by Gary Haynes
“A heart attack?”
“Yes, very likely brought on by the shock of the…” She paused. “But his heart does not show any indications of serious damage.”
“Is it safe to move him?” Tom asked.
“With the right equipment and care, yes.”
Tom figured Crane would have only sent the best. “I don’t need to know any more,” he said, standing up and holding out his hand.
She did likewise before they shook hands.
“Thank for all you’ve done, ma’am.”
“My pleasure, Mr Dupree.”
He left the room, thinking first that he desperately wanted his father to wake up and live, and second that he was going to find those responsible however long it took. And if that meant putting Crane’s crazy plan into effect, so be it.
Chapter 28
The tunnel had puddles of muddy water, the sides and ceiling shored up with planks of wood. At intervals, metal posts acted as added support. Ibrahim had had to stoop for the duration, sweating badly due to both the heat and the fear of confined spaces.
But now, past the herder and the hapless goats, he could see the far end of the tunnel. Even from a distance of forty foot, it was clear that it rose upwards to what the herder had said was another basement. The light was a muted yellow there, rather than luminous, although he could smell faint wafts of the sea, clear and piquant. He thought of his Hamas bothers and started to feel a little more human.
The herder had only spoken to Ibrahim once since handing him the Glock. He stated that just last week it had been his honour to have guided in a batch of Russian Katyusha rockets, which could reach Israeli cities, and Stinger missiles, which could shoot down their military aircraft. They had, he’d stated, been paid for by Qatari sympathisers and had been bought via the Eastern European black market. As a result, the Israelis had bulldozed many Palestinian buildings in Rafah camp, although Hamas were re-housing those affected at the nearby camp of Tel al-Sultan. But the Palestinians, a poor and persecuted lot, he’d concluded, were also fearless and ingenious, and God was Great, so the Israelis would not win in the long run.
Ibrahim knew that Hamas had thousands of rockets, even after so many had been destroyed in the prolonged incursion by the IDF in 2014, but the Israelis had an effective missile defence system, paid for by the Americans, known as Iron Dome. He knew the herder knew this, too, but there’d been no point in spoiling the moment, he’d thought.
As Ibrahim moved closer, he saw a few sand grains here and there where they’d been blown in by the warm onshore winds. He felt his fear subside. He was coming home; his spiritual home, at least. The walls of the last five yards of the tunnel, together with the exit proper, were shored up by bricks fashioned from white stone, and he ran his hand along them as he shuffled along. The camp above was but part of the Palestinian city of Rafah, although almost all the city’s population were refugees. Once he got out, it was only eighteen miles to Gaza City.
As the herder tethered the goats so that they didn’t gorge upon the straw from a filthy bale on the floor in preparation for their trek back, Ibrahim changed out of the old suit and keffiyeh headdress into the jeans and T-shirt that he’d carried in his plastic bag. Soon, he could begin a journey that would end in triumph. He had no sense of claustrophobia now, no sense that some kind of tremor could cause a cave-in; nothing but a growing sense of elation.
But then the sound of small-arms discharges broke the silence. The cracks and pings as rounds ricocheted against lintels and exposed metal in the remnants of the house above, he imagined. Men began shouting and orders were barked, albeit the sound coming down the tunnel was muted. Sensing danger the goats bucked and strained against their rope tethers, and the herder looked as if he was about to have a panic attack.
Two seconds later tear gas hit the floor and rolled about five feet from the end of the tunnel, quickly followed by stun grenades. The flashes and sounds were exacerbated by the confined space and seemed to reverberate down its whole length. The herder and the goats, taking the full force of the shockwave, were knocked clean off their feet and began moaning, the man’s head lolling before he became clearly unconscious.
Shaken, but still upright, Ibrahim’s hands made claws. It took him all of his willpower to prevent himself from rubbing his eyes, from scratching them. He’d been attacked by teargas before and he knew that the best thing to do was to let the damn stuff take its course unless there were other immediate options. But he didn’t have any water or other options. If he used the filthy water beneath his feet, he knew he’d likely get an infection, and he couldn’t afford for that to happen, given the nature of his task.
