General Driss Ben Omar arrives the next morning. He’s popular in the school. A good sort. And for the first time we spend the day with our hands in our pockets. A special pleasure. I even experience a moment of strange nostalgia: the gasoline smell in the wake of the general’s convoy sends me voyaging; I inhale it as if it were perfume. To me, gasoline and a rumbling engine mean freedom. I leave the camp, go far away, climb into a limousine and tell the chauffeur, “Onward! Don’t stop until we reach the sea.” I lower the window and observe the landscape, I look at the people, I guess at their lives. The driver hands me a bottle of mineral water. I drink from a crystal glass. The fresh air is mild. Life is beautiful. The car rolls swiftly along to arrive before sunset. I must see that famous green flash. It is so rare, but today’s my lucky day, and besides, the general has gone off in a jeep, leaving his official limousine for me. Comfort is a luxury that does not cross the threshold of reverie.
The next day, pockets must be sewn back up. Daily life goes on as before: barely mediocre food; iron discipline; punishment threatened for the slightest mistake or infraction of the rules. One mustn’t try to understand.
The winter grows ever harsher. The commandant learns that one of us has a powerful radio and is in contact with abroad. The unfortunate shepherd of Beni Mellal, accused of spying, is condemned to the worst of punishments. I’d already seen it that summer: his entire body will be buried, except for his head, left exposed to the elements. He risks dying of the cold. But my pal the shepherd says nothing. He’s a man inured to the severities of the seasons. He allows himself to be led out of the school grounds, escorted by a soldier. The next day, when he is dug up again, he is ashamed: he has pissed and shat himself. That is what enrages him. “The cold is nothing,” he tells us, “but soiling yourself without being able to move or wash is worst of all.”
As for me, I’m not getting any more news about Régis Debray, who has become a kind of virtual companion. I think about him without knowing his face or his voice. A long-distance complicity unites us, even though his fate is much more dramatic than mine. One of the student organizers whispers to me, “Debray has been condemned to death by Bolivia. He’s done for.” I feel sad. I imagine a young man, hardly older than we are, a revolutionary, ready to die for his ideas. I think about his parents.
Revolt? Absolutely not. A camp ruled by fear functions through time-tested methods. Any rebellion can become a massacre that is then deemed justifiable in defense of the state. Good riddance to those troublemakers, the press won’t ever hear about them. Killed for having fomented armed revolt? Legitimate defense! Classic scenario. Perhaps Commandant Hamadi is trying to drive us to such extremities. We sense that he wants blood to flow. Putting down a riot would make him feel useful. The left-wing press knows nothing about this. Some people did learn that young students were sent to the army to do their military service: nothing to get alarmed or indignant about.
Diarrhea. Dysentery caused by our latest meal. Spoiled meat. Some of us have fever, others are vomiting, everyone has colic. We laugh about it. All are equal in the discomforts of a general condition. At least we all remain in the camp the next day. The orderly distributes pills for us to swallow. No one has any appetite anymore, which in itself is a good thing.
In spite of the bromide, two of our companions have gone over the wall during the night to visit the whores. The next morning they’re summoned by the commandant, who tells them, “You have already given yourselves your own punishment. All the whores hereabouts are sick; I am not punishing you, I’m waiting until you’re no longer able to piss.”
The infirmary has been ordered not to take care of them. And indeed, they’ve both caught a painful case of the clap. It will remain untreated until they can leave the camp, when the malady will have already led to complications. The punishment is a dreadful one.
I am summoned by the commandant. I arrive, salute, stand at attention.
“So, you write poems!”
“Yes, commandant.”
“I’ve read them, I didn’t understand a thing. Who is this Orpheus?”
“A figure in mythology, a poet and musician . . . It’s very ancient history.”
