Birthright

by Alan Gold

  “I know that many of you hate the Jews, but perhaps that is because you don’t know them. My son Mustafa brought home a young man, badly injured and perhaps about to die. A man born a Jew. But the Koran demanded that we give him comfort, and by the grace of Allah, he recovered and prospered.

  “Allah is great and merciful. So when this young Jew stands before you to say what he has to say, I ask you to listen to his words. Because more than any other Jew, he has proved himself a man of good faith. He made a promise to my Mustafa that he would help him in his education, and he has been true to that promise. He is a man of trust.”

  Awad nodded to Shalman that it was his time. He stepped forward to face the congregation of Muslims. He cleared his throat, hoping he wouldn’t sound too nervous, hoping that his knowledge of idiomatic Arabic would prevent him from making a linguistic mistake.

  “I come here in peace. I come here on my own. Nobody has asked or told me to come. I am here because much is being said about what’s happening in Palestine. Some of it is true, but much of it is false and causing trouble between our two people, between Muslims and Jews . . .”

  In truth, Shalman had not prepared what he was going to say. There was no plan, just a need to speak. A conscience within that compelled him.

  “This should not be a question of blame. There’s enough blame for everyone. Too much blood has been spilled already. But if war comes, there will be much more. Too many tears and too much suffering.

  “The land is to be divided, a homeland for each of our peoples. The Jews have not had a home in two thousand years. This,” he said, pointing down, “is the homeland of Abraham, forefather of both our peoples. It is where Moses and Aaron stood. It is where the armies of Mohammed, peace and blessings be upon him, were sent to spread the light of Islam. It is a home rooted in the past but belonging to the present. Our present. When the United Nations votes to create Israel next door, then your people, too, will finally have a home that is not controlled by an overlord from far away but governed for yourselves.

  “But there are those who would tell us to hate. We are both the children of Abraham, and if we listen to those voices, the hatred will become louder and louder until nobody can think clearly.

  “I’ve come here today to ask you to shut your ears to those who will drive you to destruction. If your village of Ras Abu Yussuf, and a hundred villages like it, will shut their ears to the hysteria that surrounds them, if you’ll see the opportunity for both of our peoples to live side by side and share the wonders of this land, then there’s hope that there will be no more bloodshed.

  “The United Nations will send people to inspect the land, to see how we live together, to decide how the land should be divided. And when they do, there will be those on both sides who push for violence and killing and chaos. Why? Because each side will try to prove they are entitled to all the land. This is the case for both of us, Jews and Arabs. The madmen on both sides will try to prevail.

  “If we don’t participate, if we don’t listen to the voices of hatred, if we don’t take up arms, then there can be peace upon us all.”

  They were all the words he had. There was nothing left for Shalman to say. He looked at the audience. Some were listening, others were showing signs of growing anger, still others were drifting back to their homes. It was what he had thought would happen, but he had to take the risk.

  • • •

  Later, when everyone had dispersed, Shalman sat on the ground under an olive tree with Mustafa.

  “Well, at least they didn’t stone you.” Mustafa’s desert-dry humor carried not even a hint of a joke.

  “Do you think they were listening?”

  Mustafa gave his trademark shrug. “Perhaps.”

  “I know so little of your people. All I hear is the anger and rhetoric and hatred. But that’s not here. It’s not in you or Awad.”

  “We’re a tribal people. Family binds and defines us—brothers and cousins. The things that make us angry are personal, not political.” Mustafa stopped and reached up to pull a leaf from a low branch, seeming to take time to ponder what he might say next. “A boy was at a British airfield begging fuel from the soldiers. His name was Munir. There was an attack by the Jews, an explosion, a bomb, and the boy burned alive. This was in the mind of the village when you spoke . . . Not war, not the United Nations. They were thinking of a boy who should not be dead. And now they are angry because that boy was a cousin to one of the men who was listening to what you were saying, Shalman. You were talking about the United Nations; we were thinking about one of our cousins; everyone hates the Jews because his murder has come home to our village.”

