“If I could,” Azam says. “I’d fight them back. They must not be allowed to drive us from our homes.”
But the settlers disagree. “We want Israel to regain control of this area,” Segev says as he tosses the guns into his car. “It needs to reoccupy all of Hebron. Until that happens, we will take preemptive actions to stop the Palestinian gunfire.” The passion in Segev’s declaration is clear. “People here are extremely upset by the daily shootings, killings, and harassment by Palestinians. People here feel abandoned by the government. If we don’t fight, we will die.”
Tom laid the article down. He’d kept the clipping in his wallet for the past eight years.
A reminder of the end.
“What was your source for this article?” his boss asked him. “Please tell me there’s more to this than what has been uncovered.”
Robin Stubbs had not only been his editor, she was his friend. As the allegations against him gradually unfolded, she’d stuck by him. When a committee of former LA Times editors and reporters had been assembled to investigate the charge against him, he’d welcomed their action. He had nothing to hide.
But the proof had betrayed him.
“I can only say that what the committee found is wrong. Everything in this article is true.”
“That’s not going to do, Tom. Your source, Segev, doesn’t exist. The Israelis have searched. We searched. The Palestinian, Azam, had been dead for over a year before you supposedly interviewed him. That’s a fact. Come on. What’s going on here?”
The committee had reviewed all 1,458 stories he’d filed for the Los Angeles Times during his nineteen-year tenure. Nothing had raised a red flag except one.
EXTREMISTS ON BOTH SIDES, OUT OF CONTROL
“I approved the use of your ‘unnamed settler,’ and other unindentified sources,” Robin said. “I stretched policy to the max on those. Now it’s my ass on the line here, too, Tom. This story is a lie. Nothing about it is true. There are no settlers preparing to attack. No mass conspiracy. Sure, there’s violence in the area, but not to the extent you reported.”
He’d personally conducted all of the interviews, face-to-face. His expense reports verified that he had indeed been physically present at the specified locations.
But that wasn’t enough.
“I’m telling you, Robin. I talked to Azam two months ago.”
“He was dead, Tom.”
A photo of Mahmoud Azam, shown to him, matched the man he recalled from their hour or so together in Hebron.
But that man had not been Azam.
“I told you years ago to audio-record things,” Robin said.
But he hated tape recorders. Sources were far more forthcoming without a machine there, and the ones who insisted on being recorded were usually suspect.
“You have my notes,” he said, as if that was good enough.
“They’re fake, too.”
No, they weren’t. They accurately detailed exactly what he’d been told. But that didn’t matter if nobody believed him.
His credibility as a reporter had given the explosive story legs, which explained why news organizations around the world ran it. The result had been a disruption of a new round of peace talks, ones that had been making progress. The Palestinian government, in a rare move, opened its files and allowed Israel to verify that the person supposedly quoted—Mahmoud Azam—had long been dead. Israel likewise cooperated and allowed Palestinian officials to be present as they searched for Ben Segev, who could never be found.
The conclusions were inevitable.
The reporter apparently made the whole thing up.
“Tom,” Robin said, her voice low. “You’re not the only one who will be hurt by this.”
She’d worked for the Times over two decades, rising to editor of the international desk. She was respected in the industry, and her name had been mentioned for promotion to managing editor or publisher. She’d always watched his back.
Trusted him.
He knew that.
“The committee has verified, beyond all doubt, that the story is a fabrication. Can you prove them wrong?”
Her question carried a plea.
No, he could not.
He stared at her.
Husband number two had left a while back. No children. Only two dogs, a cat, and her career with the Times.
