‘Try talking to him in shattered English, then. That’s probably the only way you’re going to get through to him,’ Tank said. ‘Hey, Mike, where are you going?’
‘Nowhere,’ Mike said.
‘Ain’t that the truth,’ Tank laughed.
Mike wandered to the far end of the park to separate Uji and Sherman whose play fighting, like that of their masters, was also getting out of hand. Larry called Moses to the table where Repo and Button were sitting quietly.
‘It’s time Moses and I were going,’ he said. ‘Wayne’s moving in this afternoon and I still have the house to get ready.’
Laura stood and hugged him. ‘Have a safe trip, Larry, and don’t forget to send a postcard.’
Alice remained seated and Delores wedged, but both wished him well. Tank said he’d see him Monday morning and Mike came over and threw his arms around him and kissed him on the cheek. ‘Tell Israel to chill, man. Tell them to turn the other cheek and give the Palestinian dudes a break.’
Despite the well wishes Larry left the park feeling slightly dejected. He’d already felt badly about Maybelline’s death before he’d even gone to the park, and now he’d learned that Mrs Newbold was accusing him of running her cat over on purpose. And he felt bad about letting slip to Wayne that Laura and Alice were planning on getting married and worse still that so many voices had been raised against his young friend. He couldn’t sort any of the problems out before he went to Israel, but he promised himself he’d put them in order on his return, when he’d also introduce Herb Flores to the group.
At six o’clock on Monday morning Tank’s horn sounded outside Larry’s house. Larry was ready and waiting. He’d decided against waking Moses and Wayne at such an early hour and said his goodbyes the previous evening. He carried with him an old-fashioned wheel-less suitcase and a briefcase containing his travel documents and two copies of his paper on the Desert Land Act. He put both bags in the trunk compartment and climbed into the passenger seat. Tank greeted him with a grunt and put the car in gear.
They travelled along M St and crossed the bridge into Virginia. Instead of taking the road to Dulles International, Tank drove into Arlington and on to Wilson Boulevard, the route Larry had taken to Mrs Newbold’s house.
‘We’re not going to visit your mother, are we?’
‘Not unless you want to.’
‘Where are we going then?’
‘To the Rosslyn Metro Station,’ Tank said. ‘I said I’d get you to the airport. I didn’t say I’d drive you there. I’ll drop you at the 5A Stop and the bus will take you the rest of the way. It’ll take 45 minutes and cost $3.50 – that’s the senior citizen rate. If you’d have taken a taxi from your house it would have cost you $45 – and that’s without a tip. I’m saving you $50 and when you get back you can put it towards a new cat for my mother. I’m damned if I’m buying her one. Who you flying with? El Al?’
‘Yes. The flight’s at eleven.’
‘It’s good you’re getting there early then because they’ll want to know your life story before they let you on board – probably your inside-leg measurement, too.’
Tank dropped Larry at the 5A Bus Stop at 6:30. They shook hands and Tank told him to leave Israel as he found it. Larry promised him he would.
Six hours later Larry was sitting in a window seat sipping Diet Coke and trying to open a packet of complimentary nuts. He was sixty-seven years of age, flying to Israel to give a paper on the Desert Land Act and, for the first time in his life, about to be arrested.
9
Masada
A downside to proportional representation is that the party winning the largest number of seats – but without a majority – often has to make deals with people it doesn’t really like if it wishes to assume power. The Likud had netted 30 seats in the March election and though the largest party, was 31 short of an overall majority. Negotiations proved tough, and four weeks after the election Prime Minister Netanyahu was still unable to form a government. He had the support of United Torah Judaism, Kulanu and Shas, but was still in need of another eleven votes and had only three weeks left in which to find them. Two weeks later he agreed terms with The Jewish Home, but as the 6 May deadline loomed he was still missing three votes. It was then that Netanyahu did the inconceivable and approached the Party of the Sicarii, a small grouping on the fringe of the Israeli political spectrum.
