The Hijack Read online

  The men paused outside Abed’s house looking uncertain about where to go next, with little time to decide. Abed remained still, watching them from the shadow of his door, which was slightly ajar. One of them sensed Abed and looked straight at him, and for a moment Abed wondered if they were considering an escape through his home. If the enemy suspected, it would mean the end of his home, literally, and possibly his incarceration. Despite the dangers, Abed opened his door to offer them entry.

  ‘Close your door,’ the man said. ‘Stay out of sight.’ He was tall and lithe and gripped his rifle close to his body, his finger through the trigger guard, ready to use it in an instant. Abed did not know him although he looked vaguely familiar. The man was not from Rafah camp. Perhaps he was from Khan Younis, the larger town just north of Rafah.The man tapped his partner who was covering the other direction and they ran down a narrow alleyway opposite Abed’s front door.

  A moment later he heard more running in the direction the men had come from, and he instinctively closed his door and carefully drew the bolt across without making a noise. There was a roar of engines and the sound of masonry crumbling; one of the buildings behind Abed’s home had gone down. Then many footsteps charged past his front door and gunfire erupted, followed by shouts in Hebrew. Everyone in the camp would be wide awake by now. Families would be huddled together in fear, praying their door would be passed by, that they would be among the lucky ones tonight.

  A helicopter roared overhead drowning out all other sounds. Abed froze in the darkness as the helicopter’s searchlight shone through gaps in the corrugated roof above the front door sending shafts of light across his face. As the helicopter moved on, a voice speaking in Arabic came over a hand-held loudspeaker.

  ‘This is the IDF. All men from the age of fourteen to sixty come out of your homes with your hands raised!’

  Abed was immediately filled with concern. The last time a callout happened in his neighbourhood he was eighteen. He had been made to line up along with a dozen other men, a few older but mostly his age or younger, and they were searched and ordered to remove their shoes. Several boys were slapped about, two beaten quite severely for not co-operating quickly enough, but Abed had received little more than a few shoves, the most severe one accompanying his dismissal when he was pulled away from the wall, pushed up the street and told to go home immediately without looking back or he would be shot. He obeyed them to the letter. The IDF, the Israeli Defence Force, was not to be trifled with.They were ruthless jailors, without compassion, and punished severely those who did not obey them, and just as often those who did.The rules of Gaza at night were the rules of the jungle, and the IDF had all the teeth and claws.

  The loudspeaker’s message was repeated over and over in all directions. Abed remained behind his front door unsure what to do. If he went outside he feared it would be different this time. He was a man now and adults were often beaten and nearly always taken away and interrogated, which usually lasted a couple of days. He still had a lot to do to get his new metal shop ready to open for business, with supplies due to be delivered in the morning, which he had to be there to receive. But if he did not go outside and the IDF decided to search his home, he might be shot or accused of colluding with terrorists.The latter meant immediate imprisonment without trial for God only knew how long. Some men had been gone for years without even being charged. But compliance did not ensure safety either. There were endless stories of men, and also boys, who had left their homes as ordered in just such a situation, and been shot or beaten and left for dead.The least Abed could expect was to be half-stripped and taken to a holding area, or driven to another part of the Strip and left to find his own way back without money for food or transport. Being beaten was inevitable. It would be down to the mood of the troops as to how badly. If one of their own had been killed recently then it did not bode well for anyone. Resistance was out of the question, and to defend one’s home was to die as a terrorist. Many Palestinians had guns but few who lived in the camps. The most common was the AK47 but some had M16s, and there was even the occasional British GPMG, a heavier belt-fed machine gun. But guns were expensive in Gaza.

