The Jerusalem Assassin

by Joel C. Rosenberg

  “You have provided us critical information about President Clarke’s upcoming visit and about the king’s visit and the prime minister’s presence with them. You have pledged your loyalty to our father and told us you are willing to do whatever is necessary to achieve victory in our jihad, in our quest to rebuild the Caliphate. Is that true?”

  Slowly Mashrawi nodded.

  “Good. Then this is what Father asks. We need a shahid, a loyal and courageous martyr willing to kill the president, the prime minister, and the king. Will you lay down your life that the Caliphate may live?”

  “I will—I am—I mean, I would if I could, but . . .”

  “But what?”

  “With all due respect, it would be impossible to bring a weapon onto the Haram al-Sharif, especially on that day. I am not a coward. I will do anything I am asked. But we must be realistic. Some things just cannot be done.”

  “Nothing is impossible with Allah, Hussam. Do you believe that?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Good. There is a doctor I want you to see. He will perform a surgery on you. Tomorrow. And I will not lie to you. It will hurt. A great deal. For several days. But then you will be fine and ready for the most important and glorious mission of your life.”

  78

  KING DAVID HOTEL, JERUSALEM—10 DECEMBER

  A full day had gone by, and there was no sign of Haqqani.

  Marcus’s wake-up call came at 5 a.m. But he was already awake. He had been for more than an hour, trying to think of some way out of this mess and coming up with nothing. He rolled out of bed, threw on running shorts, a T-shirt, and a sweatshirt, and met Tomer Ben Ami, deputy director of the Shin Bet, in the lobby of the five-star hotel. No other guests were present, only the front desk staff and an older man mopping and polishing the floors of the grand vestibule. The rains had stopped, but the sky remained threatening, and it was cold and getting colder. Marcus wasn’t particularly looking forward to a run, but he was glad the police agency veteran had offered to work out with him.

  “So where are we headed?” Marcus asked.

  “Ever done ‘Murph’?” Tomer replied.

  “Yeah, a million years ago.”

  “Welcome back.” The Israeli smiled.

  Marcus did not return the smile. “You’re kidding,” he said.

  Tomer wasn’t. “Murph” was a fairly grueling workout and one of the few things Marcus didn’t miss about his Secret Service days. Designed in honor of Lieutenant Michael P. Murphy, a Navy SEAL who was killed in action in Afghanistan back in 2005, the CrossFit routine had become a favorite of U.S. Special Forces operators and the country’s most elite law enforcement officers, who performed it as a way of honoring the memory of this heroic American warrior. Marcus was familiar with the workout but hadn’t known its popularity had crossed the ocean or that a man nearly twenty years his senior could do it and wanted to.

  They began by running a mile through the streets of Jerusalem. That was the easy part. Next, they did a hundred pull-ups, side by side, followed by two hundred push-ups, followed by three hundred air squats. By the end, Marcus was desperately sucking in oxygen. Tomer was drenched in sweat but beaming from ear to ear.

  “Come on, Ryker, get the lead out,” the Israeli shouted, swatting him on the butt as they headed out on another one-mile run.

  As Marcus’s feet pounded the pavement, trying to keep up, he realized he was hurting in joints and muscles he didn’t remember having. Ever since joining the CIA under the guise of working for DSS, he’d been working out far more regularly than he had since his wife and son were killed. But not nearly this hard, and only that frigid Wednesday morning did he realize just how out of shape he still was. The one saving grace of the entire ordeal was that they hadn’t done the hour-long workout wearing twenty pounds of body armor, as Marcus had back in the Secret Service.

  They wound up at the Shin Bet’s Jerusalem office. There, Tomer took him down to the agency’s basement gun range. They toweled off, downed several bottles of water, and did target practice for an hour with handguns and submachine guns. Afterward Tomer drove Marcus back to the King David in his Range Rover.

  After he showered, shaved, and dressed in a freshly pressed suit, Marcus found Secret Service deputy director Carl Roseboro waiting for him in the lobby. A few minutes later, Tomer pulled up out front, also showered and dressed for the day. Roseboro and Ryker climbed in, and they headed to the Old City.

