Hostage (5 page)

Timidly, a pale beam of sunshine infiltrates through the basement window, protected by two wooden bars. Is it daybreak or dusk?

“You’re Jewish,” says an Arab voice. “Your name is Shaltiel Feigen-something. Feigenberg, that’s it. It’s in your papers. Married. You’re a peddler. What do you sell?”

“Words,” says Shaltiel.

“You making fun of me?”

“No, it’s the truth. I sell words.”

“I don’t believe you. No one buys words.”

“They pay for my living.”

How do they know these things about me? Shaltiel wonders. Oh yes, my documents. It’s all listed. But then they surely know that I’ve done no harm to anyone and that I have no money. My wristwatch is worth all of twelve dollars. I don’t get mixed up in things that are none of my business. I’m happy to have a few friends, who, like me, are in love with words and the silence between them. My life is of no consequence, except for my family. I don’t understand what’s happening to me.

“You want my poverty? You can have it.”

“And he thinks he’s funny,” the Arab says as he laughs.

“Not so clever,” the other one adds. “Do you think we don’t know?”

“Well then …”

“Well then what? We know you’re not rich. But we’ll get something out of you, something that’s not money. We’re fighters in the Palestinian Revolutionary Action Group, and you’re our prisoner.”

“Why me? I’m not important. No one will satisfy your demands for my sake, you can be sure.”

Then, in a neutral tone, with no sign of hatred, Luigi explains, as if to a student:

They’re not looking for money; they couldn’t care less about money. That they could get more easily and with less risk. Others give them money. They are interested in playing their part in the life and history of Islam. His organization decided to try to do on the American continent what his comrades are doing in other places, all over the Middle East. It’s the first time. Yes, it’s the first operation on American soil, which is supposed to be safe, secure, impregnable, according to the boasts of its leaders. Hostage taking is more profitable than ordinary attacks in Tel Aviv, Paris or London. It doesn’t cost them anything in human lives and brings them worldwide publicity, as well as the liberation of their comrades-in-arms. So this is a new strategy of the radical Palestinians, faithful to their military, national and religious objectives. They are gambling on Jewish solidarity and taking advantage of its influence on Western governments.

At first, it all seemed unreal to Shaltiel, a crazy scheme staged by men obsessed with pointless, criminal violence.

The first night dragged by populated with predatory, threatening shadows. It’s a tale, Shaltiel said to himself, a frightening tale, senseless and improbable, in which I’m both the witness and victim. It’s a tale in which someone like me is tormented. It’s not me who is aching, who is thirsty. I’m somewhere else. I live in another city, in another world. In another body, another story, another mystery, another person. Soon I’ll wake up, find I’m intact and serene, impatient to string together words that make people dream.

All Ahmed knows is how to insult, swear and curse. He is playing the familiar part of the wicked inquisitor alongside the nice one. Drunk with frustration, he takes it out on his powerless victim. His favorite words are “done for.” “You’re done for, you’re all done for, the Jews are done for,” he says. In the first few hours, that’s as far as he goes. Mental torture is enough for him. Everything about him spreads anger and hatred: hatred toward the Jewish state, the Jewish people, the Jewish past, the Jewish religion, Jewish money, Jewish power. These are his obsessions, his phobias, complete and all-enveloping. At least, this is the impression he wants to give. Every word coming out of his mouth is a gratuitous insult, an obscene swearword, a poisoned arrow or a call to suffering, humiliation, denial, murder.

In his view, the Jewish infidels will survive only so they can be punished by Allah and oppressed by his devoted servants. They are the cause of all evil weighing on the world. They are the incarnation of transgression, impurity personified, the vermin of the earth, society’s cancer, the enemies of peace, the negation of happiness. Realizing that Shaltiel was guilty only of belonging to the accursed people, Ahmed quickly saw how he could take advantage of the situation: He had to coerce his
hostage into signing a “voluntary” declaration condemning the Jewish state for “all the crimes committed against the unfortunate Palestinians.” He also wanted to get him to request that men of goodwill, on every side of the political spectrum, save his life by obtaining the liberation of the three Palestinian “prisoners of war.”

Between the obscenities punctuating the Arab’s orders, Shaltiel finds himself regretting two things: that he never acquired the mystical powers that would make him invisible and that he never studied the Koran. Does the Muslim holy book, held to be sacred by countless believers, really preach bloodthirsty violence? His mind, molded by the study of Jewish sources, refuses to accept this. If the Koran represents contemporary Islam, as practiced by his abductors, he feels it is a religion much to be pitied.

Ahmed believes that he is the Prophet’s personal servant. It is He who commands him to do what he does. Hence his conviction that he can do as he pleases. Shaltiel is his enemy and the enemy of his brothers in the desert; he must be denied pity. He must be crushed, his will shattered, his faith ridiculed, his honor sullied, his reason denounced, his dignity destroyed; he must be smashed, trampled on, his soul emptied of its powers and treasures. Ahmed’s immediate goal is specific: compelling the masters in Tel Aviv and Washington to accept his political demands. In front of his implacable, inflexible determination, they will show themselves to be weak and cowardly. The key to his victory is here before him: this pathetic Yid, Shaltiel Feigen-whatever.