  Ironically, most of the weapons smuggled in were not from other Arab countries, which in truth gave little support to the Palestinians. The Palestinians bought their weapons from the Israelis themselves, the so-called Israeli Mafia mostly; they passed through the settlements to be sold by the settlers themselves, the very people the guns might be used against. An AK47 could cost from three to five thousand US dollars, making Palestine the most inflated weapons’ market in the world - in Baghdad an AK47 could be picked up for as little as thirty-five dollars. Some of the weapons originated from the West Bank, captured or found by Israeli soldiers during raids and then sold on to the Mafia.Weapons captured in Gaza were usually recycled back to the Palestinians at the going rate, a poignant example of commerce rising above conflict.

  The loudspeaker voice came again, this time warning that any man found hiding would be guilty of terrorism.Abed had to go. Staying was a much greater risk. He quickly removed his trainers and put on an old pair of shoes since there was a good chance he would lose his footwear and the trainers were new.

  As he reached for the bolt, he heard something behind him and looked over his shoulder. His mother stood at the corner of the hallway in her sleeping gown looking at him. He could not see her eyes in the darkness but he knew she was filled with fear.

  ‘Don’t go out there, Abed,’ she said in a soft voice. ‘Please don’t go, my son.’

  His stomach began to churn as his own fear grew. ‘I must,’ he said.

  He reached for the bolt again and drew it across.

  ‘Abed. Please. Don’t,’ his mother pleaded again, her voice trembling.

  ‘Go back to your room, Mother.’

  He started to open the door then paused as he remembered something. He pulled his shirt over his head and dropped it to the ground so that he was naked from the waist up. Some people had died because the soldiers feared they were wearing an explosive belt. At least he would remove that excuse to shoot him, not that they needed one; he was Palestinian and that was reason enough in their eyes.

  ‘Abed, don’t go,’ his mother begged one last time, then she broke into tears knowing her son would do what he had decided and nothing she could say would change his mind.

  As he opened the door he looked back at her, but she had her head in her hands, unable to watch him go. He stepped out into the street and raised his arms.

  There were half a dozen soldiers a couple of yards away and they quickly trained their rifles on him. ‘Come out!’ one of them yelled.

  An officer stepped forward, a large man no older than Abed, dressed like the others in a khaki uniform, a harness with weapons pouches about his chest and wearing a helmet, the straps tight under his chin. ‘Forward!’ he shouted as he closed in, his rifle aimed directly at Abed’s face.

  Abed walked calmly forward keeping his hands high. The officer reached for him and was immediately joined by another soldier who grabbed Abed harshly as if he might fly away, pulled him up the street and slammed him against a wall.Another soldier joined them to search Abed’s trousers and legs while the officer stepped back.

  ‘Take your trousers off,’ the officer shouted.

  Abed did not move quickly enough for their liking and one of the soldiers slapped him brutally across the face and repeated the officer’s command. ‘Take your trousers off!’

  Abed was still too slow, refusing to give up all his dignity, arrogance his only weapon. He lowered his hands to unbutton his trousers and received another fierce slap across his face. ‘Move when we speak!’ shouted the soldier who hit him. Abed flashed a look at him; he was no more than eighteen years old. He appeared to be nervous. This was probably his first incursion, or first close contact with the enemy in a hostile situation. The soldier’s uniform was a size too large for him and his weapons pouches were worn and undone. Abed glanced at the other
s as he pulled down his trousers. They were all filled with the same hate and eagerness to kill the vermin that lived on their promised land. As he pulled a trouser leg over his shoe, the soldier who had slapped him grabbed it and yanked so hard he pulled Abed’s feet out from under him and Abed fell back against the wall, his backside hitting the street with a thump. He had grazed his back on the wall but he ignored the pain. The soldier continued to pull hard on Abed’s trousers, tearing at them until one of the legs popped over the shoe, the other shoe coming off with the last tug of the other trouser leg. He tossed the garment aside and kicked Abed.

  ‘Get up,’ he shouted. When Abed did not move straight away he kicked him again. Abed’s fear was growing by the second. The blood lust was in their eyes and he could feel they wanted to kill.