  “Anything on this Haqqani guy?” Roseboro asked.

  “Not yet,” said Tomer.

  With just one week before Air Force One was wheels down in Tel Aviv, the Israeli prime minister’s office was ecstatic, Tomer told them. The visit of the Saudi monarch was a huge diplomatic breakthrough, arguably bigger than Anwar Sadat’s arrival in 1977. But Israeli security services were growing more nervous by the day.

  “That’s not exactly reassuring,” Roseboro said.

  “It’s not supposed to be,” Tomer replied.

  “I want you to tell me you guys have this all under control.”

  “I wish I could.”

  “Israel has never lost a visiting head of state, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And Rabin was the only Israeli prime minister ever assassinated, right?”

  “Right again.”

  “And that was a long time ago.”

  “1995.”

  “And you guys have tightened up your protocols since then, right?” Roseboro pressed.

  “Of course, but you don’t understand,” Tomer explained as they found a place to park and headed up to the Temple Mount. “The stakes are much higher now. Can you even begin to imagine how catastrophic it would be to Israel’s reputation if a Muslim king gets popped while visiting our capital?”

  79

  ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICES OF THE WAQF, JERUSALEM

  The same young veiled woman as before greeted them and asked if she could help them.

  “We have an appointment with the Grand Mufti and Dr. Mashrawi,” Marcus said.

  “I’m afraid Dr. Mashrawi had a dental emergency and won’t be able to join you,” the woman replied. “But the Grand Mufti is in his office and waiting for you.”

  The three men followed her down a series of hallways until they reached their destination.

  Amin al-Azzam, decked out in his formal robes, stood up behind his large oak desk, piled high with books and papers of all kinds. Smiling warmly, he came around the desk and shook the men’s hands as Marcus introduced his American and Israeli colleagues. Then he invited them all to sit on two well-worn beige couches in the corner of his office while he took a seat in an antique wooden rocking chair. Just then, the veiled woman knocked, entered, and served hot tea with a sprig of mint in each glass.

  “I’m sorry to hear Dr. Mashrawi is not able to join us this morning,” Marcus began. “I trust everything is okay?”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” said al-Azzam. “Hussam suddenly developed a severe toothache. He went to his dentist yesterday afternoon and found out he needed an emergency root canal. My wife is watching his kids, and his wife—my daughter—took him for the procedure this morning.”

  “I’m so sorry,” Marcus replied, wincing. “That’s no fun.”

  “No, it certainly is not. But I’m sure he’ll be back on his feet in no time. So how can I help you gentlemen as the big day approaches?”

  Deputy Director Roseboro set down his teacup. “Your Excellency, I want to thank you for getting back to us so quickly and thoroughly with the answers to the many questions Agent Ryker here posed.”

  “With pleasure.”

  “To be candid, that was the easy part,” Roseboro continued. “Now, as Marcus no doubt mentioned, we need to begin a very detailed security sweep of every building, every office, every closet, every nook and cranny of the Temple Mount area, and we need to begin setting up metal detectors, video surveillance equipment, and so forth.”

  Marcus noticed the Grand Mufti tense ever so sl
ightly at Roseboro’s use of the Jewish term Temple Mount rather than the Islamic name, the Haram al-Sharif. Nevertheless, he also noticed that al-Azzam did not correct Roseboro but let the slight go.

  “But of course, Director Roseboro,” he replied calmly. “And I want you to know that I welcome all that is necessary to secure this place for the arrival of these three esteemed guests. This is our way. We want you and the rest of the world to see the hospitality we Arabs are famous for.”

  “You are most kind,” said Roseboro.

  “That said, I cannot allow you to begin your preparations until Saturday,” al-Azzam added, surprising them all.

  “I’m sorry—Saturday?” Roseboro asked.

  “Yes, I’m afraid so,” said al-Azzam. “The anticipated arrival of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques has generated enormous interest—and passion, I might add—and thus we expect our numbers on Friday to be two to three times greater than normal. We are expecting upwards of a quarter million people for midday prayers on Friday. As such, we need every hour between now and then to prepare. Once they are gone, of course, and our own holy day is complete, then you and your people may make all the preparations you need. But not until sunrise on Saturday.”