  The words cut Shalman like a surgeon’s blade.

  “I know you fight the British, Shalman. Did you know about this?”

  Shalman lifted his gaze to meet Mustafa’s. “No,” he lied.

  Ten miles away from the village, Shalman’s daughter was being minded by a young student who lived in the apartment block three doors away. The girl’s arrival had enabled Judit to go to a meeting in a house that was a twenty-minute walk away.

  Judit hadn’t been to the house before; it was a safe house, probably owned by a Russian who harbored empathy for the motherland, and who had taken his family out to a meal in a good restaurant, paid for by Anastasia Bistrzhitska.

  When Judit arrived at the house, she knocked on the door. It was opened by Anastasia. Dressed in a tight sweater, pencil-slim skirt, sheer stockings, and high heels, she looked like she was going to the theater.

  Anastasia quickly closed the door after Judit and reached for her hand as she led her down the hallway into the living room, where the curtains were tightly closed. The two women sat down on opposite chairs, a table full of coffee and cakes between them.

  “A celebration?” said Judit.

  “Judit, my dearest, the first part of your mission is at an end. It has been conducted faultlessly. We couldn’t have asked for more. Many potential obstacles eliminated. And all without raising any eyebrows.” Anastasia gave Judit a sly and flirtatious wink. “You and your comrades are to be congratulated, my dear. Your leadership, your inspiration of the agents under your command, your control of their activities, has been extraordinary for a woman so young. And it has been noted at the very highest levels of the Kremlin.”

  There was a time when such praise would have made Judit proud; they were words she had lived for and silently dedicated every action to achieving. But now, as Anastasia looked at her and sat so close, Judit felt empty. The image of the professor through the window, his head in her gun sight, was seared into her mind. All Judit did was nod.

  “Darling! Is something wrong?”

  Judit shook her head.

  “I’ve known you since you were little more than a child. In many ways, I made you. And so you cannot pretend with me.” Anastasia leaned across and put a gentle hand on Judit’s knee.

  “I’m fine. I’m just tired.”

  “Of course you are, my dear. You are leading many lives at once.”

  “I’m one person for my husband and daughter, one for the fighters in Lehi and the Irgun, and another for you. Sometimes I can’t remember which face I’m wearing.”

  Anastasia smiled. “Your true face is here. With me. A Russian face. Loyal. Strong. Resolute. This is who you are. Who you have always been.” Anastasia leaned back and sipped her coffee. “I remember the day I took you to meet Comrade Beria. I’ve seen grown men faint at the thought of meeting him. But not you. No, no. You squared your shoulders, stood up straight, and faced him. It was at that moment, my little dove, that I knew you would go to great heights. And it’s those heights that I’ve asked you here to discuss.”

  Anastasia took another sip of coffee while observing Judit carefully. Her years of training in the manipulation of people told her that something had happened in the weeks since they’d met last, and her protégée was at a turning point. Handled poorly, Anastasia knew, this valuable woman might be lost.

&nbs
p; “But there’s more, isn’t there? Tell me, darling Judita, what’s the matter?”

  Judit was no longer staring at her Russian controller but at the table; then at the window, through the curtains, and beyond at an unseen vista of bloodied bodies and hatred in the streets. “Just tired,” she repeated.

  But Anastasia was not so easily dissuaded. Putting down her coffee, she leaned closer, elbows on her knees, to take one of Judit’s hands.

  “Is it the killing? Or the lies you have to tell?”

  Judit knew they were the words of someone who once felt as she did, someone who knew and understood, someone who had also looked down the barrel of a rifle to kill a man she never knew.

  Judit’s body deflated, as though all the life had drained out of her. “I don’t know. I truly don’t. I know what I’m doing is for the good of our future, but the cost is so great. I wasn’t born a killer; that’s what I had to become. And I wasn’t born a liar, but I no longer know when I’m telling the truth.”

