The Jerusalem Inception

Chapter 39





The graduation ceremony began late in the afternoon on May 18, 1967. The field was divided into squares for each company of graduating trainees from various divisions of the IDF. Lemmy’s company was assigned to the front. They lined up, their olive-green uniforms neatly pressed and their red berets tilted to the right. Zigelnick assumed position a few feet ahead of his soldiers, facing them, his hands behind his back. A three-man military band tuned its instruments, and a senior officer approached the lectern, looking through his notes.

“Gerster,” Sanani whispered without moving his lips, “do you know why Zigelnick wears a mustache?”

“No.”

“Because he wants to look like his mother.”

The word mother jolted Lemmy, but he chuckled, struggling to keep a straight face.

Zigelnick must have heard them. “Sanani, I heard your mother ran into the rabbi who circumcised you at birth, and he yelled at her for raising the wrong piece!”

Some of the soldiers began repeating the joke to the others, and soon dozens were laughing openly.

The officer cleared his throat at the microphone. “Soldiers! The chief of staff!”

Everyone stood to attention as General Yitzhak Rabin’s helicopter descended behind the stage. It was a great surprise. No one had expected him to attend the ceremony. Only a few hours earlier the Voice of Israel had reported that UN Secretary General U Thant had not only caved in to the Egyptian demand without bringing the issue to the General Assembly in New York, but had gone even further by ordering all UN observers to leave the Sinai Peninsula. Egyptian forces had already taken control of Sharem al Sheik, poised to blockade the Straits of Tiran.

Rabin climbed the stage and jogged to the podium. “Soldiers! Several months of training might not be enough. But time is a luxury we don’t have. Therefore, on behalf of the Israeli Defense Force, I welcome you. Our enemies have an ambition. To destroy our Zionist dream. And to throw us into the sea. They think they can succeed.”

Standing so close to the stage, Lemmy was surprised at how young Rabin looked—and how tired.

“If we must, we will fight,” he continued. “For our families. For the land of our ancestors. And for Israel’s future.”

There was an audible exhalation of pride among the troops.

“Last but not least,” he continued, “for the graduates who earned the highest grades in each unit.” He held up a pocket-size copy of the Bible. “We are the People of the Book. This is our history and the story of our homeland.”

The officer next to Rabin looked at a list and announced, “Private Jerusalem Gerster!”

Everybody applauded while Lemmy ran forward. He accepted the military-issued, plastic-bound copy of the Bible from the chief of staff, who returned his salute and said, “Good luck!”

“Thank you, sir!” Lemmy ran back to his place, holding the small Bible. He returned Zigelnick’s wink.

A few other soldiers were recognized for graduating first in their units. When the last one was back in line, the graduates sang the national anthem, Hatikvah. “As long as at heart, deep inside, a Jewish soul longs; and to the ends of east, far ahead, an eye for Zion longs.” For all of them, this moment was the culmination of months of hard training, of leaping from tree summits and speeding planes, of rushing up hills in mock attacks, and of delicate training in explosives. But for Lemmy, this moment was also the culmination of a personal journey from Neturay Karta’s abhorrence of Zionism to the IDF’s patriotic spirit, from singing melancholy prayers in the synagogue to singing the Israeli anthem. “Our hope still lives, two millennia old, to be a free people on our land, the land of Zion and Jerusalem.”

Lemmy’s heart pounded with excitement. He felt warm inside. The words of Hatikvah emerged from his heart, where prayers had once originated. He felt as if he had regained his faith, only that it was a different faith. He was finally an Israeli.

Following the national anthem, the band broke into a lively tune, and each instructor decorated his own soldiers. Zigelnick attached the coveted parachute pins to their shirts and beckoned Lemmy to take his place up front. Having graduated first in his unit, Lemmy had earned the honor to lead them off the field. He marched forth, turned right, and passed before the stage, where Major General Yitzhak Rabin stood in attention and returned his salute.