  The news did not sit well at all with the two Americans, but when they began to push back, Tomer intervened. “Gentlemen, please; the Grand Mufti is only doing his job, and believe me, the last thing we want is to create a disruption ahead of Friday prayers,” the Israeli explained to Roseboro and Ryker, then turned back to al-Azzam. “Can we count on you to encourage a peaceful and orderly day on Friday and calm in the territories between now and the end of the summit?”

  “Absolutely,” the Grand Mufti said. “So long as you respect my needs and those of my team between now and Saturday. Will this be a problem?”

  “No, not at all,” Roseboro said.

  Tomer and the Grand Mufti then looked to Ryker.

  “None whatsoever,” Marcus replied.

  Marcus’s phone vibrated in his pocket. As the other men continued to talk, he pulled it out and glanced down at the screen, which read, User ID unknown.

  “Excuse me for a moment,” he said. “I’m afraid I need to take this.”

  When al-Azzam gave him leave, Marcus stepped out of the office and took the call. “Hello?”

  “Agent Ryker, this is Prince Abdullah in Riyadh.”

  80

  Marcus exited the building.

  He walked across the plaza past the Dome of the Rock and found a quiet spot under a colonnade to take the Saudi intelligence chief’s call.

  “We ran the names you asked for—Maxim and Amina Sheripov and Dr. Ali Haqqani,” Prince Abdullah reported.

  “And?”

  “I’m afraid we found nothing on the Sheripovs, just a report on their mother’s perfidy in Moscow.”

  “What about Haqqani?”

  “On him we found some very interesting material. I’m sending it all to you and your colleagues now, including phone numbers and email addresses. But here’s the gist.”

  “Go—I’m listening.”

  “Haqqani’s real name is Ghulam Salik. He was born to a devout Sunni family in Islamabad, the youngest of six children. His father was the personal physician to the president of Pakistan. His sisters are all married and still live in Islamabad. His eldest brother passed away of a heart attack about eighteen months ago, but before his death he was the personal physician to Turkish president Mustafa. Another brother is an investment banker living in Doha, Qatar. He keeps a very low profile, but we know he is closely linked to the ruling family and is a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

  “And Ghulam himself?”

  “The black sheep of the family—a brilliant doctor who became a religious fanatic. Came here to the kingdom in the midnineties for medical school but also attended one of our most problematic mosques under an extremist cleric who was arrested and executed for subversive activities about ten years ago. On June 14, 2010, Ghulam Salik flew from Doha to Sana’a, Yemen. On August 1 of that year, he flew back to Doha and then to Istanbul, Turkey. But in 2010, our investigators determined that it was Ghulam who performed the surgery on Abdullah Hassan Tali al-Asiri.”

  “The al Qaeda suicide bomber?”

  “Exactly.”

  “The one who tried to assassinate Prince Mohammed bin Nayef with the first body cavity bomb?”

  “That’s the one,” the Saudi confirmed. “But by the time we put the pieces together, Ghulam Salik had vanished off the face of the earth. Frankly, I’d never heard of the name Ali Haqqani until you called me yesterday. It took us a while, but now it’s clear to us that Haqqani and Salik are the same person.”

  “How do you know?”

  “It’s a long story and highly classified. Off the record, let’s just say that about a year ago, the mainframe computers of the Turkish Ministry of the Interior were hacked. A half century of records of every birth, death, marriage, divorce, burial, and name change in the Republic of Turkey became available on the black market. I’m not saying we bought the files. But every now and then someone friendly to the kingdom may have the opportunity to peruse such collections and see what’s available. Given that it’s been about a decade since the Ghulam Salik case went cold, we never thought to ask these particular friends to run his name and see what popped up.”

  “But let me guess,” Marcus said. “Yesterday you did.”

  “Again off the record, yes,” the prince said. “We found that in the summer of 2010, while Ghulam was in Istanbul, he had his name legally changed to Ali Haqqani. A few months later, he emigrated to the U.K. That’s where he’s been living ever since.”

  “That’s a huge break,” Marcus replied. “Thank you, Your Highness.”