  The soldier helped Abed up by his hair and Abed lost control for one second, pushing the man’s hand away.The soldier could not believe the animal’s audacity and clenched his jaw as he raised the butt of his weapon to strike, but the officer grabbed the soldier’s webbing and pulled him back.

  ‘So, we have a spirited one . . . What’s your name?’

  ‘Abed Omar.’

  ‘You live in that house?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who else is in the house?’

  ‘Only my mother.’

  ‘Let’s go and see if you’re telling the truth.’

  ‘I am telling the truth.’

  ‘I wouldn’t believe you if you told me it was night time,’ the officer said coldly. As he stepped towards the house, Abed was filled with dread. He could feel himself about to move and charge to protect his home and his mother even though it would probably be the last thing he ever did in this life.

  Shots suddenly rang out nearby, followed by an explosion in the next street. The officer stopped and glanced in that direction, the activity reminding him he had work to get on with. He looked at Abed thoughtfully and then changed his mind. ‘Bring him along,’ he barked as he turned from the door and headed up the alleyway.

  Abed was grabbed and held firmly between two soldiers as they marched him briskly behind the officer.

  They turned a corner to where several soldiers stood outside a metal door that was the entrance to a breezeblock hut.The officer stopped to talk to them and after a brief discussion faced the door and banged on it loudly.

  ‘You have been ordered to open up. If you continue to refuse we will open the door ourselves,’ he shouted in Arabic.

  He did not wait for a reply and barked an order to his men. Two of them hurried to the door and hung a small canvas pack the size of a brick on the handle. Wires were quickly led from the pack back up the street and all the soldiers except the officer and the two men holding Abed took cover.

  ‘You have fifteen seconds to open the door or we come in,’ the officer shouted then turned to the soldiers holding Abed and jutted his chin at them.

  They moved tightly behind Abed, pressing one side of him against a wall while keeping him facing the door like a shield. Abed could still see part of the charge, the wires trailing from it along the ground and past his feet. Only then did it dawn on him that the soldiers intended to blow the door while he remained exposed. He tried to twist away but an arm reached around his throat and held him in a firm chokehold.

  A woman’s voice called out from inside the house that she was coming.

  ‘Standby,’ the officer said.

  The woman called out once again, oblivious to what was going on, her voice growing louder as she walked along her roofless hallway to the door.

  If Abed could hear her then the soldiers could too but none of them responded.

  ‘Standby,’ the officer called out again.

  Abed became frantic. This was madness. ‘She’s coming to the door,’ he tried to call out but his words were stifled by the arm about his neck.

  ‘Now!’ the officer shouted.

  The explosion was deafening and the shock wave and bits of debris struck Abed’s body sending him back into the soldiers holding him. Something hit him in the face and stomach and burned for a few seconds, but he did not have time to think about any of it. He was quickly pushed forward towards the hut, the point man of a Roman wedge. The door had been blown completely off, and he was rushed into the hallway and along it, the soldiers remaining tightly behind him in case a desperado within fired upon them. He almost tripped on something on the dark floor. It was a body. But the soldiers held him up and pushed him on. When they reached the end of the narrow passage that opened out into a small yard, the soldiers in the rear rushed past him and quickly entered the rooms. A woman screamed and furniture was smashed, then two young girls were dragged crying from a room and thrown to the ground in the yard where they grabbed each other in utter terror.

  Abed was released, his employment as a human shield over for the time being at least, and he looked back up the hallway to the entrance where the body lay beside the fallen door. It was the woman who had called out.The device must have exploded as she reached for the bolt. Her right arm had been blown off above the elbow and half of her face was missing. He knew her. She was the mother of the two girls on the floor holding each other. Her husband was a security guard in a petrol station on the edge of the town. He was probably there tonight. No one would go and tell him until morning when the soldiers had gone and it was safe. Abed was horrified and looked away.

