The Woman from Tantoura: A Palestinian Novel

by Radwa Ashour

  Ezz told me, “Sadiq is right, we no longer have any life in Lebanon. Go to Abu Dhabi.” He had decided to go to Tunisia; Karima didn’t want to go, but she couldn’t convince him to change his mind. He took her and went; I remained. Why? Had I begun to think that slowly and gradually, another stream would cut a path in the earth? Yes, I was following the news of the resistance in the south, searching for the details every day on page five of the paper. Demonstrations, sit-ins, armed operations. Confronting the occupation face to face, confrontations between armored soldiers carrying weapons and the housewives of a village, or its men or its mosque or its pupils.

  At the end of February in 1984 I went to Jabsheet to offer condolences to the family of Sheikh Raghib Harb. A year later I went to Sidon to visit my mother’s tomb and that of my uncle Abu Amin.

  The Israelis had gathered their equipment and withdrawn.

  32

  The Center (1)

  I said to the elder Abed, “Your wife visited me yesterday.”

  He said, “She came to complain to you about me, didn’t she, to tell you that I hit her?”

  “She didn’t say that.”

  He looked me in the eyes, disbelieving. I had not lied. His wife had talked to me a long time about his state and complained to me, but she had not said that he had hit her.

  He said, “I can’t stand myself. I can’t even stand our little boy. I don’t know what to do. I leave the house in the morning as if I’m going to the Center, I walk in the streets or sit in a café, avoiding the usual ones since I don’t want to see anyone I know or to talk with anyone. When exhaustion and hunger become too much, I go home. I want to sleep but I can’t sleep, I’m hungry but I’m not interested in eating, I turn to my wife suddenly as if in desire and then I discover that I’m incapable of intimacy with her. I don’t read or write, my ability to concentrate is zero.”

  “Don’t you go to the Center?”

  “They closed it, the government closed it. They summoned the Center director and the next day army trucks came and loaded the furniture and the equipment and what remained of the archives.”

  “I’ll make you a cup of coffee.”

  “No thanks, I’m leaving.” Then, “I’ll come by tomorrow or the next day with my wife and the boy, to say goodbye to you and Abed and Maryam. I’m going back to Amman.”

  He said it quickly, as he was rising from his seat. He did not shake hands, or stand at the door, as usual, to finish saying something he had begun or to say something he had wanted to say during the visit and had forgotten. He said, “By your leave,” and then I heard his steps on the stairs.

  The humidity is suffocating, my face is dripping with sweat. I wipe it with a tissue, and notice that my shirt is soaked with sweat. I wash my face and change my shirt. I boil a pot of coffee and take it and the cup to the kitchen table, and sit down. I pour the coffee and light a cigarette.

  When the Israelis entered Beirut nine months earlier, they stormed into the Center and stole half of its library and archives. Abed told me, “Thank God Dr. Anis was no longer director of the Center. The mine that exploded in his face ten years ago didn’t kill him, but I’m sure that the sight of Israeli soldiers in the Center would have killed him. Neighbors in the building across from us saw the soldiers removing cartons loaded with books and putting them in trucks, for three days. They saw some of them throwing books and papers in the street from the windows and balconies. We found some of them and put them back in their place—that was on the fourth day, when we were able to go back to the Center. They weren’t satisfied with plundering, they also destroyed the furniture and the equipment they hadn’t taken, and wrote obscenities on the walls. We thought, so be it. We brought paint and wiped out all trace of the obscenities, and reorganized the work.”

  For nine months, Abed never visited me, either alone or with his wife and child, without referring to the Center. He would talk about any subject and then suddenly bring up the Center, obstructing the flow of talk for half a minute or so; then he would retreat and allow the talk to flow again.

  Six months after the plunder of the Center a car bomb exploded, burning the building and martyring a number of those who worked in it. I did not run in the streets like someone touched in the head as I had done eleven years before, the day of the first explosion, which had hit Dr. Anis in the face. I didn’t know about it until Abed himself told me the next day. I ask myself now, if I had known at the time, would I have run through the streets, shooing away death as if it were a fly, or had my senses been dulled by all the mines that had exploded? If I ran at the news of every mine that exploded in any place where I had friends or acquaintances, I would have spent my whole day running in opposite directions, running toward Shatila, or toward al-Rausha, or toward the Fakahani, or toward the sea. Who blew up the Center? Abed said, “The Lebanese security forces. Their head is Zawi Bustani, a Phalangist. They say he is a spy for Israel, on their payroll.”

  The building was no longer safe, but Abed and his colleagues insisted on continuing in it, going to work every day. The security forces and the army did their duty. After three months the Lebanese Army surrounded the Center and broke into it. Abed said, “They stood us against the wall as if they were going to execute us. They inspected the place and left. We met afterward, and agreed that we would not close the Center. We will not leave.”

  Now he’s leaving. I looked at my watch, and jumped, leaving the house. How could I forget when Maryam’s school was dismissed? I looked at my watch, hastening my steps, nearly running. When I glimpsed the door of the school at the end of the street I looked at my watch again.

