Birthright

by Alan Gold

  Zakki’s mind was intrigued by the politics but confused about what this had to do with him.

  “If the boy-imam dies, then this city, and I fear much of the empire of the Abbasids, will be torn apart by civil warfare, and all will be lost. This must be prevented.”

  “Then warn the boy and his family,” said Zakki matter-of-factly. “Go to him and tell him to leave.”

  Hadir sat back on his stool. “I cannot. Al-Mu’tasim has ears everywhere in the palace. I am too visible. Were I to warn the boy, then I and others will be killed, and the boy will die regardless.”

  Zakki thought for a moment. “Send another, then.”

  Hadir shook his head. “I cannot be seen to be sending a Muslim. The hatred between the factions is unfathomable. Somebody would betray us.”

  “Then send a Christian.” Zakki half turned and looked at the café owner.

  “The Shi’ites would never listen to a Christian. Muslims accept Jesus as a prophet, but the Christians go much beyond that and teach that Jesus was the son of Adonai Elohim, and that’s a heresy in the eyes of Islam. No, I need a different messenger.” Hadir looked intently into Zakki’s eyes.

  The Jerusalem doctor understood. “No,” he said simply. Involuntarily, he reached to his throat and touched the seal around his neck.

  Hadir did not flinch or balk at the flat refusal. “It must be a Jew who delivers the warning. And that man must be credible and free of all connections. A man who is clean.”

  Zakki was a man who lived inside of books and scrolls and his own thoughts, but he was not naive. The House of Wisdom was the most wondrous place he had ever been, and he felt more at home there than anywhere, but he was still a stranger in a strange land. Politics was a desert of shifting sands and deep rifts, and Zakki knew nothing of those involved. To align himself, to become a part of intrigues he did not understand, could be disastrous.

  “I want no part of this,” he said, even as he looked around the flanking bodyguards of the vizier standing at watch around the square.

  Hadir seemed to consider the response. His eyes remained fixed on Zakki’s. “You have so much to gain here, Doctor. So much this city, this land, can offer you. There is no center of learning in the world to rival Baghdad. And yet you also have very much to lose.”

  Zakki found himself leaning back on his stool and wishing he might stand and leave. But the eyes of Hadir held him rooted to the spot. All he could do was repeat his answer to the question Hadir never asked. “I want no part of this.”

  “I’m afraid, Zaccharius, son of Jacob, of Jerusalem, that you are already a part of this.”

  “You have no power over me. I will not be compelled.”

  Hadir smiled insincerely once more. “You have a family, yes? A beautiful family. Dorit and the children . . .”

  Zakki’s eyes widened.

  “Anyone can be compelled, my dear doctor. And it is a simple thing I ask.”

  Jerusalem

  1947

  JUDIT SAT LISTENING to Lehi leader Israel Eldad address the members of the larger and more moderate Jewish freedom-fighting force, the Irgun. The year before, Yitzhak Shamir had been captured by the British and exiled to Africa. He had escaped and sought asylum in France. In his place, Israel Eldad had become one of the major figures in Lehi. Where he once was focused on ideological determination for the group, he was now actively leading the struggle.

  As Judit listened, she was reminded of the old saying: “Two Jews, three opinions.” Lehi was one of a number of militant groups formed under the British mandate of Palestine, and they were often far from united. While the ultimate goal might have been shared, the methods and opinions on how to achieve that goal were varied and, at times, contradictory. Beria and Judit’s Soviet commanders had selected Lehi as the best vehicle for Judit, as the group of freedom fighters represented the most hard-line, the most determined, and the most willing to do what needed to be done. No doubt Beria had placed other agents in other groups, but Judit likely would never know their names or who they were.

  As she listened to Eldad, she tried to reconcile the dichotomy within her. On the one hand, Lehi as a militant Zionist organization had moved toward Moscow as a way of ridding Palestine of the British and their mandate; at the same time, she was working secretly to rid Palestine of those militant Zionists and more mainstream politicians who would oppose such a union. Only through knowing that her secret goals for Soviet Russia were both aligned with and yet divergent from those around her was she able to reconcile the need for unity. And this was why the two groups, Lehi and Irgun, were coming together.

  The leader of the Irgun, Menachem Begin, kept looking at Judit, and she wondered whether he was more interested in her as a woman than in the discussion taking place about the two organizations working hand in hand to fight the British.

  Menachem Begin reminded her strangely of the NKVD captain who’d come for her that day at the schoolhouse. She realized that he was neither looking at her nor through her but working out where she fit into his scheme of things. She could almost see the cogs of his mind figuring out whether she could be used as a seductress, or as a killer, or as a decoy.

  Judit turned her eyes from him and looked intently at the wiry Eldad. He was talking about the importance of increasing the assaults against the British, and the atmosphere in the room lay heavily on the shoulders of the thirteen men and two women. None underestimated the importance of the decisions they would soon make. If they increased their violence against the British army, public hostility on the streets of London might force their parliament to pull them out of the land; it could also oblige the British government to dramatically increase the numbers of soldiers stationed in Palestine. The imposition of martial law was a real possibility, which would have negative effects on their operations.