  The soldiers could find no one else in the house and after some terse commands from the officer,Abed was pulled back out into the street and held against a wall. He glared at the officer barking orders as the screaming girls were pulled out of the house and taken away. The majority of the soldiers moved on up the street to carry on with their search and the officer faced Abed who was staring back at him with hate-filled eyes. Blood trickled down his face from a cut on his forehead and ran over his nose and mouth, and he wanted nothing more than to tear the officer’s throat out with his teeth. The officer stood in front of Abed, slightly taller and looking down on him.

  ‘You look angry,’ the officer said calmly. ‘Have we upset you in some way?’

  The anger welled uncontrollably inside of Abed and he jerked his head forward as he spat blood into the officer’s eyes. The soldier grabbed Abed by the hair and slammed his head into the wall. The officer wiped his eyes clean with his sleeve and then, taking his time to aim while the soldier held Abed, punched Abed in the stomach so hard it took every ounce of breath out of him as his knees gave way. The soldier did not let Abed fall and gripped his throat to keep him against the wall. Abed could barely recover the air he had lost as the officer wiped the rest of the bloody spittle from his face, took a pace backwards and brought the barrel of his M16 level with Abed’s heart. The soldier held Abed as far away as he could to avoid being splattered with blood. Abed believed his time had come and he calmed himself ready for the bullet.

  The officer stared into Abed’s eyes, savouring the moment. He had every reason in the world to kill this Palestinian having lost three of his company in the last month: two to a landmine and one sniped in the back at a checkpoint.The pressure for revenge had come from his men, all conscripts, one of whom had recently lost a sister to a suicide bomber in Jerusalem. But he did not need encouragement. He loved this land more than anything, enough to die for it, and certainly enough to kill those who had promised not to rest until every Israeli was gone or dead.The officer removed the safety catch and curled his finger around the trigger.

  ‘Wait a minute.’ A voice came from behind the officer. A rugged, tough-looking man in grubby civilian clothing whose face had not seen a razor in weeks stepped from an alleyway with a similar-looking partner who remained in the shadows while the first man, holding a notepad, came over to the group.

  The officer lowered his gun and looked at the intruder with guarded contempt. He knew these men were Mossad and although he did not like them, he had no choice but to tolerate them. They called the shots on operations like this one. What the officer resented was th
e way they made him feel like a lackey of Mossad. His family had spent five generations in Israel having moved to the land before the Second World War. They had fought in just about every battle of survival since then and his father had been an officer during the Yom Kippur war and commanded a company under Sharon during the invasion of Lebanon, taking part as an observer in the infamous massacre by Phalangist militia of hundreds of Palestinian men, women and children in the Sabra and Shatila refugee camps. He was an army man through and through and proud of it, and resented these spooks lording it over him.

  ‘What’s his name?’ the Mossad agent asked the officer.

  ‘I don’t know and I don’t care.’

  The agent looked at him, guarding his own contemptuous feelings about the officer, which were not very different from the officer’s perceptions.

  ‘What’s your name?’ the agent said to Abed.

  Abed hesitated, still in shock from his near-death experience and suffering from the torture of knowing it was only a temporary reprieve.

  ‘I asked you your name,’ the agent said without any malevolence.

  ‘Abed Abu Omar.’

  The agent checked his notepad and then looked at Abed as if with a fresh pair of eyes.

  ‘Let him go,’ the agent said.

  The officer’s mouth opened like that of a fish.‘This has nothing to do with you.’

  ‘I said let him go,’ the agent repeated calmly. The officer knew he was stepping into a fight he would not win. Mossad had the last word in virtually everything and if he disobeyed, he would pay a severe price. His career would be over for one, and that alone was enough to keep him in check. He lowered his gun and relaxed his shoulders in reluctant deference.

  Another burst of gunfire came from a couple of streets away.The agent let his eyes linger on the officer’s long enough to hammer the message home that he was in charge, then disappeared up an alleyway with his partner.

  The officer spat on the ground in the direction of the agents and mumbled an obscenity before returning his attention to Abed. ‘Why did they spare you?’ he asked.