“Accident is the incompetent’s fig leaf.” Levi Eshkol had been pressed into leadership by Golda Meir and the other old-guard Labor leaders, who used him to block the younger politicians from ascending to the top. But now the Arabs were gearing up for another wholesale attack on Israel, and the media was pressuring Eshkol to yield the defense portfolio to the famed General Moshe Dayan. “Are you losing your touch, Weiss? My people were able to cut deals with the religious parties on the abortion vote in the Knesset-”
“Neturay Karta is not a party.” Elie stubbed his cigarette in an ashtray that was already full. “It’s a fundamentalist sect that cuts no deals, a fuse that can ignite a nationwide religious revolt.”
“My point exactly. They are your responsibility.” He shook his finger at Elie. “I inherited you, Weiss. I was told that your Special Operations Department can handle them, but I’m starting to have doubts.”
“Why?”
“With food comes appetite. Now rocks, tomorrow guns.”
“Shooting is not a Talmudic skill,” Elie said. “My reports outline our strategy. Neturay Karta is the epicenter of Jewish fundamentalism, of fervent anti-Zionists. We’ve been monitoring them for two decades. Ben Gurion had expected bloody religious riots within five years of declaring independence. It’s been almost two decades, and I’ve been able to contain them.”
The mention of Ben Gurion’s name had the desired effect. Prime Minister Eshkol seemed deflated. “I don’t read the Bible every day like he does. Maybe I should.”
“A small disturbance here and there is a small price to pay for civic order.”
“Not so small if you’re the poor driver who paid with a cracked skull.” The prime minister took off his thick glasses and started polishing them. “If they go meshuggah again, you must crush them like flies.”
“Neturay Karta might be a small sect, but thousands of ultra-Orthodox citizens would come to its defense from all over Israel-Haifa, Tel Aviv, Beersheba. I have informers everywhere. The black hats despise the Jewish state as a sin against God. They view the secular majority of Israelis as heretics.”
“You exaggerate.” The prime minister pulled off his shoes and rested his feet on a chair. “How many do we have nationwide?”
“Altogether about seven percent of the population. And they believe only God and his Messiah may rebuild the Jewish homeland.” Elie snapped his fingers. “Miracle making is reserved for God. They deny the authority of the government, and if they choose to go from Talmudic pontifications to action, they could destroy the Zionist dream.”
“They can sit back and let the Arabs do the job.” Prime Minister Eshkol sighed. “The Soviets have been arming the Arabs to the teeth-planes, ships, tanks, rockets, guns. The wars of ’forty-eight and ’fifty-six were child’s play compared to what’s awaiting us. They won’t repeat their mistakes. And if the Jordanians join Egypt and Syria? A unified Arab force, trained and armed by the Soviets, attacking us simultaneously on all three fronts! Armageddon! ”
“What about the UN?” Elie was referring to the Truce Supervision Force, which had monitored the borders since 1948.
“General Bull is useless.” Eshkol was referring to the former chief of the Norwegian air force, with the unlikely name Odd Bull, who commanded UN forces in the Middle East. “He’s a like a castrated sperm bull who knows what he’s supposed to do but can’t perform.”
Elie chuckled. The prime minister’s metaphor was poignant. The UN observers, sent to keep the peace, had no power to counter belligerence.
“The Arabs,” Eshkol said, “learned the lessons of past defeats-”
“We also learned some lessons.”
“We have one tank to their hundred! One rifle to their thousand! One soldier to their ten thousand!”
“One smart Jew is better than ten thousand Arab soldiers. And don’t worry about Neturay Karta. My guy can handle them.”
“With one man inside you hope to contain such a fire?”
“It would help if you could delay the abortion vote.”
Eshkol shook his head. “We’re socialists. Our labor unions and the kibbutzim want to see progressive legislation, gender equality, women’s rights. Otherwise, what differentiates us from the Arabs?”
“I understand.” Elie stood to leave. “Oh, almost forgot. I have a favor to ask.”
The prime minister peered at him through his thick eyeglasses. “Money?”
“My department is self-funded, as you know.”
“Then maybe you can spare some cash for a few tanks?”
“Of course, as soon as you appoint me chief of the Mossad.”
Prime Minister Eshkol laughed.
Elie didn’t mind. He would eventually get his wish. He had bankrolled the Special Operations Department with money and valuables he and Abraham had taken from the Nazis they had killed. In the past twenty years, he had traveled to Paris regularly to withdraw cash from several accounts he maintained there under a false identity. It allowed him to finance SOD activities outside the Israeli government’s budgetary controls. But SOD was nothing compared with Mossad. His secret plan was to gain possession of General von Koenig’s fortune and win control over Mossad. With both money and the infrastructure of overseas espionage, he would become the master of a formidable clandestine apparatus with limitless powers.
“So, what’s the favor?”
“There’s someone,” Elie said, “a Mossad operative whom I need. A temporary assignment.”
“Yes?”
“It will only be part-time, nothing too involved.”
Prime Minister Eshkol grabbed a pencil and opened his notebook. “What’s his name?”
“Tanya Galinski. She’s currently-”
“ Ohhhh!” Eshkol grinned, taking off his glasses. “Tanya Galinski! Ah scheinah meidaleh. ”
Elie didn’t respond.
“And what do you want with Mossad’s loveliest secret?”
“She’s been brought back for an eavesdropping assignment. What I need from her won’t interfere with her current duties.”
“I’ll approve it. Maybe you’ll get lucky with Miss Galinski.”
Chapter 8
Lemmy could not sit for the rest of the day. After sunset, when Sabbath was over, Temimah crushed a block of ice and wrapped it in a kitchen towel. “Lie on your belly and put it on.”
“Thanks.” He turned to go to his room.
“It’s time you grow up,” she said. “Your father expects you to take over some of his responsibilities.”
“Like what?”
She scrubbed a pot, which had waited in the sink for Sabbath to end. “Sorkeh Toiterlich is a wonderful girl, and you’re almost eighteen.”
Most of his contemporaries were already engaged, except Benjamin who, without a father, was a more challenging match. “I don’t feel ready,” Lemmy said.
“It’s not a question of being ready.” His mother filled the pot with soapy water. “It’s your duty to God. To the Jewish people. And to me.”
This surprised Lemmy. He had never thought of starting a family as a duty to his mother, whose daily life consisted of fulfilling her duties to others-to his father, to him, to the sect and its needy members. It had never occurred to him that she was also entitled, that she could be the beneficiary of someone else’s duty.
Temimah resumed scrubbing the deep pot with an iron brush. “It’s not enough for me, taking joy in other people’s children.” The brush scrubbed faster. “I’m not asking very much.”
“Asking me to marry isn’t much?” Lemmy shifted the pack of ice between his hands.
“She’ll be a good wife. I’ll help her with everything. And you can keep studying in the synagogue with Benjamin every day as if nothing happened.”
