A grave in Gaza oy-2

by Matt Beynon Rees

  The stairs led to a cheaply decorated dining area. The walls and floor were tiled in pink. The tables were black metal frames topped with fake squares of marble, peeling at the corners. The chairs were of chrome tubing with puffy cushions. The plastic packaging hadn’t been removed from the cushions, but in places it was gashed and peeling.

  A series of portraits and photographs along both walls depicted a young man in his early twenties with neat hair combed to the left and a thick beard, softly slick because it had never been shaved. Some of the photos showed a montage of the youth backed by the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem and another had him in front of the Aqsa Mosque. A local artist had copied the photo in childishly clumsy oils. On the opposite wall, the same photo had been weaved into a cheap prayer mat.

  Sami sat at a table by the window and studied the busy street below. He lit a cigarette.

  Omar Yussef stood by the table and pulled out his handkerchief to mop the sweat and dust from his forehead and neck. Sami pointed to the seat opposite him. Omar Yussef shook his head. “Before I sit down, tell me what’s going on?” he said.

  Sami looked at him and exhaled smoke slowly. “I’m sorry I dragged you away from the funeral in such a hurry. But there’s an order out to kill you,” he said.

  Omar Yussef wondered fleetingly if Sami would be the one; there was something newly dark about the young man’s eyes. But he doubted he would bring him to a place so public for the execution.

  “I had to get you away from there. It’s one of the men in the Revolutionary Council who issued the order,” Sami said. He took another drag and looked at his wristwatch. “We might be here a while. Sit down and we’ll eat something.”

  Omar Yussef lowered himself onto the uncomfortable chair. His knees ached. The warm wind rattled the windows of the restaurant. “Who is it? Who wants me killed?”

  “I don’t know yet. But it’s dangerous for you to be around any of those party men.” Sami crushed his cigarette into a tinfoil ashtray. “Let’s eat something.”

  A thin youth came to their table. His white T-shirt was stained around the belly where he had wiped his hands after chopping peppers. The shirt hung lank from his narrow shoulders and his face was bony and raddled. He reminded Omar Yussef of Husseini’s dead coffee boy.

  They ordered falafel, hummus, and a plate of pickles and olives. The youth had turned to go when Omar Yussef asked him the identity of the young man in the portraits on the wall.

  “It’s the owner’s son,” the boy said. “He was martyred in the operation at the pizza restaurant.”

  Omar Yussef remembered hearing about that bomb. It went off in a pizzeria in Tel Aviv or one of the featureless towns nearby. A dozen people in the restaurant died.

  “You’re safe from such an attack here,” the waiter said. “It’s the only advantage of dining in Gaza.”

  “You should wait for me to taste the food before telling me that.” Omar Yussef rasped a laugh.

  The youth sniggered and went away with their order.

  “You’re remarkably cheerful,” Sami said.

  “You think I don’t take seriously the idea that there’s an order to kill me? I’m in your hands. Tell me how to handle this.”

  “You’re onto something, Abu Ramiz. That’s all I can tell you. Somehow the business with Eyad Masharawi touches on things much bigger than the freedom of one professor. I don’t know how, but I’m trying to find out.”

  “Let me come with you, as you track down the truth.”

  Sami smiled and opened his arms wide. “I already did.”

  Omar Yussef looked around the empty restaurant. “Who’s meeting us here?”

  “I found out who killed James.”

  “By Allah!”

  “They’ll be here any moment now.”

  Omar Yussef rose from his chair and slammed his hands on the tabletop. “The bastards are coming here?”

  “Cool it, Abu Ramiz. I don’t think they’re really the people you’re after.”

  “They killed a UN official. They killed James.”

  “Because someone told them to. Or paid them. It’s the one who gave the order that you want, not these guys. But you need to tease it out of them, carefully.”

  “Bastards.” Omar Yussef brought his hands down on the table again.

  “True. But bastards who realize that perhaps they got in too deep and now believe they might be able to cover their asses by helping me.” Sami reached out and gently pulled Omar Yussef down into his seat. “And helping you.”

  “Who are they?”