  “What are allies for?”

  Marcus hung up, then received an incoming message. He opened the encrypted file from Prince Abdullah, reviewed it briefly, then immediately forwarded it to Oleg before calling the onetime Russian mole.

  “Good to hear from you, my friend—what’s up?” Oleg said.

  “I just sent you a file of every known phone number and email address for Ali Haqqani,” Marcus replied. “He used the name Mohammed Peshawar to get into Israel. But his real name is Ghulam Salik. Work your magic and get back to me as fast as you can.”

  81

  KAIROS SAFE HOUSE, MOUNT OF OLIVES, EAST JERUSALEM

  Mohammed al-Qassab chambered a round in his silenced Glock pistol.

  Then he pored over the image of the busy street three floors below.

  Having arrived on Friday afternoon from London, this was now his sixth day in the flat above the dentist’s office that served as the Kairos safe house. He had shaved his head and was now bald, but he had not shaved his previously clean face. His beard and mustache were coming in thick, the first of a series of steps he intended to take to change his appearance before the next stage of the mission. Even so, he did not yet feel comfortable stepping out on any of the three balconies or going up on the roof, for fear of being spotted and identified.

  Obsessed with operational security, al-Qassab had made it his business to take hourly snapshots of Rabaa al-Adwaya, the street running below to the east, as well as the west-side service road that snaked up from the Kidron Valley past the Tomb of the Prophets. He used a digital camera, putting the lens up to a small tear he’d made in two different curtains. Then, without pulling back or ruffling the curtains at all, he would take a photo and immediately study the images, looking for any threats as well as trying to establish what “normal” life looked like. He did this eighteen times a day.

  Satisfied that they were not about to be raided by Israeli police or special forces units, al-Qassab glanced at his watch. It was almost ten in the morning. They had to get moving. Silently he gave Dr. Haqqani the signal. The Pakistani nodded, then whispered to the dentist and his two assistants—all of whom were on the Kairos payroll and building sizable nest eggs in their Swiss numbered accounts—that it was
time to begin.

  Two floors below, a lone secretary was on the phone rescheduling appointments for the following week, after the peace summit. Here in the dentist’s personal flat on the top floor of the building, the dining room had been transformed into a makeshift operating theater. The dentist had sent his family away on holiday to Germany a week earlier. Neither his wife nor his four children had a clue as to who was coming to stay in their rooms or that anyone was coming at all. This gave them all the space and privacy they would need.

  Already under general anesthesia and completely unconscious, Hussam Mashrawi lay on the dining room table, surrounded by pillows and covered by sheets. A large plastic tarp had been spread across the floor to protect the beautiful Persian rug from being stained by blood or other bodily fluids. Al-Qassab watched Haqqani’s eyes scanning the medical devices that had been brought in and set up around the table. Mashrawi’s vital signs were strong, and the oxygen machine was working properly. Haqqani donned his surgical gloves, took one last look at the size and shape of the bomb that was sitting on the kitchen table nearby, then picked up a scalpel and went to work.

  Ryker and Roseboro were on hand as the first C-5M Galaxy landed at Ben Gurion International.

  Tomer Ben Ami was right at their side as two Starlifters landed in succession, minutes after the first aircraft. No matter how many times Marcus had seen them in action, he still found himself in awe of the sheer enormity of these Lockheed cargo planes. They were among the largest military planes in the world, each seemingly capable of carrying a small city’s worth of people and supplies.

  Soon, the men watched as three Marine One Sikorsky helicopters were carefully removed from the hold of the first plane. Six identical versions of “The Beast”—the presidential limousine—rolled out of the second plane along with a fleet of armored Chevy Suburbans, other Secret Service vehicles, and unmanned surveillance drones. The remaining trucks, sedans, ambulances, and other vehicles needed for POTUS’s motorcade and the Secretary of State’s motorcade rolled out of the third plane, followed by yet more vehicles that would be pre-positioned along the primary motorcade route as backups. In addition to all these, the three men were overseeing the unloading of a veritable arsenal of Secret Service and DSS weapons, ammunition, radios, and communications gear, and a laundry list of additional equipment and supplies.