  I found her inside the school near the door, with a girl and a boy, schoolmates. She was not crying, and bore none of the signs of fear I had expected. I kissed her, and she said, smiling, “Mama, you’re late!”

  “I’m sorry, Maryam, I’m sorry. Were you afraid?”

  “I wasn’t afraid. My friend Farah was afraid and cried. She said that two weeks ago a car bomb exploded near their house, and that one of their neighbors died in the explosion. She said that the same thing might have happened to her mother, and began to cry. Samir and I kept her occupied by talking to her, and it worked.”

  I looked at the little girl. She was younger than Maryam, thin and delicate. She was laughing now, talking with the boy. I said, “When we’re a little late, assume that it’s because of the traffic, or because a guest has appeared suddenly and made us late, or that the clock is broken.”

  I kept the children occupied until the boy’s mother and the girl’s sister arrived, and everyone left safely.

  Maryam asked, “Mama, why were you late?”

  “Uncle Abed visited me. He’s going to Amman. They closed the Research Center.”

  “Who closed it?”

  “The army.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s a Palestinian Center.”

  “Mama, why does the army hate us?”

  I changed the subject: “I’m going to buy you some chocolate because you didn’t cry when I was late, and because you helped your friend when she was afraid and cried.”

  Maryam said, clinging to my hand and skipping, “Buy me chocolate because I like it. I’m not so little that I cry when you’re late—I have a mind that tells me, ‘Maryam, don’t be afraid now. Wait, and if Mama doesn’t come before night, then there’s a problem, because it can’t get dark before Mama comes.’ And it was only natural to take care of Farah, because the older one helps the younger—the teacher told us that. I’m two years older than she is, because I’m seven and she’s five.”

  She emphasized the age by spreading out the fingers of her left hand and the thumb and forefinger of her right, and then folding the two fingers and leaving the five.

  “But you didn’t answer me—why does the army hate us so much?”

  “Because all their leaders are from the Phalange, and the president is also from them.”

  “Why do the Phalange hate us?”
r />   “That’s a long story, I’ll explain it to you later. Are you hungry? Today I made you …”

  “You said that Uncle Abed is going to Amman. Is he going to live there?”

  “Yes.”

  “And my brother Abed, is he going too?”

  “I don’t know. He hasn’t said.”

  “If he goes we won’t have any relatives in Beirut. Will we go too?”

  “If we went, who would you miss most in Beirut?”

  “First, Umm Ali. Second, my teacher and my friends at school. Third, the thyme-flavored snacks that Umm Nabil makes, in the camp. And Umm Nabil and her children. Fourth, Dr. Hana in the Maqasid Hospital—maybe I’ll be a doctor like her when I grow up, and like Papa, of course. Papa’s been away a long time, Mama. I mean, they kidnapped him, where? When we play in the camp we find the boy who’s hiding, we always find him. Maybe we need to look more.”

  I changed the subject again. “Sadiq says to come and visit him in Abu Dhabi. What do you think?”

  “Vacation is coming in a week and we can visit him. But we’ll come back before the beginning of school.”

  “What if he said, ‘Stay here with me’?”

  “It’s better to visit him for a month or two and then come back to our house. Would Abed come with us?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “He has his studies and his own concerns.”

  “I would rather he come with us, or that we stay with him.”

  I go back and forth to the camp. I encourage someone’s mother, or one of her neighbors, because her son has disappeared or because the army has arrested her husband. I read the Safir newspaper to the elderly ladies who can’t read. I help to prepare the list of those kidnapped, I take part in small parades of women (the time of large demonstrations has passed), organized by the Women’s Union for the Families of the Kidnapped. I take part in helping someone’s mother and her eight children, when she has no one to support her and no work and her house has been destroyed. I look for some connection or I arrange the necessary sum to free one of the young men. I contribute to reopening the nursery schools that have been destroyed, to help the women who go to work because they have been widowed in the war or the massacre or because their husband left with the fighters. I take care of the children of one of my acquaintances who has gone to Ain al-Helwa to check on her family, or to take a message, or to bring her sisters’ embroidery to sell in Beirut, so she can send them the money to help them through financial difficulties. I take Maryam to school and then I go to the camp; I stay there until her school day ends and I go back to take her home. Sometimes if I need to go to the camp in the afternoon, I leave Maryam with Umm Ali, or I take her with me, and she plays with her friends there.