  “Saladin Brigades men. From here in Gaza City. Remember, the Saladin Brigades are divided. The most powerful branch is down in Rafah, where the group was founded on the profits from smuggling arms and contraband under the Egyptian border. The Rafah gang needed an operation up in Gaza City, because it’s the biggest market for goods and weapons. So they recruited some guys here to set up a wing of the Saladin Brigades.”

  “The Rafah gang smuggles the stuff in; the Gaza City people sell it, right?”

  “Yes, and everyone’s happy. Except, after a while, the Rafah gang started to think the Gaza City bunch were keeping more than their fair share of the profits. The quarrel got nasty. They’ve patched things up, but there’s still bad blood between the different wings of the group,” Sami said. “More importantly, no one in the Gaza City gang is ever sure that Rafah isn’t about to sell them out to the security forces. That makes them easy to manipulate.”

  “By whom? Who’s manipulating them?”

  “That’s what I hope they’ll tell us. I’m expecting two of them to meet us here. They chose this restaurant. They know the owner.” Sami smiled sourly and gestured to the photos and pictures on the wall. “The Saladin Brigades sent his son to blow himself up.”

  “I suppose they get some kind of discount on their meal for that?” Omar Yussef said, with a laugh that was full of scorn.

  Sami was silent, smoking, staring through the dusty air to the street below. Omar Yussef watched him. He was a good boy, a hard man, and he was all that stood between Omar Yussef and a lonely death in Gaza. Back in Bethlehem, Omar Yussef’s clan was big, with ties to all the different security forces and militias. The gunmen would hesitate before killing him there. In Gaza, he was an alien and yet not a foreigner, so he could be made to disappear with fewer problems than Wallender or Cree, and no one with the power to do anything about it would care that he had vanished.

  The waiter brought a small plate of olives and pickled slices of radish that had been dyed purple with beetroot juice. Omar Yussef looked at his watch. They had waited twenty minutes. He realized he was hungrier than he had thought. “Where’s our food?”

  “It’s coming,” the waiter mumbled.

  It was another ten minutes before a plate of cold falafel and mediocre hummus arrived at the table. Omar Yussef asked for a bottle of water and stared at the disappointing food. Sami picked up a falafel, rolled it in the hummus and took a bite. He put the second half back on his plate and lit another cigarette.

  Omar Yussef ripped a corner of flat bread and tasted the hummus with it. The nausea of the previous day returned. Every tiny chip of chickpea in the puree seemed to cut into the roof of his mouth and the back of his throat like the crystal that had choked Odwan. He swigged a glass of water and rinsed it about his mouth until the nutty taste was gone. He covered his lips with his hand, so that Sami wouldn’t see the quivering tension that tightened his lower face.

  They had been at their post by the window an hour. Downstairs the noise of customers in the restaurant grew louder, but no one ascended to the dining room. The owner of the restaurant stamped up the stairs just before one o’clock. He was a sad-looking man with a drooping mustache and a spare frame that suggested he thought little more of his establishment’s food than Omar Yussef did. He nodded to Sami, who snapped upright in his chair. The owner lifted a catch on a metal door in the back of the dining room. He took a step up the unlit staircase of bare conc
rete outside and whispered.

  Two men came down the steps and into the restaurant. The first was tall, gaunt and mournful, with graying hair and a slouching curve to his back and neck. He looked around the room quickly, grimacing and touching his uneven front teeth with his tongue as though they pained him. Behind him came a smaller man in a blue baseball cap with skin almost as light as a European. He wore a rounded black beard and a black vest. Both carried M-16s across their chests, their right hands on the triggers, left hands low on the barrel ready to lift and fire. They came toward Sami and Omar Yussef, their heavy military boots resounding on the thin floor.

  The restaurant owner went down the stairs.

  Sami rose to greet the men. Omar Yussef held his hands tight to his sides, fighting the temptation to step forward and strike these murderers in their faces. Both men offered him their hands. He looked at the floor and gave them quick, light handshakes. The tall gunman’s shake was weak, but the smaller man’s hand was thick and hard against Omar Yussef’s palm. The tall man pulled out two chairs at the table where Omar Yussef and Sami were sitting and placed them far enough away to be out of reach.

