A Jerusalem Story

Where be these enemies? Capulet! Montague! See, what a scourge is laid upon your hate, That heaven finds means to kill your joys with love.

—William Shakespeare

Prologue

BOOM! A flash of light collides with the steel and concrete. Windows explode outward and the concussion throws the unfortunate who are too close to the ground like bowling pins falling every which way. The sprays of bullets firing back and forth in the night are like a ballet of lights coordinated to entertain, not to kill.

Mayhem.

Pandemonium.

The symphony of warfare.

Ron, the newest recruit and the youngest in the group of commandos, just turned eighteen last Sunday, runs around a corner to get a better position. Darkness! All he heard was the sound of the gun, the bullet hits him in the chest and he dies before his head hits the ground.

The twelve-year-old Palestinian, screams back, “Ali, I got one, I got one, I killed a Jew.”

Confusion

Bedlam

Chaos in the early morning before sunrise.

In his moment of glory a screaming bullet whether meant for him or not, pierces the back of his neck just under his right ear and explodes out through his throat. The noise level is far too loud to hear the slight gurgling sound that comes from deep inside him. In mid sentence the young defender of Jenin falls, holding the blood from gushing out of his neck, only a few feet from the Jewish soldier he has just killed. His body twitches and contorts before it goes lymph.

“Ibrahim!”

Unseen because of the blanket of darkness, a synchronized whir of a large propeller gets louder with each passing second. Abu Yassin hears the dreaded sound and must make for cover leaving his beloved brother lying in his pool of death. He is hardly out of range when three rockets of immense firepower hit the culminating point in split second intervals, causing a huge explosion which lights up the night sky that can be seen on the Mediterranean coast almost twenty miles away. A plume of smoke, dust, and for sure some human DNA reaches high into the now dawning sky.

The shooting stops. The Jewish commander calls his superior in Tel Aviv on a secure channel. “All is still, all is still. “

In Ramallah, in the West Bank, a shopkeeper, whose son was killed as he fought in the name of Hamas… Fucking Jews,

In Jerusalem, the father of Ron, the youngest commando, and the only Israeli killed in the raid…Fucking Arabs.

Part I

“Yakov, what are we going to do if they catch us…”

“Stop it, no one is going to catch us.”

“I’m scared,” she sobs, “do you know what they will do if they catch me with you?”

“They’re not going to catch us. Look, I have been thinking, we’ll leave, go to the United States. There we can live our lives together, without all this shit.”

“Leave my family, my mother, my home, are you serious?”

Gently, he takes her face in his hands and caresses her lovingly, “Dahab, I love you, All I want is to be with you, spend the rest of my life with you, have children with you. I want to live like normal people... with you.” Yacov turns away and hangs his head as he contemplates his next sentence. “We cannot continue to live in this world where people will not stop killing each other.” He turns back to Dahab and takes both of her hands; “If we have any chance at a normal life we must leave Israel, now. Look, I have almost enough money to buy two tickets. We take a plane to Paris, from there we go to New York, I have a friend living there. I talked to him a few days ago. I explained the situation. He is willing to help us Dahab. Please I love you.”

She looks, forlornly at first, and then her dark, exotic eyes seem to glisten with happiness. She throws her arms around his neck, holds him tight, and whispers in total submission, “yes, anything for you.”

They continue to hold each other for a minute, then walk arm in arm into the beach front hotel on Herbert Samuel dr., the last street before the sand in Tel Aviv. They exchange greetings with the hotel clerk who regards the two young people as regular customers. They silently make their way up to the third floor, a climb they have made many times. The shaky handrail gives some sort of strange comfort to Yacov. A safe feeling? No, it’s more like an old friend. On the third floor they walk into the room closing the door behind them. The two lovers surrender themselves to each other…

Part II

The shuk is an interesting place. For hundreds of years it has seen vendors share their wares day in and day out. It’s a market place not unlike others throughout the Arab world, several square blocks of open air, merchant stalls that sell everything from bread to beads. As the morning call to the faithful circulates through the city, the Jerusalem chill surrounds the men and women setting up their domains to sell today’s goods.

It ‘s a hard life but Dahab’s family’s stall is one of the more successful ones. The cold gray Jerusalem morning bites at Dahab’s perfectly toned olive skin. She can barely move her lips in the morning chill.

“Looks like it might rain today.” Omar, her father implies with some authority.

“Oh father, if we have to close early today, can I go into the city to get my book for the class.”

“We’ll see daughter, we’ll see.”