  And then the dam broke. It started softly, with a catch of breath. Then a gasp of air, and the tears began to flow, and Judit was sobbing, burying her face in her hands, crying like a baby. Anastasia held her tightly, like Judit’s mother used to hold her when her father came home in one of his drunken rages.

  Through her sobs, Judit said, “I miss my baby. I hardly know Vered.”

  “You are not alone,” Anastasia whispered. “And you are not weak. It happens to all of us.” And then she hit on a brilliant idea. “Darling little dove, we’re going to take a trip: you, me, and Vered. We’re going to get out of here.”

  “A trip? Where?”

  “To Moscow. It is time your little one saw the motherland. It’s time your parents saw their granddaughter. In this way, you’ll feel like the mother you deserve to be.”

  Anastasia paused, letting the idea settle in. Then she said softly, “And when you’re there, my dove, when you’re removed from the fighting and the murder, when you walk in Gorky Park and along the Moskva River and look at the domes of St. Basil’s, and when we’re sitting in a café sipping coffee and there’s no gunfire, just happy Russians enjoying life, then you’ll begin to feel like the old Judita, the young woman who is going to run for the Knesset, and who, one day, will become prime minister of Israel. Yes?”

  Judit looked at her in amazement. “Prime minister?” She burst out laughing, but Anastasia’s face was serious. “You’re joking, aren’t you?”

  Anastasia smiled slyly. “I’m Russian. I have no sense of humor. You’re destined to be prime minister of Israel. It’s part of our long-term planning. And Comrade Stalin himself is looking forward to meeting you and discussing your political path.”

  PART THREE

  Cathedral of Clermont, Auvergne region of central France

  November 27, 1095

  HIS KNEES ACHED from three hours of prayer on a freezing stone floor. When Otho de Lagery, revered by much of the Catholic world as Pope Urban II, rose to his feet, his sacristan and his confessor rushed over to grasp him under the arms and aid his standing.

  Pope Urban was successor to Pope Victor III. His predecessor, who had spent most of his time hiding from the papacy in a Benedictine monastery in Monte Cassino, had been faced with many of the same problems that now beset Urban: troublesome monarchs such as Henry IV and their contesting of Rome’s control, wars with Germany and France, and even rival false, self-declared popes.

  Had his thoughts been confined to these problems, Urban might have been more composed. But recently, his worries had been compounded by a letter from the Byzantine emperor in Constantinople, Alexios the First Komnenos.

  Komnenos was the successor to the Caesars of the Eastern Roman Empire and, in his correspondence, had begged Urban to send help in repelling the invading Seljuk Muslim Turks.

  It was his role as pope to hear the will of God. And when no voice was forthcoming from the heavens, it was his role to decide the will of God. But divine directives could have practical and political outcomes, and in the letter from Constantinople, Urban saw an opportunity to galvanize the warring and fractious children of Europe into something more coherent.

  What was required was a common cause. The defense of Constantinople would be the beginning, but Urban saw a larger prize that could empower the Church to levels it had never known. Once their mission had been successfully completed in Constantinople, the armies motivated by the Church would march on to Jerusalem and free the holy city from the contemptible grasp of the Muslim heathen.

  • • •

  For two months past, Urban had let it be known through the complex but highly effective communication system that was the Church hierarchy, that when the Great Council met in session, he would make a pronouncement that would change the course of the world.

  People had come, in hundreds and thousands, to hear his words. Knights and barons, ladies in their finery, and peasants from the fields. So vast was the crowd assembled in Clermont that fitting them into the cathedral would be impossible. Instead, Urban ordered the construction of a huge platform in the fields behind the church from which he would make the proclamation that he had spent so many hours on his knees formulating.

  As the sun began to climb to its zenith above the wintry horizon, Pope Urban II left the home of Bishop Guillaume de Baffie, where he’d been staying, and walked the short distance toward the field and the platform through the massive crowd that had formed.