  Sami introduced Omar Yussef as the colleague of the UN official who had been killed. The shorter gunman flicked his eyes toward Omar Yussef. The irises were dark brown, surrounded by malevolent sclera the color of milky coffee.

  The tall gunman cleared his throat. “I’m sorry, ustaz, for the death of your colleague. We acted upon instructions, but we were misled.” He coughed again. “I’m Walid Bahloul from here in the camp. This is the brother Khaled al-Banna, who’s also from the Saladin Brigades in Gaza City.”

  The second man’s eyes twitched, as though his name shouldn’t have been disclosed.

  “Why did you carry out this act against the UN?” Omar Yussef said. He concentrated on the taller gunman, Walid. His wet, gray eyes were less disconcerting and he seemed ready to talk.

  “We really are sorry about the foreigner, ustaz,” Walid said. “We thought there would just be a driver or some local staff in the car.”

  “Local staff? A Palestinian? Someone like me?” Reme mber what Sami said: cool it, Omar Yussef thought.

  “It wasn’t an operation against the UN, in truth, ustaz,” Walid said. “It was a signal to the security forces to release our departed brother Bassam Odwan, may Allah be merciful to him.”

  “But you already kidnapped Magnus Wallender and were holding him in return for Odwan’s freedom.”

  “Who?”

  “The Swede, also from the UN.”

  “Him? That wasn’t us, ustaz.”

  “Who was it?”

  Walid looked nervously at Khaled, whose eyes were firmly on Omar Yussef.

  “The Swede was taken by someone from Rafah,” Walid said.

  “The Saladin Brigades from Rafah?”

  “I don’t know. I think so.”

  “But you aren’t sure?”

  “Communication is difficult.” Walid’s smile was as weak as his handshake and he lifted his shoulders apologetically. “We took action against the UN car and killed your colleague, because we thought it would be a gesture to the Saladin Brigades in Rafah. To show that we were willing to perform drastic acts in support of their man Bassam Odwan.”

  “You saw the leaflet that the Saladin Brigades put out after the Swede’s kidnapping? Demanding Odwan’s release in return for the Swede?”

  “Yes.”

  Omar Yussef was angry with these men for killing James, but now they were lying to him, as well. He raised his finger and pointed at the tall man. “You were just trying to show that if Rafah people invaded your turf in Gaza City to kidnap a foreigner, you could do a more spectacular job?”

  Walid turned fully to Khaled. The second man didn’t look at him, but he licked his thick lips in the midst of his black beard and sniffed. “There’s no need for excuses,” Khaled said. “Walid is trying to make this sound nice, like we had fine motives. I don’t care what you think of me, I only want to be sure that I don’t end up carrying the can for this. So let’s cut the bullshit. We were paid to blow up the UN car.”

  “By whom? Someone in Gaza City?” Omar Yussef was thinking of the Revolutionary Council people at the funeral and the order to kill him.

  “No, he’s not from here. He’s a real bastard.”

  “You don’t have real bastards in Gaza City?”

  “We have people here with hard hearts and we have others here with shit for brains,” Khaled said. “But this guy’s the other way around. His head is hard and a dirty piece of shit throbs where his heart ought to be.”

  Omar Yussef thought he might have liked Khaled, if the man hadn’t also been Cree’s killer. “Who is he?”

  Khaled breathed deeply and wrinkled his nose. “Yasser Salah.”

  “Yasser Salah paid you to kill the UN man?”

  “He paid us to blow up the UN car.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “Whoever was in the UN car was supposed to die.”

  “Meaning me, too?”

  Khaled shrugged. “He called us early yesterday afternoon. He said a UN car was on the way to the checkpoint. He told us he’d pay us to blow it up. He didn’t give us the passenger list.”

  “That was a short deadline.”

  Walid smiled, proudly. “We have the northern areas of the Saladin Road rigged with explosives permanently, in case the Israelis use it to invade Gaza again.”

  Khaled hissed and raised his eyes briefly toward the ceiling. “So now you know what you need to know. We’re clear with you and you’ll square it with the UN?”

