Daniel Silva - The Kill Artist

“After the assassination the Israelis moved into West Beirut and took up positions overlooking Sabra and Shatila. They wanted to cleanse the camps of the remaining PLO fighters, and in order to prevent Israeli casualties they sent in the Phalange militiamen to do the job for them. Everyone knew what would happen once the militiamen were let loose on the camps. Gemayel was dead, and we were the ones who were going to pay the price. It would be a bloodbath, but the Israeli army let them in anyway.

“The Israelis let the first Phalangists into Shatila at sunset, one hundred and fifty of them. They had guns, of course, but most of them had knives and axes as well. The slaughter lasted forty-eight hours. The lucky ones were shot. Those who weren’t so lucky died more gruesome deaths. They chopped people to bits. They disemboweled people and left them to die. They skinned people alive. They gouged out eyes and left people to wander the carnage blindly until they were shot. They tied people to trucks and dragged them through the streets until they were dead.

“Children weren’t spared. A child could grow up to be a terrorist, according to the Phalangists, so they killed all the children. Women weren’t spared, because a woman could give birth to a terrorist. They made a point of ritualistically slicing off the breasts of the Palestinian women. Breasts give milk. Breasts nourish a people that the Phalangists wanted to exterminate. All through the night they broke into homes and slaughtered everyone inside. When darkness fell, the Israelis lit up the sky with flares so the Phalangists could go about their work more easily.”

Jacqueline made a steeple of her fingers and pressed them against her lips. Yusef continued with his account.

“The Israelis knew exactly what was going on. Their headquarters was located just two hundred yards from the edge of Shatila. From the rooftop they could see directly into the camp. They could overhear the Phalangists talking on their radios. But they didn’t lift a finger to stop it. And why did they stand by and do nothing? Because it was exactly what they wanted to happen.

“I was just seven at the time. My father was dead. He was killed that summer when the Israelis shelled the camps during the Battle of Beirut. I lived in Shatila with my mother and my sister. She was just a year and a half old at the time. We hid beneath our bed, listening to the screaming and the gunfire, watching the shadows of the flares dancing on the walls. We prayed that the Phalangists would somehow miss our house. Sometimes we could hear them outside our window. They were laughing. They were slaughtering everyone in sight, but they were laughing. My mother covered our mouths whenever they came near to keep us quiet. She nearly smothered my sister.

“Finally they broke down our door. I wriggled out of my mother’s grasp and went to them. They asked where my family was, and I told them everyone was dead. They laughed and told me that I would soon be with them. One of the Phalangists had a knife. He grabbed me by the hair and dragged me outside. He stripped off my shirt and sliced away the skin on the center of my back. Then they tied me to a truck and dragged me through the streets. At some point I went unconscious, but before I blacked out I remember the Phalangists shooting at me. They were using me for target practice.

“Somehow, I survived. Maybe they thought I was dead, I don’t know. When I regained consciousness the rope they had used for the dragging was still wrapped around my right ankle. I crawled beneath a pile of rubble and waited. I stayed there for a day and a half. Finally, the massacre was over, and the Phalangists withdrew from the camps. I came out of my hiding place and found my way back to our family’s house. I found my mother’s body in our bed. She was naked, and she had been raped. Her breasts had been sliced off. I looked for my sister. I found her on the kitchen table. They had cut her into pieces and laid her out in a circle with her head in the center.”

Jacqueline tumbled out of bed, crawled into the bathroom, and was violently sick. Yusef knelt beside her and placed a hand on her back as her body wretched.

When she finished he said, “You ask me why I hate the Israelis so much. I hate them because they sent the Phalangists to massacre us. I hate them because they stood by and did nothing while Christians, their great friends in Lebanon, raped and killed my mother and chopped my sister to bits and laid her body out in a circle. Now you know why I’m a rejectionist when it comes to this so-called peace process. How can I trust these people?”

“I understand.”

“Do you really understand, Dominique? Is it possible?”

“I suppose not.”

“Now, I’ve been completely honest with you about everything. Is there anything you wish to tell me about yourself? Any secrets you’ve been keeping from me?”

“Nothing of any consequence.”

“You’re telling me the truth, Dominique?”

“Yes.”

The call came at four-fifteen that morning. It woke Yusef, though not Gabriel. He had been sitting up all morning, listening to Yusef’s account of Sabra and Shatila over and over again. It rang just once. Yusef, his voice heavy with sleep, said, “Hello.”

“Lancaster Gate, tomorrow, two o’clock.”

Click.

Jacqueline said, “What was that?”

“A wrong number. Go back to sleep.”

Maida Vale in morning. A gang of schoolboys teasing a pretty girl. Jacqueline imagined they were Phalangist militiamen armed with knives and axes. A lorry roared past, belching diesel fumes. Jacqueline saw a man tied to the bumper being dragged to death. Her block of flats loomed in front of her. She looked up and imagined Israeli soldiers standing on the roof, watching the slaughter below through binoculars, firing flares so the killers could better see their victims. She entered the building, climbed the stairs, and slipped into the flat. Gabriel was sitting on the couch.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Tell you what?”

“Why didn’t you tell me he had survived Shatila? Why didn’t you tell me his family had been butchered like that?”

“What difference would it have made?”

“I just wish I had known!” She lit a cigarette and inhaled deeply. “Is it true? Are the things he told me true?”

“Which part?”

“All of it, Gabriel! Don’t play fucking games with me.”

“Yes, it’s true! His family died at Shatila. He’s suffered. So what? We’ve all suffered. It doesn’t give him the right to murder innocent people because history didn’t go his way!”

“He was an innocent, Gabriel! He was just a boy!”

“We’re in the middle of an operation, Jacqueline. Now is not the time for a debate on moral equivalence and the ethics of counterterrorism.”

“I apologize for permitting the question of morality to enter my thoughts. I forgot you and Shamron never get tripped up over something so trivial.”

“Don’t lump me in with Shamron.”

“Why not? Because he gives orders, and you follow them?”

“What about Tunis?” Gabriel asked. “You knew Tunis was an assassination job, but you willingly took part in it. You even volunteered to go back the night of the killing.”

“That’s because the target was Abu Jihad. He had the blood of hundreds of Israelis and Jews on his hands.”

“This one has blood on his hands too. Don’t forget that.”

“He’s just a boy, a boy whose family was butchered while the Israeli army looked on and did nothing.”

“He’s not a boy. He’s a twenty-five-year-old man who helps Tariq kill people.”

“And you’re going to use him to get to Tariq, because of what Tariq did to you? When does it end? When there’s no more blood to shed? When, Gabriel?”