Where the Desert Meets the Sea

by Werner Sonne

The mosque’s golden dome shone in the morning sun, above the rock upon which Abraham had nearly sacrificed his son. From here, tradition had it, the prophet Mohammed had ascended to heaven on his horse, accompanied by the Archangel Gabriel. After Mecca and Medina, it was the most important site of Islam, built by the Muslims right where the Temple of the Jews had once stood.

Which dome and which mosque?

If nothing else, they’d surely become more moderate once the Olympic Games proved successful.

Huh?

It was midnight in Palestine, ten in the evening on November 29 in London, as the president of the United Nations, Brazilian Osvaldo Aranha, announced the result. “The United Nations General Assembly,” they heard over the speaker, “in a vote of thirty-three in favor, thirteen against, and ten abstentions, has decided to partition Palestine.”

President of the UNGA? Was that the literal announcement?

He took both her hands and held them tight in his. “I love you,” he heard himself say, “and I’d like for us to be together.” She stood up, without letting go, and pulled him up. As if in a daze, he followed her to the bedroom. Inside the doorway, she kissed him. “You want us to be together? Forever?” “Forever,” he said without hesitation.

So…one or more of them is going to die?

We were not for this Jewish state nonsense, and we see no reason to view things any differently now.

Is this based on anything? Did the British military disagree with Balfour? Or, is this just a throwaway line so the British guy can chew out the British Jewish guy?

The man they called Abbu Moussa was a prominent member of the Husseini clan, the most important Arab family in Jerusalem, to which his cousin Mufti Hadj Amin al-Husseini also belonged. Like his cousin, Abbu Moussa had led the Arab uprisings in Palestine a decade earlier. And like his cousin, he’d also spent time in Nazi Germany. The British had locked him up for years, and now he was secretly returning to Palestine. Now his enemies were no longer the British. Now he had only one goal: preventing the Jews from founding their state on Palestinian land.

So, some of it is historical, but...

“In Qantara, a military camp south of Damascus. Our man there reports that it’s quite a mess. Syrians, Turks, Palestinians, Iraqis, Lebanese, and—now comes the interesting part—men from the Balkans and even Germans. Of course, the Germans and the guys from the Balkans are your old SS friends and Wehrmacht soldiers who escaped from POW camps. They’re the best trained, many of them experts in explosives, in weapons of all kinds. And the ones we’re most interested in.”

Hmmm

“We have British deserters here, plus Muslims from all over, even some from the Balkans. They’re totally fanatical, and no wonder; some of them are ours, from the SS Handschar Division, the unit comprised entirely of Muslims. Lots of them are experts we can rely on for sabotage, bomb attacks, and what have you. Very effective.”

Dragging out every piece of WW2 arcana? Plentiful research is no substitute for storytelling...

In the long line of willing warriors, a young, unshaven man wearing a red-and-white checked kaffiyeh used the waiting time to clean his carbine. Aaron Mehulem had no trouble making conversation with the others in line. His Arabic was better than his Hebrew. He had grown up in a suburb of Baghdad, the son of Jewish parents, and his family later emigrated to Palestine. He ignored Fritz, and Fritz did the same, as if both were invisible. But Aaron had an important mission. He wasn’t only the Jewish spy in this training camp—he was also the liaison between Fritz and the Haganah.

Hmmm

“You’re the traitor,” he proclaimed. “The deserter they sent to Dachau. You’re him. Paulsen. I was there. Our SS commanders had us fall in and watch when they took you away, as a deterrence to us.” Fritz felt a hard blow to his head. Everything went dark.

“Will you stop that?” he’d said. “That’s Hitler’s language.” She’d defended herself without thinking, unleashing her fury for the first time. “Yes, it sure is. I’m well aware. But it’s also the language of my parents and grandparents, and even though you might not like it, of Theodor Herzl. He didn’t know any Hebrew.”

“The day of decision has come. Fight for Al-Quds, the city of the Prophet Mohammed. You are the Jihad Muqaddas, the muftis’ warriors. Allahu Akbar!”

So, whence comes this "Jihad Muqaddas" phrase?