Part III

On the other side of the city right where Ezrat Tora forks off and becomes Givat Moshe, Yacov Shalev walks bundled up in his scarf and heavy jacket, hands in his pockets, he hates wearing gloves. They’re too confining. It’s cold, but, he doesn’t mind, he is used to the weather. He is a Jerusalemite. As he enters his building on King George Ave. he passes the kiosk where the headline of the Jerusalem Post reads Bus Bombing Kills Thirteen. As he walks into his office he hears two men, one young, and the other old, arguing.

“We need to go in there and kill every one of those bastards.”

“What we need is to establish peace quickly so we can separate from those that want to do us harm.”

“And how is that going to stop the terrorists?”

“Look, when you have a responsible Palestinian government, with something to lose by violating international law, you will see a crack down on terror.”

“No you won’t, Arafat’s people are the ones that are sponsoring the terror. Giving them legitimacy will only make it easier for them to kill us.”

Yacov just shakes his head at the insolubility of the problem and walks into his office to start work.

Part IV

Dahab hands the change to Mrs. Rahim while her father carries on a conversation with her cousin that she cannot help overhearing. Omar stands and listens respectfully to the firebrand that is explaining his interpretation of Allah’s wishes.

“We will push those Zionist monkeys right into the ocean.”

“Muhammad, the only thing you and your friends are going to accomplish with that attitude is to get more of our innocent people killed.”

“Your problem uncle is that you don’t understand the words of the prophet. We will retake the land that was stolen from us. It will not be easy but in time we will be victorious. And, we will throw the Jews out.”

“Look, no one wants to see the Zionists removed from this place more than me. My father, your grandfather had land in the valley near Tel Aviv, before 1948. I would like to have that back. I’m entitled to it. But the Jews are too strong, their weapons are too advanced and they have the United States backing them up. No, my friend, you will not win. You will only lose. Our best bet is to compromise with them. If we can return to the 1967 boundaries that would be enough for me. ”

“NEVER! I will never give anything to those pigs. They murder our children, oppress our entire people, and poison us with their western democracy. They must die, and they will. We will not stop until they are all gone.”

Omar, realizing how hopeless it is to continue the conversation, ends it by turning to the next customer who is waiting patiently to be served.

Appalled by the determination to continue such bloodshed, Dahab stands and listens while she continues her work. Afraid to say anything, less she brings suspicion upon herself. If she were to be found out carrying on this dishonor with a Jew, she knows she would be dead. She wisely chooses not to even look at the men carrying on the conversation.

“Father, it is starting to rain, and I really need this book for school, can I be excused to go”

“Where is it that you must go, Dahab?” Her father says slightly annoyed.

“I told you before, father. It is on the western side of the city. It is the only store that has the book, please father, I need to go.”

Omar realizes that he must allow his daughter to do this. “ Ok, but be careful. I don’t trust those Jews over there.”

“I will, I promise”

Dahab gathers her pack and leaves the stall to walk toward the Jewish quarter of the city and out of Jaffa gate into West Jerusalem. Outside the old city walls she walks along Jaffa road on the small patch of pavement that runs next to the green lawn spacing the old city walls from the street. It begins to rain a little harder, she crosses to take cover at the bus stop, the one that faces the building pocked with snipers bullets reminding all that this is the Middle East. She takes out her cell phone and dials Yakov. Her fingers cannot move fast enough to punch in his number as she misses him so much. She feels her heart ache, which really is probably a stomach upset, until she hears his voice.

“Hello?”

Part V

Yakov leaves work telling Joseph, his superior, that he does not feel well. Through the rain he walks fast. Jerusalemites walk fast anyway, something to do with being picked off by snipers in the early days before the Zionists consolidated their power in 1967. Learn to walk fast in case a sniper takes a shot at you from the Jordanian side.

Dahab continues north on Shivtai Yisrael like he instructed her to do. At the crossing of Gruzenberg Ave. she sees him on the corner opposite her. Her heart begins to pound, they must be careful. He waits for her on his side of the street. She crosses. When they are next to each other they both look around like children who are misbehaving. There is no one to hurt them. They embrace.

“I have a cab waiting.”

“Where are we going?”

“To talk, to plan, to love, to live.” They both chuckle in a serendipitous connection of which only real lovers are capable.

She playfully slaps his arm, as he gets too close for them to avoid a kiss.

“Yakov, I don’t know what to do. I love you but I am scared to leave my family. I will never be able to return if I go.”

Irritated. “We can never live a normal life here. Do you want to spend the rest of our lives looking over our shoulders to make sure no one can see us?”