  “We’re at the turning point, my comrades,” said Israel Eldad. “We always knew we would be surrounded by enemies, Arab and British. But it is the British who have the most to lose. Here they are occupiers, so their will is weak. The world’s media is on our side. There are stories in the American and European newspapers about British soldiers assaulting Jewish refugees. This we can leverage, and from this the British can be broken and sent back to their homeland. Now is the time to strike harder and not diminish our struggle.”

  There were nods and murmurs of agreement around the table. Menachem Begin surveyed the faces of his Irgun colleagues and the young Lehi men and women. He was a shrewd politician who could smell the winds of change. He knew that if he didn’t agree to a joint assault, then Lehi would walk away from the Irgun, and both organizations would be diminished.

  Judit cast her eyes across the room from Menachem to Eldad and back. These two men were very important to her goals. If a future Israel would be an effective communist client of Soviet Russia, then future political power may rest with these men; and if that was the case, then perhaps Begin would have to be dealt with.

  • • •

  A week after the meeting, late at night and well beyond the hour of curfew that the British army had imposed on the nation because of the killings, fifteen people, alone and in small groups, made their way through the streets to a designated point. There were thirteen men and two women. One of the women was Judit. The other was a Tunisian Jewish girl named Ashira, new to Lehi but so bristling with gritted determination that Judit could not help but wonder what events marred her past.

  The group converged on the quiet and dark of the Alliance Girls’ School, a modest but well-constructed building set back from the street. The caretaker of the school was a covert member of Lehi who had cleared the building and waited for the group in the dark.

  The caretaker ushered them in quickly and led them to the school’s hall. With just a small oil lamp casting a dim orange glow, the group found a long table where British army uniforms were laid out. The men put on the uniforms, while Judit and Ashira ensured that their weapons were loaded with ammunition.

  When they were
ready, Israel Eldad inspected each man as though on a parade ground. Satisfied that they would pass muster if an officer happened to demand an inspection, he nodded and ordered them to prepare to move out. He then turned to Judit and put a hand on her shoulder, drawing her away from the group and lowering his voice.

  “I know you, Judit. I know you would like to put on one of those uniforms and fire the first shot into the building.”

  Judit raised a corner of her mouth in a wry smile.

  “But your task is more important. The British will respond quickly. They are prepared, and they’re scared. The rear access is too narrow; when help comes, it will come to the front door. This is where you will be, machine gun at the ready. You understand? No one enters that building while our boys are inside.”

  Judit gave a curt nod, and Eldad squeezed her shoulder once more. “Good. Now go. And take care of Ashira.”

  Judit often wondered about her Lehi comrades and whether they, like her, were agents for the Soviet Union. Was Eldad under the wing of the NKVD? Would he be part of the push for a great communist state in Palestine? Was this why he was pushing Lehi so strongly toward Comrade Stalin, or was it only because of his hatred of Britain?

  Judit nodded again and turned to Ashira, standing behind her. They picked up their bulky weapons and followed the men out of the door. It was two in the morning, but none of the men or women was tired. They were alive with the task ahead.

  The two women climbed into the back of a truck that had been painted the previous day in the colors of the British army. It was not a perfect imitation, but in the dark of night, to a casual observer it would pass.

  Judit, and Ashira, along with ten men, sat silently on wooden benches on either side of the truck’s cargo area. The other three men had stepped into a waiting taxi. The plan was that the taxi would drive past the Officers’ Club, and if there were no vehicles parked in front of the building, they’d stop and pretend to pay the driver while the truck pulled up behind them.

  One of the men was Dov; she’d once met him with Shalman, but now that her husband was no longer intimately part of the group, more father to their child than freedom fighter, she and Dov had developed their own friendship. She enjoyed her infrequent moments with Dov, listening to the kind of boy Shalman had been on his kibbutz.

  Theirs were among the very few vehicles on the road that night due to the curfew. Judit wasn’t frightened as they drove at a normal Jerusalem speed toward King David Street. She had reconciled herself years ago to the fragility of her existence and had come to terms with the possibility of being killed during one of these operations. It was for this reason alone that she had deliberately distanced herself from her daughter, Vered. It pained her; she could not deny who she was as a mother. But she had been trained to remain focused on larger objectives; if the future for her daughter was to live within a safe and unified communist state under the protection of the Soviet motherland, then it would take people like Judit to make such sacrifices.

  Her solace for both her private and political lives was that, on the one hand, she was not the only agent of Beria and the NKVD in Palestine and, on the other, the way Shalman doted on their daughter, she knew deep down that if her existence were snuffed out by a British bullet, Vered would be safe and loved with her father.

  It was these recognitions that steadied her resolve as she rode in the truck toward the British Officers’ Club in Goldschmidt House.

  Judit glanced over at Ashira and saw that the young woman was nervous. She leaned forward and smiled at her. “Don’t worry. It’ll go like clockwork. We’re taking them by surprise.”

  Ashira nodded, and while the nervousness didn’t dissolve, the fierce determination to see it through was evident in her eyes.