  Urban was surrounded by his ecclesiastical servants, carrying his shepherd’s crook, with his chaplain carrying before him an open illuminated manuscript of the Gospel according to St. John. Surrounded by the trappings of his station, Urban knew that he was an impressive figure. His vestments were of the very finest silk from China, gold thread made by Italian craftsmen and sewn into the chasuble by the sisters of the Nunnery of the Virgin of Madrid, a miter in the form of a triple crown. To all who saw him, he was, on earth, the representative of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

  Urban climbed the steps of the platform, his gown dragging on the wood in soft folds hiding his feet so that he appeared to float upward. Spread before him were representatives of the greatest of all the kings and rulers of Europe and their retinues, surrounded by swaths of loyal peasant Christians. The crowd slipped into a hush, and people fell to their knees and crossed themselves.

  A huge illustrated Bible had been placed on a lectern upon the platform, open at the page of the prophet Micah, which Urban would take as his text. Elevated far above even the tallest peasant, Urban could see how huge the crowd was, and hoped that his voice would carry to the back.

  He’d made notes about his speech but instead trusted God and his memory that he wouldn’t need to read what he was about to say. As a man who sought out the pleasant company of actors when he was appointed the papal legate in Germany a decade ago, he’d learned how to hold the attention of an audience, how to pause to make them concentrate, and how to stress his words.

  And so he began, reading from the great book before him.

  “For behold, the Lord comes forth from His place, and He shall descend and tread upon the high places of the earth. And the mountains shall melt under Him, and the valleys shall split, as wax before fire, as water poured down a steep place. All this is because of the transgressions of the Jews and the Arabs, and because of the sins of those who do not worship Jesus as the Son of God.”

  He looked up from the text and shouted, “Brothers in Christ, I speak to you today of a grave matter. Not a matter of the flesh, of kings, or of governance of our Holy Roman Congregation. But today I must address you all, even the most lowly among you, the congregation of the faithful, concerning the very survival of our mother Church itself.”

  When his words settled on the multitude, he heard gasps and even some cries from deep within the audience. It was a good reaction. The weather was freezing cold, yet there were no murmurs of dissent. All had come from far and wide to hear his voice, and like an actor delivering rehearsed
lines from a morality play at Easter, he waited for a reaction.

  “The Muslim is now at our door; the very Saracen himself, with his vicious scimitar and his leering countenance, killing and maiming in the name of a false god, spreading like the very plague through the lands of the East. And how long, brothers and sisters, will it be before he is here—in Rome or Paris, Hungary or Bavaria, even Clermont itself, raping and killing and forcing your children to bow to his prophet in his mosque? To turn aside from the true cross of Christ and instead worship the evil crescent of Islam, a pointed thing like the horns of a devilish goat.”

  There were screams of fear. Had he gone too far? He looked at the three hundred clericals who had accompanied him and saw that they were looking at him in horror. Good. He had their attention. He looked beyond them, into the crowd of thousands, and was pleased to see that they were terrified.

  “The Muslim is knocking on our door in his wild and unruly haste, and he desires to take our house, our chattels, our very God and Almighty Jesus himself. So now, today, you must apply the strength of your righteousness to issues that involve both yourselves and Almighty God directly. For your brethren who live in the East are in urgent need of your help, and you must hasten to give them the aid that has often been promised them. For the Turks and Arabs, the Saracens and the Seljuks, have attacked them and conquered much Christian land. They have killed and captured many and have destroyed the churches and devastated the empire. If you permit them to continue in their pagan brutishness with impunity, then they will take this as a sign of our weakness, and they will be heartened and attack even more of the faithful of God.

  “Because of this, the Lord beseeches you as Christ’s heralds to publish this everywhere and to persuade all people of Christ to raise up their arms, sharpen their swords, carry aid promptly to those Christians living under the threat of the Muslim invaders, and destroy that vile race who has stolen the lands of our Lord.”