The smell assaulted his nostrils, a noxious, sulphur-like odour that, together with the ammonia from the gas, made him gag. He realized he had a nosebleed. But he was just glad that fragmentation grenades hadn’t been thrown. With that, quick bursts of automatic fire shattered the brief silence. Ibrahim saw the remnants of the muzzle flashes even through the haze in his streaming eyes.
He searched around for the chequered keffiyeh and yanked it up. He wrapped it around his nose and mouth before pulling out the Glock from his waist belt and chambering a round. The small-arms fire intensified, peppered with the cries of the wounded and dying. An explosion erupted, probably the result of an RPG, he thought, as the heat and the stench of cordite became almost unbearable. The shockwave didn’t travel down the cylinder cut into the soil and sandstone that housed the vertical aluminium step ladder and that was good. Most people, Ibrahim knew, were unaware of such an invisible killer.
Then there were voices close by, agitated and speaking Hebrew. Jewish voices, he knew. The IDF.
Move, he thought.
He shuffled backwards just as the entrance to the tunnel suddenly became engulfed in billows of orange flame from a fireball, the roar and hiss unmistakable to an active jihadist. He shielded his face and, masked by the sound of the ongoing explosion, shot out three of the lights so that he was shrouded in relative darkness.
As the flames retreated back up towards the unseen source, he didn’t know if the discharged ordnance had been fired by the IDF or Hamas fighters. He caught a waft of burning flesh, hair and fur, knowing that the goats and the herder had been all but incinerated. The man and beasts had been incapable of moving, he thought, and the straw had been ignited to add to the conflagration.
He raised the Glock and waited. He feared God. He feared the tunnel. But he did not fear men.
Chapter 29
The IDF appeared like giant subterranean insects, their gasmasks great compound eyes. Ibrahim had seen their brown calf-length boots first, followed by the bodies clad in khaki battledress and Kevlar helmets. Their flashlights were attached to IMI Galil assault rifles and Mossberg 500 pump-action shotguns. The beams scoured the tunnel for any sign of life – for the dead.
Shrinking up against the wall and lying flat, a thought struck him, even in the midst of the chaos. They didn’t use fragmentation grenades or other explosives because they didn’t want to weaken the tunnel and risk being buried alive themselves. But that also meant that they were looking for prisoners, because he knew the Jews were more partial to killing Arabs by burying them in tunnels, rather than caging them. Perhaps they were looking for people to interrogate as to the whereabouts of other top-notch tunnels, he thought. A shiver went through him, even though his body was slick with sweat. Perhaps they’re looking for me. Perhaps they know something.
Hearing footsteps behind him, Ibrahim knew the Egyptian military wouldn’t stray onto Israeli soil, not unless it was a joint operation. Trapped then, he thought, as he raised the Glock to his temple. If he turned and saw commandoes racing down the tunnel from the rear, he would not hesitate to shoot himself, he decided.
With that, bursts of automatic fire pinged over his head in rapid succession. Fifty rounds in a few seconds; more, even, he estimated. And it was aimed at the Israelis.
Only four IDF troops had made it down into the
tunnel. They’d clambered over the smoking corpse and carcasses and had inched along about two yards, conscious, maybe, that the intel, if there’d been any, had been wrong, and they’d just killed an innocent man and his goats.
Their flashlights were supposed to be an advantage. They wouldn’t have known that the tunnel had been relatively well-lit, unless a Palestinian in the know had wanted to make enough money to get out of Gaza, even if that meant being a traitor. But what was meant to be an advantage was now a curse, a target.
Their legs had been targeted, just in case they were wearing ballistic plates as chest protection, Ibrahim knew. They’d sunk down, blood and bone splattering up the walls like an abstract painting by a madman. There’d been only muffled cries, their gasmasks remaining intact.
With the beams from the Jews’ flashlights pointing in three different directions, their weapons silent, heavy, mud-splattered boots pounded past him, but not a word was said. A few feet from the IDF a shot rang out, which sounded to him like the discharge from a handgun, probably an Israeli BUL Storm semi-auto, a 9mm cartridge. It hit the edge of a steel joist, causing a flash of sparks. A last ditch attempt at defence, or a gesture of defiance from a flailing arm. It didn’t matter. The wounded soldiers were breathing their last breaths.