Over the years, close to 200 political parties had run in the country’s elections, and more than a hundred had gained seats. Most were short-lived, here-today-and-gone-tomorrow parties, but if in their day they’d been fortunate enough to hold the balance of power in the Knesset, they were able to exert power far beyond that warranted by numerical representation. The Party of the Sicarii was one such party, a one trick pony with a one-track mind, and in the March election had won three seats – seats vital to Netanyahu if he was to form a government. With two hours remaining, and in return for their support, he agreed to the Sicarii’s one and only demand: authority over the ancient fortification of Masada.
The nationalist icon rested on a remote rock plateau on the eastern edge of the Judean Desert. The bloc, though now detached from the scarp, was part of the Great Rift Valley’s western wall and overlooked the Dead Sea. It was 450 metres high and had a surface area 600 by 300 metres. It was a fortress waiting to happen, and though its strategic potential had been appreciated during the Hasmonean period, it was King Herod who turned the mesa into an impregnable stronghold. On his death, and after the Province of Judea had been incorporated into the Empire, Masada became a garrison for Roman soldiers and remained so until 66 AD when, at the outbreak of the First Jewish-Roman War, the fortress was furtively taken by a group of rebels known as the Sicarii.
In that year existing religious tensions spilled over into anti-taxation protests, attacks on Roman citizens and then – after the Romans retaliated by sacking the Temple and executing 6,000 Jews – all-out war. At first things went well for the Jews and the Romans were expelled from Jerusalem and large parts of Judea. But then the war turned, and after a couple of years of toing and froing, only Jerusalem remained in rebel hands. Its defenders, however, were far from united and the city descended into a state of civil war as militants from competing factions, seemingly more interested in defeating each other than the Romans, fought for control of the city. Eventually the factions headed by the Zealots and Sicarii prevailed, and it was they who commanded Jerusalem at the time of its fall.
The Zealots and Sicarii, though often at variance, were both upholders of the Fourth Philosophy of Judaism – the previous three having been taken by the Pharisees, Sadducees and Essenes – and were intent on securing Judea for the Jews and ridding the land of Gentiles, paganism and foreign control. They looked upon themselves as the heirs of Judah Maccabee – the patriot who’d fought and defeated the forces of the Seleucid Empire almost 250 years earlier – and were prepared to use violence of any kind to achieve their goals. Their adversaries, however, were also prepared to use violence of any kind to stop them achieving their goals, and when it came to savagery, the Romans were without equal.
Jerusalem fell and the city and Second Temple were destroyed. Those Sicarii who’d survived the onslaught fled to Masada, still under their control and the last of the rebel strongholds. There they withstood the Romans for three years until in 73 AD the Tenth Legion laid siege to the mountain. Rather than twiddle their thumbs and starve the rebels into submission the Romans built a ramp against the western cliff and dragged a tower and battering ram up the slope. They punched a hole through the outer defences, set the inner defences of timber and earth on fire and the next day, once the flames had subsided, prepared for the fight of their lives. They were greeted, however, not with stones and missiles but another wall – one of silence – and beyond that wall, the corpses of 960 men, women and children.
Rather than face crucifixion or certain slavery the Sicarii
had chosen to commit suicide and die in a state of freedom. They’d drawn lots and the ten winners had been given the responsibility of despatching the losing 950. The ten winners had then drawn further lots and the victor charged with slitting the throats of the losing nine. The overall winner, who had by this time already killed 104 of his family and friends, then turned the knife on himself. It was bloodshed on a grand scale but the Roman police weren’t looking for anyone else. They did, however, find two women and five children hiding in a cistern, but what happened to them is anyone’s guess.
Masada sank into obscurity and remained there for thirteen centuries until rediscovered in 1838. The story of its destruction was rekindled and the flames fanned into a patriotic myth. Masada became a byword for courage, heroism and sacrifice, and a symbol of the ancient kingdom, the Diaspora and Jewish cultural identity. It came to represent the new nation’s struggle for liberty, its right to exist and Masada shall not fall again was incorporated into the Israeli Defence Forces’ oath of allegiance.