“Ah, you write poems about things from another time. Fine, I’m giving them back to you. It’s our beloved country you should be writing about and here’s an idea for you: why don’t you compose a beautiful poem about our magnificent flag for the next Throne Celebration? You see this color? It’s the red of our blood, and this green star is our agricultural patrimony, our wealth for which every Moroccan is ready to fight and give his life. Now that’s poetry, while you, you hide out in ancient history of no interest.”
Stammering, I tell him that poetry is something that can’t be controlled. He makes a face, then waves me out.
A second window has been broken, this time in the officers’ club. The commandant decides on a new kind of collective punishment: each of us must denounce someone; whoever refuses goes to prison for as many days as there are letters in his name. Me, it’s ten days. I didn’t denounce anyone. Here I am in a cell with two other guys I don’t know and who haven’t any idea why they are there.
These denunciations produce surprising results. Out of the ninety-three here punished by the king, only twenty snitched on someone. I don’t want to judge them; people do what suits them. My father taught me that such things should not be done. He told me about the militants for Moroccan independence who were denounced to the French police during the Protectorate and all tortured or sent into exile, and also about the Jews denounced in France by neighbors, those close to them, people without dignity or morality. He made me understand that within the family, we do not betray others. The commandant is furious. His maneuver has failed. He calls even the twenty informers traitors. After three days, he orders us freed and has us resume training for future maneuvers.
It’s springtime: the sky is a very soft blue, the air is cool, the mountains white, and the commandant is in a good humor. He has just been made a lieutenant colonel. He announced this to us himself, and to celebrate he has decided to grant us one day’s leave. This is the first time that we can leave the school and walk freely in the streets. My parents live just over three hundred miles away. Traveling there to embrace them is impossible. Our leave begins at eight in the morning and ends at midnight. Lateness will incur severe penalties; desertion will be punishable by death. One of the lieutenants has kindly warned us, “Don’t try to escape, or your brothers and parents will be the ones to pay a heavy price.” He mentions the case of Lahmri, a sergeant who deserted to join a woman with whom he was besotted: caught, he was imprisoned and judged by a special court, as Morocco was then at war with Algeria. He was executed; the press reported it. Executed to set an example. So I settle for a walk through the town of Ahermoumou. Actually, it’s a village, where there is nothing. I look for a phone booth. There is none. There is a post office, but it’s been closed. I’m told that Hamza the grocer has a phone. I’d pay dearly to hear my mother’s voice. Hamza is at the mosque. I wait with a pal of mine. One of the grocer’s neighbors advises us to go look for him because he sometimes falls asleep after prayers. And here we are in the mosque, boots in hand, inquiring about Hamza the grocer. And yes, he’s quietly napping, leaning against a pillar. I shake him gently. He jerks awake, thinking Satan is nudging him.
“What do you want? Can’t a person be left in peace?”
I beg him to go back with us so we can use his phone.
“It doesn’t work. I haven’t paid the bill, they’re such thieves. So I’m through with the phone. Go in peace.”
We leave sadly. We eat a tagine of lamb with olives and preserved lemon. The restaurant isn’t very clean but the tagine cooked over coals is good. After eating our fill, we head back. Some women wink at us. My companion is tempted; I hold him back: they are prostitutes who have never seen a doctor. That scares him and we return to the school with relief.
The next day, the platoon leaders call the ro
ll and report to the commandant: all present and accounted for!
That day they teach us how to disassemble and reassemble the MAS-36 bolt-action rifle. For the first time I discover how the parts of this weapon fit together. Then we tackle the pistol. I smile, thinking of Humphrey Bogart fiddling with this weapon. After these drills, they have us repeat the assembly and disassembly lessons blindfolded. I flunk. “Ah,” the lieutenant says to me, “it’s the poet who can’t figure it out!” I keep quiet. The others laugh. I’m embarrassed. The commandant is behind this, he wants to make fun of me.
