“Shut up, or the poet Munir Tabrani may hear you. The other day I read an article saying that he’d been at an evening with the novelist Rabai al-Madhoun—the writer we were talking about on the way from the airport—in the Abu Salma Hall in Nazareth. Our friend al-Madhoun, it seems, had finished off two plates of hummus, followed by two plates of kunafa, drank a jug of water, then got excited, and started to make a speech: ‘We’ve got hummus, we’ve got kunafa from its home in Nablus. We’ve got our clothes, we’ve got the stitching of the decorations and the silk, and the rainbows on the chests of the peasant women. We have the whole of Jerusalem, and the souls of the prophets who left their sites on the Rock for people to fight over. So long as the women of our sacred countryside continue to bring their vegetables, their thyme, their basil, and their smells for us to savor in Khan al-Zeit and the ancient alleys, nothing will remain but our own history, our history that is ours . . .’
“Munir stood up in the middle of the hall and shouted at al-Madhoun, ‘Forget your hummus, forget your kunafa, the Jews have taken the whole country, and you’re talking to me about hummus and thyme. Give us a break, man!’”
We laughed together. “You know,” Salman went on, “Jerusalem would be nothing without Abu Shakir’s and Abu Hasan’s hummus. What would Jerusalem be worth without Salah al-Din Street and Bab al-Wad, and the Jaffa Gate, and all the gates that take people to their places of faith? If it didn’t have all this, it wouldn’t have the al-Aqsa mosque or the Dome of the Rock, the Christian quarter, the Church of the Resurrection, the Western Wall, the Khan al-Zeit Market, al-Khallaya, or the clever merchants who came to Jerusalem in bygone times and preserved its markets and commerce. That’s without getting into politics and mentioning Orient House, the National Hotel, or the al-Hakawati Theater. Could Jerusalem be Jerusalem if it wasn’t for all this, man—and above all, its mountains, its history, its walls, wars, and peace? Although, between ourselves, the City of Peace has never known peace!”
After saying all this, he drank a little water from his glass, at the same time swallowing the remains of his speech. One sentence, though, remained on his tongue: “Don’t forget our appointment with Dr. Fahmy al-Khatib, like you forgot to remind me of Jaafar’s kunafa!”
“We’ve still got two hours,” I replied.
“Don’t forget, either,” exclaimed Julie, “that we have to see the Church of the Resurrection, to say a prayer and for me to buy some incense.”
“Yes, dear, to say a prayer and buy some incense,” echoed Salman, imitating Julie’s accent. So we all left, and made for the Church of the Resurrection.
The four of us wandered along the ancient alleyways, accompanied by the past—like friends across a long period of history—until we reached one of Jerusalem’s great landmarks: the Church of the Resurrection. We stopped in the courtyard in front of it, before a place that brings together Christians from all over the world—though as soon as they get inside it, they divide it up.
Julie made the sign of the cross over her chest and wept. She started her prayers for Ivana’s soul before she’d even crossed the threshold into the purity of the church.
Salman said that he and Aida had visited the church many times, and they went off to wander around the neighborhood. I started to contemplate the church, the key to which had been entrusted to a Muslim Palestinian family, as the various Christian sects could not agree among themselves. Wajih Nusseibeh opened and closed the doors of the church every day. Muslims had also guarded it in a tradition handed down since AD 638, when the caliph Omar ibn al-Khattab had entrusted the key to Abdallah ibn Nusseibeh al-Maziniya, after receiving it from the Patriarch Sophronius, together with the keys to the city of Jerusalem itself. The Christian sects agreed to leave this task in the hands of two Muslim families, the Judahs and the Nusseibehs. The first kept the key to the church secure, and the second opened the door. This wise arrangement solved the problems that arose between the sects—as in the summer of 2002, when a Coptic priest had moved his seat from the agreed place, into the shade. The Ethiopians regarded this as a hostile act of aggression, and a fight broke out, which resulted in eleven people being injured.
Julie walked toward the church entrance and disappeared inside. I remained alone, looking at the groups entering devoutly and emerging even more devoutly. When she reappeared, she was so exhausted by her emotions that she expressed a wish to leave the place quickly. I didn’t pursue it, but asked instead about the holy incense, and she confirmed that she had bought some. Then we turned around, to find Salman and Aida waiting for us at the corner.
We all walked together in silence until we left by the Damascus Gate.
*
Salman stopped his car halfway up the hill. “This is Dr. Fahmy’s house. And there they are.”
It was an odd scene. Fahmy and his wife were sitting at a large rectangular table set in the middle of a leafy terrace, like two people sitting on the edge of a public road. There was no sign of any house or building. In a side area were two cars which must have belonged to the couple. Salman drove his car in, parked it behind one of the other two cars, then got out. We followed him, Julie with a large bunch of roses we had bought on the way to the house, and I with the porcelain statue in my hands. We had already taken the statue out of the box it had traveled in—surrounded by pieces of sponge to protect it