“Well, no, of course not, but…”

But nothing, it is either we go or we continue to live here in misery. Dahab, I will tell you again and again. I love you. I will never leave you. If you must stay I will stay with you. I cannot live without you. I need you…I want you…BOOM! What was that? Oh my God…

A huge explosion

The concussion drives them both to the ground. With instinct, Yakov covers Dahab protectively. Within seconds debris begins to fall all around them. Rocks and boards bouncing in the street.

Fire, dust, raining debris.

The fire and heat was a curious juxtaposition to the rain coming out of the sky. An ordeal of fire and water. Dahab and Yakov slowly rise; they cannot believe what has just happened. Stunned, they look around. The building behind them is on fire, there are people screaming, there is destruction and confusion everywhere. At Dahab’s foot Yakov sees a hand, a child’s hand, curled with blood still dripping from its fingernails. He nestles her head into his chest so that she will not see the gruesome sight.

“C’mon we’ve got to help.”

Several people are lying on the street already, Yakov goes into the building and brings out a woman that has a nail stuck in her eye, but she is alive.

“My baby, my baby, my baby is in there,” seemingly unaware of the seriousness of her own injury, she locks on to his shirt and will not let go.

“Ok, I will get her, you stay here and don’t move”

Yacov runs back into the pile of twisted metal and broken glass, smoldering in its wake, small fires burning sporadically like something out of Dante’s inferno. He comes up on a pile of what looks like human flesh. Oh no, please no. Then he hears the whimper of a little person, shaken, brutalized by the blast, but very much alive. He looks behind a door, which is hanging on one hinge. She is there. He picks up the little girl and carries her outside where there is a reunion of life between mother and daughter.

Dahab is comforting an old woman who has a superficial gash across her forehead. It will leave a memorable scar that she fully accepts knowing the alternative is unthinkable.

“Thank you young lady, thank you.”

“You’re welcome, just lie still until the medical people can come.”

That accent, its Arabic. “You’re an Arab! Take your filthy hands off of me.”

“Mam, I am only trying to help you.”

“I don’t want any help from the likes of you. Go to your own side of the city. Haven’t you done enough here for one day?”

Dahab, humiliated and disgusted begins to walk away.

“Dahab! Wait” Yakov sees her start to walk off and goes after her leaving the wounded, the dying and others that need his help.

“Wait, where are you going?”

“I’m going home, leave me alone”

“What? Dahab, wait, stop it, wait, WAIT!” He grabs her by the arm and physically halts her drive.

“What is going on? What happened back there?”

“I just realized something. Those are your people, not mine. Mine are over there,” She points to the eastern side of the city.

Dahab suddenly realizes what she is saying and cannot continue to be angry with Yakov for something he is, not something he does. With clarity she knows that subjecting him to that makes her no better than that woman on the street, or her terrorist cousin in the shuk or anyone else that hates on either side of this fight.

She falls into his arms weeping. “Shhhh, it’s OK, it’s Ok,” he tells her in comforting tones. He sits her down on the bus bench in front of them and gently caresses her, rocking her back and forth with a loving touch.

“I hate this place, “ she says in quiet proclamation.

“So do I.”

From a car down the street, Mohammed, Dahab’s terrorist cousin, is there to reconnoiter the destruction of the suicide blast for his superiors in Jenin. But he discovers a much greater subterfuge at the bus stop. He watches Yacov and Dahab lovingly caring for each other. It disgusts his cultural sensibilities that his own cousin would be carrying on like that, unmarried, un-chaperoned, and with a Jew! He knows what he needs to do. He understands his obligations. He will perform it with pleasure under the watchful eyes of Allah.

Part VI

“C’mon, let’s get a cab and I’ll take you home,” Yacov says.

“No.” She tugs at his shirt. She looks up at him. “Don’t leave me.”

“OK. We’ll go to Tel Aviv.” As they climb into the cab her cell phone drops out of her purse and falls gently on a patch of grass next to the curb. They drive off and a shadowy figure comes and picks up the phone.

As they lie on the bed looking out the huge bay window of the hotel on the sand, the waves are choppy and gray. They lie as one; their bodies wrapped together like a vine across the bed. The rain has stopped but the streets are still wet.

“What time is it?”

“Five o’clock”

“Oh, I have to go. It’ll take me at least an hour to get back to Jerusalem.”

On the ride back, both lovers are silent. They hold each other’s hand all the way back to the city.