  “You think I’m a decision-maker at the UN?” Omar Yussef said.

  “Don’t fuck me about,” Khaled leaned forward. “They won’t know anything unless you want them to know it. We’re not big fish, either; we’ve been exploited in all this. You figure out how to keep us in the clear, or you’ll go the same way your colleague did.”

  “I don’t know the whole story yet.”

  “Yes, you do.” Khaled pushed out his bearded chin.

  “I do not.” Omar Yussef scratched his mustache and narrowed his eyes to hold Khaled’s stare. “Why did the Saladin Brigades kill General Husseini?”

  Khaled broke the stare with a humorless laugh. “The UN thing is your business. You’re entitled to know about it. Husseini’s another matter.”

  “I think it’s connected and I want to know the truth.”

  “You don’t think Gaza’s better off without that bastard?” Khaled said.

  “That’s not my judgment to make. Why did you kill him?”

  Khaled’s face was stern once more. “He killed our brother Bassam Odwan.”

  “And he was coming after us,” Walid said. “At the Revolutionary Council last night, General Husseini said he knew that the Saladin Brigades killed the UN man and he vowed to bring us in for it.”

  Omar Yussef glanced at Sami. He was smoking and watching the street, but he was listening. “Who told you that? Colonel al-Fara?”

  The gunmen weren’t about to answer that. They both sniffed and coughed.

  Omar Yussef touched the ends of his mustache, as though something unexpected had just occurred to him. “Do you know about the Saladin I?”

  “The what?” Khaled asked.

  “Never mind. Do you have any of the old Qassam missiles?”

  “ Qassam missiles?” Khaled leaned forward. “Is the Saladin I a missile, as well? What do you want to know about missiles for?”

  “It may be important.”

  Khaled pulled his upper lip high toward his nose, as he breathed in. “We have some Qassams. We don’t use them much-it pisses off the Revolutionary Council leaders.”

  “Why?”

  “When we fire the Qassams over the fence, the Israelis cancel all the VIP cards and the chiefs can’t go to Tel Aviv to fuck their Russian whores. We’ve got a bunch of Qassam s in a warehouse right here in the camp. You want to buy one?” Khaled pushed his chair
back and stood. “We’re going. You’ll make sure the UN doesn’t come looking for anyone in Gaza City, right? Rafah’s where all the strings have been pulled. It’s them you want.”

  Omar Yussef remembered what Odwan had told him about the key to Wallender’s freedom being held by the head of the Saladin Brigades in Rafah. “Okay, but you have to get me a meeting with Abu Jamal.”

  There was a long silence. Sami picked up the remaining half of his falafel and tapped its crust against the edge of his plate. Khaled eyed the green center of the falafel angrily.

  “Sami will hear from us about that,” Khaled said.

  “This afternoon?”

  “Go to Rafah. I’ll be in touch with Sami on his cellphone and I’ll tell you where to meet Abu Jamal.”

  “We’ll go there right away.”

  Khaled swallowed hard. “Don’t be in a hurry. Abu Jamal isn’t that easy to reach. Sami will hear from us.” He walked backward to the metal door. Walid mumbled a farewell and followed. Khaled leapt up the concrete steps three at a time and Walid trotted after him, pulling the door shut with a heavy clank.

  “What they said about the Revolutionary Council isn’t true, Sami. You told me yourself that no one mentioned James’s murder at that meeting,” Omar Yussef said, excitedly.

  “That’s what Abu Adel told me.”

  “He was present at the meeting. We can trust what he said.”

  Sami smiled and shrugged. “Of course.”

  “Yasser Salah must have told these guys that Husseini had promised to arrest them, so that they’d assassinate Husseini. But why? Yasser Salah wanted Odwan killed for murdering his brother, and Husseini did exactly that: he killed Odwan in his prison cell.”

  Sami gestured toward the door through which Khaled and Walid had left. “Those two are pretty scared. They realize that this is something bigger than they expected. They also see that it reaches high up, and they don’t know who they can trust, in the Saladin Brigades or the security forces.”

  “But why would Yasser Salah want Husseini dead?”