Had the myth of Masada remained undisputed, the Party of the Sicarii might never have been formed, but the story was now being challenged on all fronts and there were those in Israel unprepared to trust its legacy to others. Some critics had questioned the rationale of a Jewish state celebrating an act of mass suicide when Jewish law forbade self-immolation and considered it a serious sin. Others had cast doubt on the idea that the defenders of Masada had even committed suicide, and pointed to the fact that archaeological digs on the plateau had only ever uncovered the remains of 28 people – and most of these skeletons had been found in the company of pig bones. More damaging were the political voices that condemned the allegory for engendering a fortress mentality within the nation and encouraging its citizens to believe that the only way to deal with an enemy was to fight it to the death. For them Masada illuminated only the ruinous potential of nationalism: the Sicarii and their allies had refused to compromise during the Jewish-Roman War and by doing so had brought death and destruction to the Jewish people. The modern state of Israel had to learn from these mistakes and not compound them.
The newly-formed Party of the Sicarii ran on the platform of the Fourth Philosophy: they would secure Israel for the Jews and rid the land of Gentiles (Arabs), paganism (Islam) and foreign control (the rest of the world). Like their namesakes of the past they used violence to achieve these goals, but instead of the traditional Sicarii dagger opted for character assassination. They accused their opponents of anti-Semitism (Jew as well as Arab), of being a bunch of Uncle Toms and equated those who criticised the history and meaning of Masada with the malefactors who denied the Holocaust. Against all predictions the Party of the Sicarii won three seats in the election, and against all common sense Netanyahu invited them to join the government.
Masada and its buffer zone were owned by the State of Israel, but cooperatively managed by the Nature and Parks Authority and the Antiquities Authority. Both now reported to the Party of the Sicarii. Day-to-day administration of the site continued as normal, but changes were made to the way Masada was presented to the nation and the thousands of tourists who flocked there every year. All tour guides were now vetted and certified by the Sicarii and any straying from the given script – the Sicarii script – were banned from the site, fined and in exceptional circumstances imprisoned.
Likewise, all promotional material was rewritten and a defence of suicide-in-mitigating-circumstances added. Nowhere in the Bible was there a direct prohibition of suicide, it stated, and certainly it wasn’t one of the Ten Commandments. King Saul and Samson had both committed suicide and the verses describing their deaths were written without judgement. Their suicides had been acts of martyrdom and their deaths a sanctification of God’s holy name. And the deaths of those who’d defended Masada were no different, and the State had been right to accord the remains of the 28 Sicarii full military burials.
In similar vein all archaeological controversy was excised from the brochures and there was now no mention of the pig bones discovered on the mountain. The Sicarii went further and banned all scientific activity on the site. Past excavations had proved anything but helpful and only succeeded in sullying the fortress’s reputation. Masada was good as it stood and could speak for itself.
The Party of the Sicarii congratulated themselves on the changes and were keen to show them to their absentee mentor, a man who had done more to rehabilitate the name of the ancient Sicarii than any other and was recognised as the world’s leading authority on the Fourth Philosophy. His blessing and future writings on their accomplishments might well cement their reforms and secure the legacy of Masada for future generations. And there was also a good chance that his promotion of their achievements would bring them the necessary donations to fund future electoral activity.
They wrote to their idol care of the Baltimore Hebrew University and anxiously awaited his reply. Three weeks later they received an email: Dr Lavi Maccabee would be happy to pay them a visit.
The confusion over Larry’s name started in the El Al terminal at Dulles and continued through immigration at Ben Gurion Airport. At both locations, and on several occasions, he’d been addressed as Maccabee, and his explanation that his name was pronounced MacCabe gone unnoticed. His surname was Scottish he’d told them, and roughly translated as son of the helmeted one and had nothing to do with hammers. Airport and immigration officials had listened to him, nodded their heads as if understanding his point, and then continued to refer to him as Mr Maccabee.