But the ricochet hit the left side of the thigh of one of the two men who’d come to Ibrahim’s aid. He didn’t see any of the man’s blood, just heard a yelp as a puppy makes when it gets its paw stood on. As the man twisted to the mud, Ibrahim saw that he wore a ski mask and a combat jacket. The able fighter didn’t flinch and opened up with his Uzi submachine gun, peppering the splayed bodies beneath him until he’d emptied the clip. Stockless, with a telescoping bolt design, the weapon was a mere seventeen inches long. It was light and easily concealable compared to an AK-47, but at close quarters the Uzi was as lethal as an SMG three times its size.
When the muzzle blast had ended, the man, whose face was covered by the drawn-over ends of his tasselled headdress, bent down to his comrade. Just then he shouted up the shaft. “Ibrahim is alive,’ he said.
Ibrahim stood up and moved forwards, his hand on his Glock, although it was hanging low. He watched the man unwrap his headdress and use it as a makeshift tourniquet, the victim squealing when he’d raised the leg and had tightened the knot.
“Come, Ibrahim, come quick.”
The voice came from just beyond the exit to the tunnel and it was Arabic rather than Hebrew. Ibrahim put his hand on the man’s shoulder as he comforted the other. His face was densely bearded and his eyes were bloodshot.
“God be with you with you, brother,” Ibrahim said.
“And with you. This is my nephew,” the man said, as he took off the other’s ski mask.
The nephew was no more than seventeen years old, Ibrahim thought, the face contorted in agony, as he moaned and mumbled verses from the Qur’an.
“Go,” the man said.
“Thank you, brother.”
“Quickly now,” the same voice from beyond the end of tunnel said.
After Ibrahim had scaled the steel ladder, an open hand appeared from where the shaft connected to the second basement. Ibrahim ignored it and clambered up the slight incline and surveyed the scene. The concrete floor was covered with rubble and detritus. There was a huge hole in the floor above that extended up two storeys to the ceiling proper. Bright sunlight was pouring in at angle, filled with visible dust, sparkling intermittently like tiny diamonds.
Five Hamas fighters were standing among the wreckage, one holding an RPG, the others Chinese Type56 assault rifles, with their distinctive curved magazines. Ibrahim knew that they’d been smuggled in by special units of the Revolutionary Guard from Iranian ports, a journey to Gaza via Sudan and the Sinai. One of them walked over and, shouldering his rifle, replaced the slab that had covered the tunnel exit and kicked over some brick dust and debris to camouflage it.
The fighters wore civilian clothes, T-shirts and jeans, rather than the back or khaki uniforms of the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the Hamas-affiliated military wing of which they were a part. But they all had their faces and necks covered by cloth masks, with only their eyes showing. Around the masks were the emerald-green headbands of the Brigades emblazoned with Arabic text, stating, “There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his Prophet”.
If anyone needed proof of Shia Iran’s hatred of Israel it was that they’d wholeheartedly backed Hamas in the Palestinian conflict with the Jews. Hamas were Sunnis, after all. But now there was talk of the Iranians teaming up with the US to help out in Iraq, although Ibrahim guessed that was to assist them in their negotiations over their nuclear programme. Whatever, he’d always known they weren’t to be trusted.
He knew Hamas would never degrade itself in such a manner. Founded in 1987 during the First Intifada, the uprising against Jewish occupation of the Palestinian territories, Hamas was an acronym for arakat al-Muqāwamah al-Islāmiyyah, or Islamic Resistance Movement. It sought an Islamic state free of Israel and was funded mainly by wealthy Sunnis in the Gulf States, and, of course, Iran. The geopolitics of the Middle East was complicated, he knew.
“A patrol?” Ibrahim asked.