Elie Weiss stopped at the central post office in Jerusalem and collected a package that was waiting for Rupert Danzig. It came from his agent in Munich and contained a few newspaper clippings about a house fire in a nearby suburb, which killed a man and injured his son, age sixteen. The victim, Manfred Horch, was a widower who owned an auto repair shop. He had served in the SS during the war. The son, Wilhelm, was a high-school dropout who worked as an apprentice with his father. He was hospitalized with severe burns. Elie’s agent scribbled in the margin: Son died during the night. Death not reported in the news. No living relatives or close friends. Body cremated and hospital records altered to show that Wilhelm was transferred to private clinic near Zurich for further treatment.

Beside the news clippings, the agent sent a copy of an admission application for Lyceum Alpin St. Nicholas, the prestigious Swiss boarding school.

Elie filled out a blank telegram form, addressed to his Munich agent. In the block reserved for the text, he wrote only one word: Proceed.

Mossad headquarters ordered Tanya to prepare for a quick departure. With war appearing imminent, she had been assigned to run a weapon-acquisitioning operation in Europe. Twenty minutes later, a retired agent, summoned back to service, showed up at her door. She adjusted the headphones to fit him and spent an hour explaining how to use the eavesdropping equipment.

Having experienced Mossad life for so many years, Tanya was accustomed to sudden, life-altering orders, accepting them with equanimity that was rooted in the trust she had in her superiors. But there was no way to stop her mind from engaging in the endless game of speculation: Where? Why? What?

She knew Israel had ordered and paid for large quantities of French armaments, from bullets to cannons and Mirage jets. But earlier this morning President De Gaulle had followed the American example by announcing a complete embargo on all weapon supplies to the Middle East—a disingenuous announcement, considering that only Israel was affected by it while its Arab enemies continued to receive huge quantities of modern weapons and jets from the Soviet Union.

Paris required a different dress style than Jerusalem. She pulled a silk scarf from her closet and faced the mirror. The cheerful red, green, and yellow fabric contrasted with the heaviness in her heart. She thought of Abraham’s wife in her tight headdress and sad eyes while looping the scarf around her neck and forcing on a smile. “C’est la vie, Mademoiselle Galinski.”

“Oui?” the agent in the other room yelled, “Es-tu parle le moi?”

“No,” Tanya said. “I was talking to myself.”

The soldiers spent the afternoon preparing for redeployment. No one had yet told them where the company of fresh-minted paratroopers would be sent. Most hoped for the north, where the cool Galilee Mountains would be a pleasant relief from the desert heat. A few argued that, having trained for months in the south, they would fight better in the familiar topography of the Negev.

Before dinner, Captain Zigelnick summoned Lemmy and Sanani to the command tent. It was dimly lit, only one bare lamp hanging from the pole in the center, shedding a circle of light on a field desk. He returned their salutes. “Congratulations on your achievement, Gerster.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“And congratulations to you too, Sanani.”

“What for?”

“For not getting kicked out before graduation.”

“Why would you kick me out?”

“For all your bad jokes.”

They laughed.

Lemmy registered the glow of a cigarette in the dark corner of the tent. A small figure stepped forward. When the light reached the face, Sanani made a funny little noise. The face was gaunt and sickly, and burn scars covered the left cheek and neck, down into his collar. And the strangest eyes—tiny and black—were separated by an aquiline nose. He wore a wool cap, pulled down to his ears, which stuck out.

Zigelnick said, “This is Agent Weiss from the Special Operations Department in Jerusalem.”

They saluted him, but he extended his hand instead. It was small and clammy. He immediately retreated back into the shadows.

“SOD needs two volunteers,” Zigelnick said, “for a secret mission. It’s your choice whether or not to volunteer. You can take your time and let me know tomorrow.”

“I’m in,” Lemmy said.

“Same here,” Sanani said.

“Very well.” Zigelnick shook their hands for the first time, and probably the last. “Get your gear and follow Agent Weiss. Good luck!”

