The Collaborator of Bethlehem

Jihad Awdeh flicked his cigarette onto the slope behind the apartment building. Its orange tip rested in the darkness a moment. Omar Yussef watched it disappear. He waited again, but Jihad merely rested his elbows on the balcony rail and looked into the darkness.

“You remember how angry Hussein was when George Saba forced you both off his roof that night, when you went there to fire at the Israelis?” Omar Yussef continued. “Well, I believe that Hussein led the soldiers to Louai, and then had his revenge on George Saba by tagging him as the collaborator. That way he’d also prevent anyone from suspecting that he himself was, in fact, the collaborator. But when he found out what Dima told me, he killed her, too.”

“How did he discover that she spoke to you?”

Omar Yussef decided not to mention his suspicion that Khamis Zeydan passed on the details of that meeting to Hus-sein. “I don’t know.”

“So someone else could’ve killed her.”

“I suppose so, but I don’t know why anyone else would have done so.” Omar Yussef turned toward Jihad Awdeh. The man’s face was obscured, silhouetted against the light emanating from the room behind them. Omar Yussef didn’t want to touch him, but he needed to make some kind of contact in the darkness. He put his hand on Jihad’s shoulder. “I need your help, Jihad. George Saba is an innocent man. He’ll be executed in seventeen hours. His blood would be on my hands, if I didn’t come here and beg you to help me. The law counts for nothing in this town. You are the power. You are the one who can save a guiltless man.”

“Do you think someone who holds a gun on me and Hus-sein when we are resisting the occupation forces is a guiltless man?”

That’s a trap, Omar Yussef thought. Be careful. “George was desperate. He knew that your presence on his roof would draw Israeli fire. He feared for his family. He didn’t know that it was you and Hussein on his roof.”

Jihad Awdeh lit another cigarette. “Who will be ready to listen to the notion that the martyr Hussein was really a criminal and a collaborator?”

“You said that you didn’t like him.”

“That doesn’t mean I believe he was a collaborator. Or that I believe George Saba is innocent.”

“I told you the evidence.”

“Hussein Tamari risked his life against the Jews many times. Even this morning, he organized the martyrdom mission in the Jerusalem market. These are things that outweigh your evidence.”

“Then don’t pin Louai’s murder on Hussein. Let Hussein’s name remain clean, let him be a hero. But set George Saba free, anyway.”

“Someone has to pay. If it isn’t Hussein, it’ll have to be the Christian.”

Omar Yussef moved closer. He smelled Jihad Awdeh’s sweat beneath the aura of his cigarettes. “I came to you, Jihad, because I know that you aren’t one of them. You haven’t become leader of the Martyrs Brigades just because you happen to be a member of the right family. You’re clever. You’ve made it to the top of the Martyrs Brigades, in spite of the fact that the others treat you as an outsider. For the rest of them,” Omar Yussef gestured beyond the glass door to the gunmen milling about the living room, “Hussein was some kind of hero and saint, because he’s their blood. But you’re able to think independently. You can see what he really was. Don’t let George die for the sake of someone else’s image. This is flesh and blood that will be destroyed tomorrow, not someone’s reputation.”

Jihad Awdeh was silent.

“Look, you have to admit that George Saba can’t be the collaborator,” Omar Yussef said. “Hussein was assassinated tonight while George was in jail. Could he have led the Israelis to Hus-sein from inside his prison cell?”

“Since the Israelis killed Hussein,” Jihad said, “doesn’t that prove that he was no collaborator? Your accusation against him doesn’t make sense. Why would they kill their own agent?”

The Martyrs Brigades leader looked about him, as though making sure no one could overhear. It seemed to Omar Yussef that a tinge of regret passed over Jihad Awdeh’s face as he looked at the crowd of gunmen inside. Quietly, he spoke. “Just before Hussein left his headquarters for the iftar, Khamis Zeydan was with him. Hussein told the police chief where he was going.”

Omar Yussef remembered Khamis Zeydan’s phone call from the side of Hussein Tamari’s burning vehicle. The policeman had told him that he knew Hussein was in the destroyed jeep because he was following him when the missile struck. Omar Yussef felt a deep horror. Already he suspected his friend of betraying Dima Abdel Rahman. Certainly he knew that Khamis Zeydan hated the Martyrs Brigades boss who scorned and humiliated his authority as police chief even to his face. He had wondered why Khamis Zeydan was at the scene of Hussein’s death when he received the phone call. Jihad Awdeh wondered, too.

Jihad opened the balcony door. Voices spilled out. The living room was filling with gunmen who would depart from here to Hussein Tamari’s funeral. “I have to go now. We’re burying the martyrs.”

Omar Yussef nodded. He shook the hand that Jihad Awdeh proferred. It was cold, but Omar Yussef, too, found it chilly on the balcony. He passed through the crowd of burly men in their sweaty camouflage jackets. They carried their Kalash-nikovs, which they would fire into the air as they took what was left of the martyr Hussein to his final rest.

Omar Yussef ran his suspicions about Khamis Zeydan through his head again as he went down the stairs. If Jihad Awdeh believed the police chief was guilty, Khamis Zeydan was in danger. Omar Yussef wanted to call his friend immediately. But if Khamis Zeydan was prepared to let George Saba die for something he hadn’t done, could Omar Yussef count him as a friend any more? Was he even a man whose life was worth protecting?

As he crossed the street Omar Yussef briefly saw the silhouette of his granddaughter Nadia, still watching from the window of his house. Then she was gone.

Chapter 24