communal farm in Palestine

  Gush Etzion – a bloc of four kibbutzim ten miles south of Jerusalem on the cusp of the Negev; the bloc includes Kfar Etzion, Massuot Yitzhak, Ein Tzurim, and Revadim

  Displaced Persons (DPs) – United Nations term for the millions forcibly removed from their homes during World War II; many returned to their homelands while the rest emigrated elsewhere

  Ma’apilim – Hebrew word for immigrants to Palestine

  Haverim – Hebrew word for settlers, primarily farmers

  Aliyah Bet – the Haganah’s organized effort to smuggle Jewish refugees and immigrants into the Mandate of Palestine

  Yishuv – the Jewish population of Mandate Palestine

  Jewish Agency – the official government of the Yishuv

  Haganah – the underground armed force of the Jewish Agency, originally created in 1920 to protect remote Jewish settlements

  Palmach – the commandos of the Haganah

  Sten gun – a small submachine gun of British design, inexpensive and simple to fabricate

  Irgun – a paramilitary splinter group which left the Haganah in the belief that the Jewish Agency was too restrained in its defiance of the British occupation

  Lehi – also known as the Stern Gang; broke away from both the Haganah and Irgun; the smallest of the paramilitary resistance groups, Lehi was also the most violent

  Bren gun – a light, portable machine gun widely used by British armed forces

  Kharda – Arabic word for scrap iron, Hugo’s nickname

  Acre prison – twelfth-century Crusader fortress north of Haifa, used as a prison first by the Turks, then the British

  Russian Compound – in the mid-nineteenth century, Russia built a complex near Jerusalem’s Old City to accommodate Russian pilgrims to Jerusalem; the compound included a women’s hospice which the British Mandate government later turned into the city’s main prison

  Sappers – a military term for those who specialize in digging trenches, tunnels, and fortifications

  UNSCOP – in 1947, the United Nations Special Committee on Palestine was charged with investigating and recommending the governance of Palestine between the Jews and Arabs

  Neve Ovadia – the library in Kfar Etzion, the largest kibbutz of the Etzion bloc

  Lamed Hey – Hebrew numerals for thirty-five, a reference to the Haganah platoon killed while bringing, on foot, supplies to the blockaded Etzion bloc on January 16, 1948

  Spandau – a heavy machine gun widely used by the German armies in both World Wars

  Sharav – a dry, hot, sandy wind occurring sporadically in the Middle East during spring and autumn

  Operation Nachshon – the Haganah’s plan during the 1948 Jewish-Arab War to open the road for supplies from Tel Aviv to reach beleaguered Jerusalem; Nachshon was the name of the first man to leap onto the dry ground of the parted Red Sea when the Jewish people left bondage in Egypt

  Mukhtar – the leader of an Arab town or village

  1940

  God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”

  “Here I am,” Abraham replied.

  “Take your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”

  Genesis 22:2

  Restrain your voice from weeping and your eyes from shedding tears, for there is a reward for your labor; they shall return from the enemy’s land.

  And there is hope for the future; the children will return home.

  Jeremiah 31:16–17

  Chapter 1

  Éva

  September 28

  Vienna

  In his blue opera coat, Éva’s father rode beside her on the tram to the train station. Her mother and young sister filled the seat behind. Her father said nothing on the way; this was how he kept from shouting.

  At the station, the eastbound locomotive steamed while porters’ bells rang. The platform bustled with departure. Éva stood before the open door of a packed passenger car; every window held faces in profile and tears. Again, Éva told her father his decision to stay in Vienna was dangerous and foolish. He was being hardheaded. On no other day had she spoken to him like this, but she needed to be fearless at the last or carry away with her the burden of holding her own tongue.

  Her father lowered his head until his long grey goatee touched his starched collar. Gabbi broke from her mother to hug Éva’s waist; Éva crooked an arm around her sister.

  Her father spoke in a reined voice.

  “You chose to go.”

  “I want us all to go.”

  “Edvard.” Her mother stroked his arm from behind because she wanted him to speak gently. With effort, he did.

  “We will be alright.”

  “You believe this? The Germans? You believe this?”

  “There are a quarter million Jews in Vienna. What can they do?”

  Éva could imagine, and so could he. Why say it aloud if he would not?
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br />   “You’re sending me away.”

  “We are not sending you away.” His tone rose; her mother touched his arm again. “You asked for this.”

  “I want us to be safe. I’m afraid.”

  “So you leave your home. You leave my protection.”

  “I leave so you’ll come behind me.”

  “You don’t believe I can protect you. Say it. Say you don’t.”

  “I don’t. Not from the Germans.”

  “Good. You have that much courage, at least.”

  She indicated the many cars packed with Jews. “These people don’t feel safe here either.”

  “I’m not their father. I want my family to stay here. You want us to go. You make me say the hardest thing a father can say. So go.”

  “Follow me. I’ll have everything waiting for you in Palestine.”

  “Will you have your grandfather’s shop there?”

  “Papa.”

  “If I leave, the Germans will take it. And our home. They’ll empty my bank accounts. We’ll have nothing. Nothing to come back to. This is what I have. This is what my family built. And I should leave it? Stand here quietly while you tear everything to pieces?”

  “You can have a shop in Palestine.”

  “It wouldn’t be my father’s.”

  “But it would. You see, it would.”

  The locomotive screeched. Ghosts of steam riffled past. Éva cupped her small sister’s head.

  “Let me take Gabbi.”

  Her father had said all he was going to. He gestured for Éva’s mother to pull the younger girl away.

  Her mother bussed Éva’s cheek.

  “My child.”

  “Mutti. Make him come.”

  Her mother blinked above a final smile. “Make him? Did the two of you just meet?”

  “Come before it gets too late. Promise.”

  “We’ll be alright.”

  Éva embraced her. She found nothing to whisper into the soft curtain of her mother’s hair. She couldn’t beg or argue more—or say goodbye. Éva kissed her cheek.

  Her father took a backwards step. With hands that she had never before seen shake, he unbuttoned his blue opera coat. He smiled, too. He wanted to be remembered smiling. He held the long coat out for her to step into. Éva turned her back for him to drape the coat across her shoulders.

 

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