  33

  Abed’s Detention

  Abed didn’t come home for three nights. I was somewhat concerned; I thought he’s with his colleagues here or there. A momentary anxiety assails me: what if he’s infiltrated the south? He has infiltrated before, and I didn’t know about it until after he returned. I chase away the anxiety; there’s nothing new in his being away from home for a night or two. On the fifth day the anxiety grips me; it’s no longer anxiety but certainty, something bad has happened to him. Has he been kidnapped? Have they killed him at one of the barriers? I jump out of bed and look at my watch: the hands show two in the morning. I have to wait until daybreak, and then make arrangements. How will I do that, where will I start? By visiting those I know among his friends in Beirut? By going to the Popular Committee in the camp? To an official of the organization? Where will I find an official in the organization? Why haven’t I done that before? For sure you’ve become feeble-minded, Ruqayya—“Delusions,” you say, what delusions, when kidnapping happens every day and killing young men is routine? Where did you get this foolish calm, from apathy or stupidity? I get up to boil a pot of coffee; it boils over. I wipe up what has spilled on the stove and wash the pot, filling it with water and adding the coffee gradually. I watch the pot carefully, waiting for the coffee to boil, concentrating my attention on it so it won’t boil over. I lift the pot from the fire with care—and my hand suddenly shakes, spilling the pot and everything in it on the floor and on my clothes. God help me! I throw the pot in the sink and bring a rag to clean the floor. I change my nightgown, wash the pot and fill it with water. I sit in the living room sipping the coffee and smoking. Abed might be with a group of his friends, dividing his time as usual between his studies and his political work, distracted from us, forgetting to come home. That has happened before. I calm myself by recalling this day and that, when he stayed away and then returned, until my imagination concludes that he is safe, and that my concern is only unfounded anxiety. Then it jumps in the opposite direction—have they taken him? Kidnapped him? Beaten him? Maybe they’ve killed him, what would I do then?

  After the dawn prayer I knocked on Umm Ali’s door. She did not open, so I knew that she was still praying. I waited at the door and knocked again after a few minutes, and heard her heavy steps coming to the door. She asked who it was, and I said “Ruqayya.” She opened the door and said, “Good morning.” I said, “Abed hasn’t come home for five days, maybe they’ve kidnapped him.” She asked me to sit down and then made me a cup of coffee. She suggested that I visit the houses of his friends first, saying, “I’ll take Maryam to school and you go to them right away, before they leave for work. If you don’t find him with any of them, we’ll begin looking for him.”

  My son was lucky and I was too, because many of the young men who were kidnapped disappeared or were killed; their families didn’t know that they had been killed, and when they were sure they didn’t know where they were buried. The Phalange were no longer the only ones who detained Palestinians, nor were the Christian militias. Amal had suddenly appeared on the scene—my God, how? Why? A friend in the camp, a very old man, said to me, “Sitt Ruqayya, have you forgotten Tall al-Zaatar? Alliances change between the leaders and our young men pay the price. The camp pays the price. Now Syria and Abu Ammar are enemies and Amal is allied with Syria, so it aims its canons at Shatila, and we call the men of Amal enemies. In the very recent past we faced the Israelis together, in Khalda, in the Shouf and in the south. God help us!”

  How can I free Abed? I don’t know.

  We followed many trails. Sadiq asked for the help of a businessman among his associates in the Gulf who had a business relationship with an influential figure in Amal. Umm Ali spared no relative, near or distant, nor anyone among her acquaintances or the acquaintances of her acquaintances, visiting them all and asking for help. “We want to know the boy’s fate,” she said. “I raised him with my own hands, can you take my son and beat him? If he’s with you, free him, I’ll vouch for him.” In the evening Umm Ali put before me the day’s yield: whom she had visited, whom she had spoken with, who had taken her and put her in touch with whom. I looked at her in amazement at her ability, at this age, to go to five places in one day. I followed her heavy steps as she carried the coffee or the thyme snacks she had baked, and I realized that the legs and feet struggled to carry her heavy body.

  In my daily search I met a person who assured me that he knew the way to Abed. He said that the kidnappers had asked for a sum of money, which he named. I sold all my jewelry and gave it to him.

  Did Umm Ali’s visits bear fruit, or the money I paid, or did the men who had detained Abed just decide to free him, without any reason, just as they had decided to take him without any reason? Were they young men from Amal or were they from the Phalange or from an independent group, brigands profiting from the chaos all around to make some quick money by getting information and selling it to this side or the other? To this day I don’t know.

  After he was freed, Abed told me his story: “I was leaving Shatila, and here came three guys calling me. They were young men in civilian clothes. I thought they wanted to ask me the time, or that they were not from the area and wanted me to guide them to a street or a place. When I
got near, one of them asked me if I were Lebanese or Palestinian. I had a bad feeling, but I answered, ‘Palestinian, why do you ask?’ And here was one of them pointing his weapon at my head. I don’t know where he had been hiding the weapon. He raised it at me and the other two grabbed me and dragged me roughly into a building. We went into an apartment on the first floor, and they began to interrogate me, asking about the organization I belonged to, about the head of the organization, about the camp, the names of the leaders in it and the quantity of the weapons and the tunnels that connected the buildings. I said I didn’t know, and they began to beat me. I repeated that I didn’t belong to any organization and that I’m a law student in the Lebanese University, and that I don’t live in the camp, and I don’t have any information or the answers to their questions. The beating got worse. Then they blindfolded me and took me to another place and took off my clothes, and beat me again, until the blood flowed from my face and chest and back. They said, ‘We’ll kill you if you don’t talk.’ They shoved a revolver at my head. I said, ‘I don’t have anything to say.’ They tied my hands and feet with a rope and threw me in with three other guys. Every day they came to us and said, ‘We’re going to kill you,’ and then they left. After three days they took me in the trunk of a car, tied up and blindfolded. We came to a place at Bir Hasan. They took off the blindfold and untied me, and put me in a cell by myself.”