Friday is our day for couscous and the firing range. The guns shoot blanks. Every shot rattles my limbs, especially my shoulder, and leaves me deaf for a few minutes. Rumors are going around: we’re being prepared for a lightning strike on the Algerian border. The idea that General Oufkir is trying to eliminate us in a “patriotic” way keeps running through my head. He’s quite capable of it. All last year the French press debated his involvement in the kidnapping and murder of Mehdi Ben Barka. Whipping up a little blitzkrieg with a neighbor and getting us wiped out at the same time . . . I’m suspicious, but those I call the politicals are convinced of it, and one of the leaders of UNEM in particular. He has marshaled his arguments:
“We are political prisoners, even if we don’t all have the same status. We represent a risk for those in power. What we have gone through here, what the army has done and is still doing to us, is something the higher-ups want to keep under wraps. The army is not an instrument of repression, and it has a reputation to defend. That’s what makes our disappearance a plausible conjecture. They’ll turn us into heroes fallen for the fatherland and give us medals when we’re dead. The tensions with Algeria are real. Anything can happen.”
Suddenly I feel cold, as if an icy wind had just confirmed the hypotheses of this eloquent man. I tell myself that everything is possible, but one can’t eliminate ninety-three people in an attack. It’s not believable. I keep thinking: possible, impossible, plausible, implausible . . . Anything can happen . . . Why haven’t we had any information about how long we’ll be held captive? That’s understandable: we haven’t had a trial, because no government body has officially determined our status. Well, how long does a person’s military service last? It depends on the country. Since Morocco had no institution of military service before our arrest, it’s impossible to envision any specific release date for us.
I’m hungry. We’re hungry. The food is decent but insufficient. Besides, we have to carry out all orders on the double. Yesterday some of us repainted the commandant’s house. Today, we’re out in the sun. We must stand still and remain silent. I guess the big boss must rack his brains every evening to find a new way to mistreat us. I push back against this mistreatment, and I’m proud of that. Hunger gives me migraines. I resist by thinking of a meadow full of flowers and butterflies of every color.
LIBERATION YES, LIBERATION NO
June 5, 1967: War is declared between Israel and the Arab nations. Maximum alert. Assembly at six a.m. The big boss has something to tell us. The heat hasn’t yet reached its zenith. We wait. He arrives in battle dress, his baton under his arm. You’d think he was going to film a commercial along the lines of “Join the Army and See the World.” He begins:
“The Zionist enemy has struck. Our brothers in Egypt, Syria, and Jordan are fighting valiantly. We must be ready at any moment to go to their aid. As it is, know that we are at war, so remain on the alert! Attention! At ease! Attention! At ease!”
Marcel is summoned to the lieutenant colonel’s office.
Marcel is set free. Orders from Rabat. Now is not the time to risk an incident involving a Jew. Marcel collects his civilian things, puts them in a bag, and bids farewell to us one by one. Some men tell him, “You’re lucky,” others say, “Hurry back.” Still, there are a few who will badmouth him: “Liberated, he’ll go fight with his Zionist brothers.” Marcel has never felt anything but Moroccan as both Arab and Jew. He belongs to the millions of Jewish families who have always lived side by side with Muslims. But he did tell us one time that someone from the Israeli secret service had come to urge his parents to emigrate to Israel. His father, from a long line of mattress makers, refused. The agent threatened him with retaliation. The father replied, “I’m fine where I am, I have nothing in common with Poles or Americans simply because we are Jews.” The agent had kept at him, but Marcel’s father had not given in.
After a week, the alert was over. Bitter defeat for the Arabs. No comment within our ranks. Our silence reflects our despair.
We spend the summer on more and more dangerous maneuvers. We are exhausted. We scale a mountain, laden like mules while having to evade enemy fire. Our captain is not playing the game: he protects us, shows us where to hide and rest. He’s not happy to be among those chosen to punish us. Later we will learn that he was demoted and posted to the Sahara.