By the time Larry arrived at the check-in desk of the King David Hotel late Tuesday morning, he’d been travelling with little sleep for more than twenty-four hours and was happy to answer to any name as long as his title remained intact.
‘Welcome to the King David, Mr Maccabee,’ the receptionist smiled. ‘Is this your first visit to Israel?’
‘It is,’ Larry smiled back. ‘But it’s Professor and not Mr Maccabee. I’m here for a conference.’
The receptionist apologised, altered the registration details and printed his key card. ‘We’ve upgraded you to a deluxe room, Professor Maccabee. I hope your stay with us will be an enjoyable one.’ She then called for a bellboy to take him to room 312.
The King David Hotel was in the Yemin Moshe neighbourhood, across the street from the YMCA and overlooking the Old City and Mount Zion. It was square-set, seven storeys high and built from pink limestone. Its outward appearance was colonial, but its public spaces were decorated with Assyrian, Hittite, Muslim and Phoenician motifs. It was the place where presidents and royalty stayed when they visited Jerusalem, and the haunt of rock stars, actors and famous hairdressers. As the world’s leading authority on the Desert Land Act Larry felt completely out of place.
He napped for a couple of hours and then showered, changed into clean clothes and went down to the lobby. The day was hot and he covered his head with his new baseball cap. He turned right on King David St and followed Ha-Emek to Jaffa Gate. He’d decided to spend the afternoon wandering the streets of the Old City, finding his bearings and then returning to explore it more fully on the days that followed.
Larry was a right-turner, someone whose natural inclination in life was always to turn to the right in strange surroundings. Accordingly he set off through the Armenian Quarter, and three hours later was back at Jaffa Gate with all four Quarters under his belt and two pages of jottings in his notebook. He found a small eatery outside the walled city and stood in line to place his order. Eventually he was served and he took his coffee and piece of cake to an outdoor table at the rear of the premises and opened his journal.
He’d been surprised by how small the Old City was – by his estimation no more than a half square mile. The streets had been narrow, cobbled and irregular in pattern, dotted with small courtyards, external staircases, roof gardens and arches. He’d passed synagogues, mosques, churches and monasteries; museums, archaeological sites, bazaars and residences of differin
g sizes and heights. So far as Larry could determine, the Old City of Jerusalem was a jumble of pale stone buildings hedged in by walls forty feet high and eight feet thick, and the only open areas were the Temple Mount and the plaza, running the length of the Western Wall.
He pressed the remaining crumbs of cake to his finger, placed them in his mouth and took a sip of coffee. The Armenian and Jewish Quarters had been quiet that afternoon, but the Muslim and Christian Quarters had buzzed with activity, the former with everyday life and the latter with digitised tourism. He thought it sensible to mix and match his future visits to the Old City and split his time between restful and more taxing sights, the open and the claustrophobic. He’d start the next day, he decided, by spending the morning at the Western Wall and the afternoon in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
It was close to six when Larry made it back to the King David. He was about to enter when he was stopped at the door by a woman in dark navy uniform and asked his business. Larry was pleased to tell her. He liked it that Israelis took such an interest in people.
‘I’m retired these days,’ he said, ‘but I used to teach late nineteenth-century American history at Georgetown University. I’m here to present a paper on the Desert Land Act to a symposium on Desert Reclamation at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Usually I’d have brought my wife with me but Helen died this year and she’s in the Willow Columbarium at Oak Hill Cemetery and so…’
‘Your business at the hotel!’ the woman snapped.
‘Well, I’m a guest, of course,’ Larry said, taken aback by her manner. ‘I’m staying in a deluxe room.’
‘And your name?’
‘McCabe,’ Larry answered. ‘Professor Larry McCabe.’
The woman scanned a list of names and started to frown. ‘There is no… do you mean Maccabee?’
‘Yes, that’s me,’ Larry said resignedly. ‘Professor Maccabee.’
Larry & the Dog People Page 21