  Ashira had escaped anti-Semitic gangs murdering the ancient Jewish communities in Tunisia and had been gang-raped on her journey on foot across the top of Africa by Bedouin, who’d left her for dead. Somehow, she’d survived and managed to cross from the west to the east of Egypt to reach Palestine. Once she arrived, she was quickly taken into the bosom of Lehi and her hatred was given focus. But her reasons for the fight differed from those in the truck. She’d joined Lehi to fight Arabs, not the British. She would follow orders; she had no other choice, no other family. But to Ashira at the moment, Sten gun in hand, she felt like her real enemy was still waiting.

  The two vehicles reached the intersection with King George Street, checked that there was no traffic, and turned right. They drove slowly north toward the Officers’ Club. But the taxi drove past when he saw three Jeeps parked outside. The truck trundled past. One of the officers standing on the pavement looked at the truck, full of servicemen in British uniform. Instantly, Dov stood and shouted out “tenshun” and saluted. It was a gesture returned by the officer, who gave a desultory salute, little more than a wave of his hand, as he walked into the grounds, past the guard post and barbed wire.

  The vehicles drove three streets away and turned left, then left again. The taxi stopped for ten minutes and the truck pulled up behind it in the small side street, all of the expectant occupants nervously waiting for the agreed-upon time to elapse before they could try again.

  With a nod from Dov, the taxi driver started the engine, and the convoy drove to the end of the street, then turned left twice until they were back on King George. This time the road ahead was clear; the vehicles outside the Officers’ Club had driven away. The taxi drove up to the entrance and three Jewish men dressed in British officers’ uniforms got out, carrying fully laden cases. The truck pulled over to the other side of the street, and as the uniformed NCOs jumped down, Judit and Ashira carefully positioned their machine guns on the left side of the vehicle.

  The three disguised officers pretended to pay the driver, and the taxi drove off. They walked across the pavement toward the guard post. One of them appeared to take out his identity papers, and after the two guards had saluted, they waited without any concerns for the men to prove their identity before going back inside.

  Suddenly, two dull cracks fractured the silence of the night, the pistols’ silencers preventing any but those closest from hearing anything. Both of the British soldiers guarding the club fell down dead, and Judit watched anxiously as the three Irgun and Lehi men crossed the large external courtyard. The other men followed quickly, rifles and machine guns poised for immediate firing.

  As they burst through the doors of the club, the sound of gunfire echoed off the buildings in the street. Judit looked carefully and saw flashes of light illuminate the interior of the darkened lobby. She looked up to the higher levels where the officers’ bedrooms were located; no lights had been turned on. Bullets were a common sound in the Jerusalem night.

  Judit and Ashira scanned the road to the north and south, their machine guns placed on tripods as they made ready to blast any approaching British army vehicle with round after round of fire. But it was the early hours of a Jerusalem morning, and there was no traffic on the roads.

  The gunfire inside the building became more intense as night staff realized that they were under attack and came running toward the vestibule of the club to defend the building.

  Inside, Dov and three of his compatriots were taking the bombs out of the cases and standing them against pillars that supported the upper floors. Dov made sure the first of the bombs, one planted by him, was primed and ready and that the timer clock was counting down the 120 seconds before exploding. Quickly, he placed a mattress around the pillar, completely covering the bomb, then secured it with wire so when the bomb exploded, most of its force would be directed into the structure instead of out into the air.

  He then ran, risking being shot in the cross fire, to the other three pillars, making sure all of the timers were working properly before he placed mattresses around them. Then he barked at his colleagues, “Let’s go. Now!”

  With that, they all turned and ran crouching toward the door, their exit covered by a merciless barrage of rifle fire from the men d
ressed as privates and corporals to provide armed support so the bomb planters could set their devices.

  As Dov and his three companions ran past, he shouted, “Follow us—forty-five seconds.”

  They emerged into the night air, straightened up, and ran across the courtyard for the barbed-wire entry. For the first time, Dov felt secure enough to turn and ensure that his men were safe. The three bomb planters were by his side, and he looked anxiously for the rest of the team of ten to escape. Thirty seconds before the bombs were due to explode, they came scampering out of the building and into the courtyard.

  Judit looked up and saw several lights on in the rooms above. More men had been wakened by the hellish commotion in the lobby. She saw a couple of men in pajamas going to the windows and looking down on the street. Then the men in her troop came running across the road toward her truck. She and Ashira jumped down, leaving the machine guns. Dov shouted to the truck driver to go. He started the engine and drove as quickly as he could to a wadi three miles west of Jerusalem. Once there, the plan was to push the vehicle down the cliff, along with the machine guns. After a night of such devastation, the last thing the freedom fighters wanted was to be caught at a road block wearing British uniforms and in possession of such weaponry.

  Judit watched the truck drive off and turned to look at the building. It seemed as though somebody had turned on a massive arc light inside the darkened lobby of the club. From all of the lower windows, a brilliant light burst out, illuminating the trees and shrubs in the gardens. And then the windows blew out, releasing most of the hellish fury as flame, smoke, and a blast of ear-shattering din. The other three bombs went off within seconds. And above the nightmare tumult of the explosions came the screams of men who were thrown out of windows, of NCOs whose bodies were aflame in the conflagration, of kitchen staff trying to escape the inferno.