He passed his hand over the ground where five dead Israelis lay, their faces covered by gasmasks. Blood oozed slowly from scorched entry wounds over their already sodden uniforms. Given their kit and insignia, he knew they were regulars rather than Special Forces. This confused him. If they were after him they would have used elite troops, but the dead could even be conscripts.
“A patrol, yes,” the man who’d covered the exit said. “And more will come soon. Border guards. We must go now. They went down the tunnel to escape, brother. They weren’t looking for you.”
“And the Egyptians in the tunnel?” Ibrahim asked.
“Jihadist brothers. They were protecting the other end of the tunnel from outside the house. We radioed them.”
“We have a present for you too, brother,” the man carrying the RPG said.
“A present?” Ibrahim asked.
“You will not be disappointed, brother.”
As his Hamas brothers nodded, Ibrahim wondered what sort of present they had for him in Gaza City. It had been a bizarre day on many levels, he thought.
Chapter 30
Crane had asked for an early meeting with the Director of the CIA. Given he was the head of the Clandestine Service, it wasn’t difficult to arrange, especially due to the teaser he’d said on the secure landline a couple of hours ago. We haven’t seen anything like this before. It wasn’t a cheap trick, either. Fresh intel had just come in from the Mossad, and when Crane had been handed the printout he’d shouted a string of expletives that even he’d felt ashamed of afterwards, especially given that his female assistant had to suffer hearing the tirade.
In the Original Headquarters Building at Langley – otherwise known as the OHD – he entered the voluminous main lobby, passing over the famous CIA granite floor seal. More than fifteen feet in diameter, the seal comprised an eagle’s head and the shield decorated with the sixteen-point compass star, representing the gathering together of world intelligence data.
He took an elevator to the first floor after glancing at the Memorial Wall on the north wall. Flanked by the Stars and Stripes and the CIA flag, there were one-hundred and two stars, a simple yet profound tribute to those men and women of the agency who’d been killed on active service for their country.
Getting out, he walked over the gleaming black and white tiles, past the row of official portraits of the former directors hanging on the wall to his left, beginning with Rear Admiral Sidney W. Souers. It had been agreed that he’d meet with the present director in an ultra-secure, lead-lined office that was swept for bugs four times a day and was off limits to all but those with sensitive compartmented information security clearance. If anyone entered it who was without the electronic pass around their wrist, the computer screens would shut down, the lights would go out and the alarms would sound.
Either side of the office door, two CIA operatives were standing still, their black lounge suits concealing, he knew, Beretta M9 semi-autos. Recognizing him, they nodded. The door was opened by the youngest guy with a Marine-style haircut.
Crane looked at him before entering. “You got alopecia, son?”
“No, sir,” he replied.
Crane smiled and walked inside the office.
CIA Director Martina Truman was a trim, olive-skinned fifty-five-year-old, with earlobe-length grey-brown hair and a small mole above her right eyebrow. Sitting at a chrome and glass desk to the right of the door, she wore a navy-blue jacket with a silver broach over a silk blouse. She looked to be of Mediterranean descent, but her family had originated from County Cork in Ireland. Her eyes looked as if they were made from shiny black ceramic.
She’d risen quickly, mostly due to her managerial skills, but also because she’d received two Distinguished Intelligence Crosses, which was almost unheard of, given that in the history of the agency only thirty-six had been won. The highest decoration awarded by the CIA, both citations read: For voluntary acts of extraordinary heroism involving the acceptance of existing dangers with conspicuous fortitude and exemplary courage. No one in the CIA disrespected Martina Truman, especially Crane. He had recommended her for the second cross.
She’d put on a desk lamp and was sipping a glass of what Crane knew to be green tea. She only ever drank green tea. Zero calories, he knew. As he walked over to the chair opposite her and the door was closed behind him, she said, “I’d offer you one, Dan, but it doesn’t taste so good with sugar in it.”
“I like my sugar,” Crane said. “It takes the edge off.”
“Off what?”
“My propensity for rudeness.”
“Dan, you’re the rudest man I know. You should be one of those radio talk show hosts. You’d get rich.”
“I am rich, Martina. The good Lord put me on this earth for a purpose and in doing His will I am rich in spirit,” he said with a broad smile.