Yakov drops her off inside west Jerusalem where she gets directly into a cab, partially because she is in a hurry, and partially because they have both learned to move fast in case someone sees them together.

At her home she pays the cab driver and walks up the stairs to her house. Just as she is about to put the key in the huge, green, metal door she hears screaming going on inside. “She must die” her father demands.

“No, Omar, please not my baby.”

“She has disgraced this family. Our honor will be restored.” They know.

“Allah demands it.” Another voice. Who is that? She can’t quite make it out… Mohammad, that lunatic!

Frightened by what she’s heard she takes off down the stairs and begins to run. Not in any particular direction, just away from that house. Her mind is racing faster than her feet. Oh my God, I can never return there. That house is my house and from now until forever it will mean death. I can’t believe this is happening. She begins to cry. My mother. She hails a cab and tells the driver Yacov’s address.

Yacov gets confirmation on the tickets. They leave the day after tomorrow. He can’t wait to tell Dahab. He dials her up on her cell. The phone rings three times. A man answers.

Mohammad is helping Omar prepare for the honor killing of his daughter. A phone rings. What is that? It’s coming from his pocket. It’s her phone.

“Hello?”

“Who IS this?

Who is THIS?

Where’s Dahab?

“Oh, is this the Jew dog?”

Yacov holds the phone away from his ear for a moment and stares at it like it’s the phone’s fault. Frantic now, “What have you done with Dahab?’

“What have I done? It’s you that has done something, Jew boy.”

“Where is she? What have you done with her,” he repeats himself as a sinking feeling begins to take over his being.

She’s DEAD asshole! You killed her by dishonoring her to her family. So, say good-bye Jew, she’s gone.

Yacov hangs up the phone and releases an anguishing yell. His world is crushed. He is beside himself. He cannot get it out of his mind. You killed her, you killed her, you killed her. He decides that he cannot live without her. There is just no life without Dahab. If I cannot be with her in life maybe I can be with her in death. A strange calm suddenly comes over him now that he knows how to solve this problem.

Dahab reaches into her purse to call Yacov to tell him that she’s coming. Her nerves are frazzled and she feels so alone in the world. Just hearing his voice would mean so much to her. Where, where is it? She cannot find her phone. She really needs to hear his voice but she will be there in a few minutes.

He sits on the edge of his bed for what seems like an eternity. He gets up, goes into his closet and takes out his IDF issue .45 and pops in a clip. He holds it to his temple. “I will see you very soon my love.” BAM! The shot goes off and Yacov hits the ground. The blood runs out slowly but consistently from the wound that covers a three quarter inch hole in his head. His eyes glaze over like they can only see into the other world now.

Climbing the stairs Dahab hears a shot. That sounded like it came from Yacov’s room.” Yacov?”

She runs up the rest of the stairs and opens the door and sees him lying on the floor. She collapses next to him crying, trying to hold him and keep his blood inside. At that moment the phone rings. Composing herself she answers it.

”Oh there you are, you have to come home whore.”

”Mohammad! How did you get this phone number?” She fights to hold back her sobs.

“I told your boyfriend that you were already dead, I hope that is alright since you are dead as soon as I find you anyway, you whore.”

Now she understands. Now it is all clear. She closes the phone. She picks up the .45 that is still in Yacov’s hand and looks at it, “I’m coming my love.” In one motion she puts it in her mouth and pulls the trigger.

Epilogue

I love Jerusalem this time of year. The winter weather broods and bellows like an angry old man. December’s and January’s are dark, cloudy and raining. Sometimes it even snows. When the sun does show itself, it is strong and plays off the classic Jerusalem stone that covers every building in the city by law. Giving off a golden hue, it truly is one of the more beautiful cities in the world. Yacov was my brother and I loved him. He had mentioned a couple of times he was seeing somebody but he was always vague and I didn’t press him on it. I found out about their forbidden love affair mostly through two sources. The hotel clerk on Herbert Samuel dr. explained how they had been coming there for months, and how they appeared to be so in love. Yossi Ben Haron, Yakov’s friend in New York contacted me when he heard the news. Yakov told him everything. After Dahab’s family refused to claim her body, and considering all that happened, we thought it appropriate to bury them together. They were interned at Mount Herzl cemetery. If you go there today you can find them off to the right on The Hill of Abraham. Their epitaph simply reads: Loving brother and son, and lover of Dahab who also lies here. Together in life, together with God, together in peace.

Note from author: This takes place during the Jenin incuriou in 2002 not the present day fight going on in the west bank and gaza. It just never ends there