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.
Abed was even more surprised than the officer, and was feeling almost high with relief.‘I don’t know,’ he said.
‘You think I give a shit what he said?’
Abed’s relief went screaming into reverse.
‘This isn’t over,’ he said. ‘I’m going to save you for another time, make you sweat a little.’
The officer removed the magazine from his M16, cocked the weapon and caught the bullet that ejected from the breech. ‘You see this,’ he said holding the bullet up to Abed’s face. ‘This is yours . . . Kiss it.’ He pushed it against Abed’s bloody lips, grinding it into his mouth, cutting his gums.
‘There, it has your kiss. Now, listen carefully. This is what I’m going to do with it. I’m going to give it to one of my snipers - he’s the best in Israel - and I’m going to tell him to give it back to you one day. Maybe in a week, maybe in a month, but one day, you’ll get it back. Right through your head. Or perhaps I’ll just do it myself.’
The officer let the threat sink in, stepped back and placed the bullet in a breast pocket. He pushed the magazine back into its housing on the weapon, pulled the cocking arm until it was all the way back, then released it on its spring to load a new bullet into the breech with a slam.
‘Take him away,’ he said. The soldier yanked Abed down the street and around the corner to a waiting truck where a dozen other men from the camp were pressed inside, some of them bloody, all looking frightened.Abed’s hands were bound behind his back and he was pushed up and into the truck. Two soldiers climbed in, shoving their prisoners further along, the tailgate was slammed shut and the truck drove away.
Abed was kept in a holding cell for a week along with several other prisoners before he was removed for interrogation. He was questioned for an hour after which he was returned to the cell. Two days later he was unceremoniously released, wearing the shirt and jeans from a Palestinian prisoner who apparently would never need them again.
When he opened his front door, he stopped in the doorway. Strewn about the hallway and small yard was their household furniture and belongings, or what was left of them. Anything that could be broken had been. A pile of clothes in a corner had been defecated on. Filled with immediate concern for his mother he hurried down the hallway to the entrance of the main room where he saw her huddled in a corner wrapped in a blanket. When she looked up and saw him, he could feel the relief gush from her as she leapt to her feet and ran into his arms, sobbing uncontrollably. He held her close, stroked her and kissed her head. ‘It’s okay, Mother. I’m all right.’
She would not let go of him and after a minute or so he gently pushed her away to look at her. ‘Are you okay? Did they hurt you?’ he asked.
She shook her head and tried to smile as the tears ran down her face, then took hold of him again