“When we’re finished.”
I could tell right away he wasn’t used to negotiating with Jews.
And so, with great reluctance, I removed my hat and took my place in front of the gray wall facing the camera. It was obvious that this video was going to have no production value at all. There were no flags behind me or masked men standing in the frame holding weapons. I can’t explain it, but even while overcome with dread over this video and the pain it would cause those at home to see it, I also had the distinct feeling that this was all bullshit and the video would never see the light of day.
Chubs went through the questions that were going to be hurled at me on camera. The first few just focused on my background to establish my identity—my name, address, occupation, and the names of my parents. The last two questions were the most important to Kawa, as those were the ones that would prove my guilt.
“Why did you come to Syria?” Chubs asked.
I gave my usual answer—that I was there to take photos—and he told me to amend it to say that I was there to take photos for the CIA.
“And who did you send these pictures to?”
“Who did I send them to?” I asked, confused. I didn’t actually know anyone at the CIA, so I wasn’t sure what they wanted from me.
“Yes, who did you send them to?”
My first instinct was to say Art Vandelay, the name George Costanza used in Seinfeld whenever he had to lie about something, but then I thought of all the hilarious-but-potentially-deadly-to-me comments Americans would post should the video ever be uploaded to YouTube and reconsidered. Humiliating the jihadis like that would probably make them put the tire on me and never take it off.
“I sent them to some guy at the CIA,” I responded.
Surprisingly, this was good enough for them, so Chubs hit record on the camera and we went through the whole routine twice. I wanted to give the impression that I was perfectly okay, or as okay as I could be under the circumstances, so I spoke in an enthusiastic, game-show-host kind of voice that I knew would crack up my friends back home, being careful not to be so blatant that they’d make me redo it. After we were finished I turned to Kawa and extended my hand. For the first time, he shook it.
“Are you happy?” I asked.
“Yes, Jumu’ah,” he replied.
Abu Dejana led me back to the cell and took Theo for his turn. While Theo was gone I filled in Abdelatif on what had transpired in the kitchen. My “some guy at the CIA” answer gave us both a chuckle.
“You should have said Agent Theo Curtis,” he said, and we laughed.
When Theo returned he told us he’d been given the same questions as I had been, only instead of sending photos to the CIA he was told to say he sent reports.
A few minutes later Abu Dejana was back yet again. He handed me three pieces of bread and a bowl. When I saw the bowl was filled with halawa, I looked up at Abu Dejana with a What the fuck? expression.
“Hey man, I asked for yogurt!” I said.
He rolled his eyes and slammed the door in my face.
“I think you guys should become Muslims,” Abdelatif said often.
He said it would increase our chances of release, which I knew was probably true, and that it would keep us safe because the Koran says Muslims can’t kill other believers—apparently nobody outside our walls had gotten to that page yet.
The truth was I’d been thinking about this for a while. My first week in captivity I’d tried to plant the seeds for a possible conversion by asking for a Koran in English, but they refused to supply me with one. I’d figured I could pretend that reading it, over time, led me to find Allah, and thought that discovering the faith “naturally” this way would make it more believable, and not only enhance my chances of survival but also improve my treatment. Another motivating factor was the possibility that conversion would create an opportunity to escape. Once I switched teams I could try nagging the emir and guards into taking me to a mosque to pray. Some of those mosques had thousands of people praying in them on any given day, which meant I might have a real chance if I managed to melt into the crowd. Once the Moroccan joined us in our cell I got the idea to convert by pretending that I felt God in the room every time he prayed.
For now, whenever he made his conversion pitch I pretended to be intrigued by it, but not convinced, anxious not to appear too eager and give away the fact that I was a complete phony.
Sometimes Abdelatif awoke in the middle of the day babbling in French and Italian. Due to his broken leg he always slept facedown, and when this happened he’d raise his head in panic with fear etched into his face. As he muttered whatever it was he was saying, I’d have to shake him back to consciousness. I had never seen anyone so scared before in my life, but I guess spending a week in the boiler room will do that to a man. I can only imagine what he saw in his dreams.
Awake, though, he was stubborn and confident, with the kind of bullying, rigid personality that insists on dominance. He may have been the youngest man in the room, but in his mind he was in charge. For one thing, he was both an Arab and a Sunni Muslim, and according to him these two characteristics made him fundamentally superior to us in nearly every way. He could spend hours pontificating on the reasons behind his racial and religious
