Matt Rees - A grave in Gaza

Wallender leaned over the cup and inhaled. “Not European coffee. I’d call it Scottish coffee.”

Cree clapped his hands and gave a thumbs-up to the waiter. “I can see I’m going to become a caffeine addict,” he said. He drank, with a sigh.

Omar Yussef smelled the alcohol across the table. The raw scent of something he had forbidden himself made him resentful of Cree. “We have to see Masharawi as soon as possible. The longer he’s kept in jail, the harder it will be for us to persuade the security people that this is all just a misunderstanding,” he said.

“We?” Cree tilted his head. “You’re here to inspect the schools, Mister Yussef. I didn’t intend to involve Magnus in this issue in the first place, and this morning I want to discuss with him whether he shouldn’t simply withdraw from it now. Leave it to those of us who are trained professionals in our dealings with the security forces. Certainly, I think it’d be inappropriate for you to continue taking part in our enquiries.”

“I believe I can help. There may be subtleties that you would miss, because you are foreigners.”

“I speak a bit of Arabic, you know, and I’ve been here long enough to understand how to talk to these buggers.”

“Perhaps you know the security people,” Omar Yussef said. “But Masharawi? I think you would treat him as a troublemaker, if you were allowed to speak to him.”

“Seems like he’s made some trouble, doesn’t it?”

“He merely spoke his mind.”

“Like I say, he does seem to be a troublemaker.”

Omar Yussef raised his voice. “Then we need more troublemakers in Palestine.”

Cree put down his cup. “You have to remember, Mister Yussef, that Magnus’s responsibility is both to the schoolchildren of Gaza’s refugee camps and also to the United Nations. He and I have to consider the Masharawi situation not only from a humanitarian perspective. There’s also the question of UN policy in the peace negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis.”

“How does Masharawi’s case affect that?”

“It means that we need to balance our reaction to the Masharawi case against our diplomatic interests.”

“Surely the Palestinians need to keep the UN on their side, diplomatically,” Omar Yussef said. “Which means that if the UN demands Masharawi’s release, they will have to comply.”

“We only have a certain amount of capital to expend with demands like that.”

“What use is capital, if it isn’t worth a man’s life?” Omar Yussef brought his fist down on the table.

“No one’s suggesting Masharawi’s about to be killed,” Cree said.

“They’re accusing him of collaboration. What do you think happens to collaborators?” Omar Yussef flicked his wrist with his palm downward to mime the sudden taking of a life.

“We all know that’s just a cover story. They’ve arrested him because of the questions he asked his students about corruption. It’s a warning to other teachers that they shouldn’t delve too deep.”

“That, too, is something the UN should stand against. The UN should push for freedom of speech.” Omar Yussef turned to Wallender. “Is this how the UN would react if I was arrested in Dehaisha? Would you tell my wife Maryam that there were big, diplomatic issues involved and that I was a small fish who didn’t merit the attention of the mighty UN?”

Wallender frowned. “James, it seems to me that if we go quickly to the Preventive Security, it can all be cleared up without the diplomats knowing anything about it.”

“That’s just the problem-the Preventive Security,” Cree said. “If Masharawi had been arrested by anyone else, we’d have more room to maneuver. There’re a dozen security services here and we can basically ignore eleven of them. But Colonel al-Fara is the most important contact our diplomats have in the security forces.”

Omar Yussef growled and hammered his hand on the table once more, rattling the cups.

Cree laid his hands flat beside his plate and drew a long breath. “It’s like this: we want peace talks to go ahead between Israel and the Palestinians, but Israel won’t talk if there’s terrorism. If al-Fara keeps the terrorists quiet in his own nasty fashion, everyone’s happy. But if al-Fara decides not to help us, there’ll be terror attacks in Israel and everything goes to hell. Ergo, we need him happy.”

“So this bastard al-Fara can do whatever he likes to the people of Gaza, as long as he doesn’t let them kill any Israelis?” Omar Yussef felt his hands shaking. He hid them below the tabletop in his lap.

“Mister Yussef, it’s not that simple. If al-Fara chooses not to act against the terrorist groups, the Israelis will storm into Gaza to fight the terrorists themselves. Al-Fara’s prepared to let that happen, because it’d illustrate that, without him, Gaza is helpless. Our alternatives: Israeli tanks on the streets, or carte blanche for al-Fara.” Cree sat back with a shrug.

“Why didn’t you say this yesterday?” Omar Yussef said. “Someone in New York who has no idea what a Palestinian refugee camp looks like or smells like told you how to handle this, didn’t they? You spoke to someone high up in New York and they told you to bury the Masharawi case.”

“Mister Yussef-”

“I’m not ‘Mister Yussef.’ My family name is Sirhan. Omar and Yussef are my first two names.” He lifted a finger and pointed it at Cree, though he knew it would shake as he did so. “You don’t even understand Arab names. Yet you think you understand the duplicitous minds of men like al-Fara.”

Cree stared doubtfully at the pointing finger. “Do you want me to call you Mister Sirhan instead?”

“No, I should be referred to as Abu Ramiz, the father of Ramiz. But by you, I prefer not to be addressed at all.”

Wallender took hold of Omar Yussef’s hand. “Abu Ramiz, calm down, please. Let’s not forget that we all want Masharawi released. We need to secure his freedom without angering our diplomats in New York and without getting on the wrong side of Colonel al-Fara. It’s going to take the ingenuity of all three of us to figure out a way to do that. We must work together. So please.”

Omar Yussef stared at his plate. He tapped his finger on a crust of toast. “I apologize, James.”

Cree watched him. He pushed his chair back. “The car’s outside. Let’s go to the jail. Maybe they’ll let us talk to Masharawi.”

Omar Yussef looked up.

Cree smiled at him. “The European coffee has made me reckless,” he said.

The Suburban came into the wide streets of Tel el-Hawa, the neighborhood where the PLO’s top hacks had built their gaudy mansions. Uniformed men hunched in the shade of mock Greek pillars, coughing out the swirling dirt. Nasser drove fast down a long, straight street. They reached an elongated, two-story white building, just before the road disappeared into rolling cabbage fields and dunes. It was surrounded by a whitewashed wall about eight feet high. By the gate, a handful of men in leather jackets stood with their legs apart and Kalashnikovs across their chests. This was the headquarters of the Preventive Security.

Nasser pulled the UN vehicle up to the gate. One of the guards came to the window, unsmiling. “Leave the car out here and bring your passports to the entrance,” he said.

Outside the car, Omar Yussef coughed against the dirt and hunched into the hot wind. In the gatehouse, a guard examined the passports of the two foreigners. He wore a loose black leather jacket with a gray synthetic fur collar and a black T-shirt. His face was thick and his hands and stomach were bulky. It was the bullish kind of fatness that hides great strength, like the broad solidity of a Turkish wrestler. He cleared the dust from his throat and wiped his long, black mustache with the back of his hand. He took Omar Yussef’s green ID card and stared at him with blank, sadistic eyes. “What do you want?”