Tanya met the rest of the Mossad team at Lod Airport. The head of the Europe Desk briefed them on the whereabouts of the weapons Israel had purchased from France, the identities of sympathetic government officials, industrialists, and army officers. While De Gaulle and his advisors at the Quai d’Orsay were intent on neutrality, the French military brass was still smarting from a series of defeats in Algiers and therefore eager to see Israel deny the Arabs a certain victory.

Most pressing was the IDF’s severe shortage in artillery pieces, half-tracks, light guns, and ammunition supplies, in addition to replacement parts for jets and other French-made weapons Israel had purchased over the past decade. Tanya’s team would use every possible mean to gain access to various military and factory warehouses where the goods were kept, take possession, and transport everything to the Mediterranean coast. A fleet of fast cargo ships was already on its way from Haifa to Marseilles.

Especially daring was the plan to take possession of the twenty-three new Mirage jets, which the French refused to deliver even though Israel had already paid for them. Mossad had learned that the jets were stored in a military air field south of Paris. A group of IDF pilots was on high alert, ready to board a cargo plane for a flight across the Mediterranean as soon as Mossad had secured access to the jets.

Tanya’s contact was the chief procurement official at the French Defense Ministry, a charming man of distant Jewish descent, whose repeated marriage proposals Tanya had rebuffed over the years while obtaining priceless concessions for Israel. She would coordinate the whole operation from a Paris apartment, making sure that the different teams played their roles in a synchronized manner.

She knew some of the Mossad agents in the room from past operations. Others were new faces. All thirty-six men and women were fluent in French and versed in the social subtleties required to blend in without being noticed.

The briefing was conducted strictly in French to acclimate everyone to the field, and the questions went down to the smallest details.

Before going out to the tarmac, where a plane was waiting to fly them to Paris, a table was rolled in, loaded with food. Everyone descended on the trays of chopped salad, humus, fries, and roast lamb. Tanya grabbed a piece of pita bread and went to the departures terminal. It was crowded, people trying to catch flights out of the country, angry exchanges in many languages, and frustrated airline attendants with no seats to offer.

She crossed over to the arrivals terminal and went to the IDF counter, which had been set up to process returning Israelis. The lines there were even longer, Israeli men rushing home from abroad to join their reservist units.

Flashing her credentials, Tanya found the supervising officer and gave him an envelope addressed to Bira, which contained pocket money and a loving note. A second envelope had Lemmy’s name on it. It held a longer letter she had written intermittently over the past few days, confessing that, even though she had initially seen him purely as Abraham’s son and a means to remain connected to a lost lover, she had come to love him for who he was, for his quick mind and sense of humor, for his kindness and easy laugh. He had every right to be angry, she added, but anger should give way to understanding and forgiveness. She would be away for a while, so during his vacations he should stay with Bira in Tel Aviv. “And when I return, we’ll talk about what happened and discuss the future. Keep safe. All my love, Tanya.”

The officer promised to forward the note to Paratrooper Command, where they would make sure it reached Jerusalem Gerster.

Back with her team, Tanya stood at the door of the plane and exchanged a few words with each one as they boarded. These men and women were professionals, having participated in multiple overseas operations. But this wasn’t just another operation. They were leaving behind families and friends whose survival, and the survival of Israel, depended on what would happen in France over the next couple of days.

The plane rose into the dark night. Tanya watched through a porthole. From above, Tel Aviv appeared like a carpet of glistening lights, which ended in a straight line at the Mediterranean coast. She had not prayed in a long time, not since Dachau. But craning her neck to catch a last glimpse of Israel, Tanya mumbled a short prayer for Lemmy and Bira, and for herself as well—that she would see both of them alive again. Then she rested her head back, shut her eyes, and thought of Abraham Gerster—not the bearded rabbi from Neturay Karta, but the blond youth who had sung to her during the snowy nights of 1945.