We decide to petition for a little more food. But how can we win our case? One of our politicals asks to see a captain close to the lieutenant colonel: a promise of improvement, but nothing happens. Although we can tell that the lieutenant in charge of our weapons training does not really agree with these words, he drums them into us: “In the army, no protesting, no petitioning, only obedience.” So, we’re stuck with the skimpy rations. But Halim, one of the politicals, has an idea: ask the shepherd who grazes his flock on the other side of the barbed wire around the shooting range if he’s willing to sell us a lamb. To our great surprise, the shepherd accepts. Halim begins to collect the money. Everyone gives what he can. Which adds up to a tidy sum. The shepherd shows us the lamb. But now what do we do? It’s simple: he’ll take care of everything. He’ll cut its throat, prepare it, then deliver it on Friday as roasted méchoui lamb! He takes the money and of course vanishes forever.
The news reaches the ears of the big boss. He laughs, it seems, until he almost chokes. At least this episode preoccupies us for a while; the meals remain the same. Halim asks the big boss if he can go after the shepherd. Not a chance. “That will teach you not to trust just anyone!” Hunger has made us naive.
It’s July. I’ve been interned a whole year: not something to celebrate. There’s nothing to celebrate—except perhaps that we’ve survived the whims of psychopaths, had a few close brushes with death, seen men crawl like animals before a sadistic officer, discovered the weak points of a few superiors, and still don’t know if one day we will ever leave this prison that will not speak its name. No news from our families. But in his great goodness the boss has allowed us to write to our parents in letters that are read before they are sent. Mine is simple:
My dear Father, I hope that this letter will find you in good health, will reassure my mother, and bring you both good news. Here everything’s fine. We engage in sports, we eat well, and we learn to love and defend our country. Don’t worry about anything: everyone takes wonderful care of us. We lack for nothing—except that I miss the sight of your face. May God keep you and grant you long life.
Your son blessed by you.
I know that my father is sharp enough to read between the lines. And anyway, he mustn’t be upset.
One month later, I receive a letter from my father that I have very carefully preserved, so extraordinary is this document. In refined classical Arabic he informs me of his situation while blessing and addressing me in the language of a great lord forbidden to show emotion:
In the name of God and His Messenger may Salvation be upon Him.
Our beloved son, our pride, our grandeur!
Ever since you left, we know how useful you are to the nation we all of us adore and above all else thanks to our King, may God glorify him and lend him long life and make him triumph over all his adversaries.
Our beloved son. We are well and we are proud that you have been chosen to serve God, the Nation, and the King! Your mother is well even though she is a little worried from not seeing you more often, but she has a feeling that soon you will come visit her. It must be said
that the house is empty without you especially since your brother went to study in France. We are alone with the woman who helps your mother with the housework.
I hope this letter will find you in good and perfect health; we think of you and we await you, dear beloved son.
May God keep you and protect you; may God keep and glorify our King. Long live the King, Long live Morocco!
Your father, humble servant of God.
I read and reread his message. I decode it. My father is aware of the repression and machinations of the military. Reading between the lines: the references to the king are for the censor who will check the letter. I know that my father has never carried in his heart this king whom everyone fears but doesn’t really love. I understand that in reality, my mother is ill. I slip the letter under my pillow, thinking that I will see my parents in my dreams.
That night, however, I dream mostly of Ava Gardner. I miss her. Her deep voice, her black and shining eyes, her allure, her insolence, I miss all that. The last time I saw her was in The Barefoot Contessa. In fact I miss everything that has anything to do with the movies, which are my absolute passion, and I truly suffer from not going to see them anymore. To think that just a few months before my arrest I saw Sidney Lumet’s The Hill . . . a film that shows how a sadistic and obsessively strict warrant officer torments military inmates in a prison camp from which not everyone gets out alive. Impressed by the power of this almost documentary-style film that also features exceptionally physical performances by its leads, I thought at the time that what happens in that prison was unreal. I have however been living for a year in a very real remake of that film. Without the camera.
The Punishment Page 7