Little by little, Ahmed convinces himself that, in addition to the liberation of the Muslim prisoners, it will be essential for
him to force the hostage to disown his people—those manipulators, renegades, criminal gangsters, children of the devil and death.

“Whether you admit it or not, from the fact of being Jewish, you’ve got Muslim blood on your hands,” he says to his prisoner. “What the Jews are doing at home, they’re doing in your name too.”

“No, no, no!” protests Shaltiel, who hasn’t yet understood the meaning of this accusation. “I’m Jewish, but I’ve never humiliated anyone. I’ve never committed a crime! You’ve made a mistake about me. I’m not the person you’re looking for. I’m not your enemy! I’m against all humiliation, all persecution; I’m opposed to violence in every form, for violence includes violation. The Jew that I am, the storyteller I am, repudiates it with all my heart and soul.”

Ahmed isn’t listening to him. There is no discussing theology, sociology and politics when someone is under the spell of a self-enclosed totalitarian ideology. Intentionally or out of ignorance, Ahmed, who is empirical in all matters, detests pointless and laborious philosophical imaginings, never-ending discussions, or clashes of ideas that might be respectful of non-believer opponents and sinners deserving only of complete contempt. His argument boils down to two words: yes and no. His vocabulary is meager, limited to threats and swearwords. His role is not to listen but to be listened to. As he sees it, every infidel is a potential hostage. He is the all-powerful, omniscient master; the slave owes him not just absolute obedience, but also his existence and survival.

Even torture that is only verbal reinforces the power of the torturer: The prisoner’s imagination leads him to dread the next
round of interrogations. And when it happens, the feeling of inferiority becomes more acute; it bores into the brain, and the cultural and psychological defenses that surround the brain disintegrate and vanish. The ego is dissolved. Could Ecclesiastes be right? Is a living dog worth more than a dead lion? Chased from his throne by Ashmedai, the master of demons, good King Solomon, the wisest of men, experienced mental torments too. Physical pain comes later. For the tortured, all the knowledge acquired from childhood in the course of a lifetime won’t protect you. The moans seem to issue from another body. In the end, the victim doesn’t have anything or anyone to cling to. It’s the feeling of falling into a bottomless well. Suddenly emptiness or the idea of emptiness appeals to him. Oh, to have an empty head, an empty heart, an empty future; to think of nothing, to feel nothing: This would be paradise in the middle of hell.

But Shaltiel knows this is impossible. His breath is not the only thing binding him to life. He has his parents, his wife, his close friends; they must be dying of anguish. What do they know? What are they doing? Who are they calling? What are the police doing? What is the press saying? In his imagination—and it fits with reality—he imagines Brooklyn in turmoil: the intense speculation in the study and prayer houses; the Hasidim consulting their Teacher, who advises them to recite particular Psalms. In her powerlessness, Blanca must be agonizing. If there is anyone who is moving heaven and earth, it is she. Nothing stops her; nothing holds her back. Dynamic and full of ideas, she must be running from one office to the next, from one of the dozens of Jewish organizations to another; he can hear her motivating them, encouraging them, urging them to act: Surely someone can get to a congressman, a government official.

“So, you little bastard Yid,” Ahmed yells. “Are you going to open your filthy mouth finally? If you don’t talk, I’ll make you drink your own blood! Are you going to ask for the liberation of my heroic comrades? Are you going to sign a confession and publicize your disgust for the Jewish army and the Jewish politicians? They will be done for in time, I can guarantee that! And you first and foremost!”

Meeting with flat refusals, the Arab moved away and seemed to take his companion to task, as though he were testing his loyalty to their cause.

“We’ve got to get him to show his weakness and cowardliness publicly. Thanks to him, we’ll force the liberation of my brother and the others and also gain the respect of revolutionaries throughout the world. That’s our mission!”

So there are only two of them, thinks Shaltiel. Two men, two terrorists, bound by hatred. Yet, listening to them, they’re so different. One will never change because he won’t entertain doubts, but is the other one capable of doubting? In the end, which of the two will kill me? Actually, what’s the difference. Inevitably, they’ll go through with it.

He says to himself that like Dostoyevsky he’ll be a witness to the preparations of his own execution.

He hears a door opening and closing. One of the terrorists has gone out. It’s the Italian. Ahmed begins to manhandle his prisoner, hoping he’ll reach a breaking point.

Shaltiel takes refuge in his memories and in words, as usual. He calls them, but they don’t obey. Ideas and images overlap, become distorted, diverted, disassociated. Finally, a wave of panic turns to tenderness.

Suddenly, a weird thought pops into his head: Why not
make a “confession” and sign their preposterous statements, to which no intelligent person will attach any importance, and put an end to this stupid, horrendous spectacle? Other men, ever so much more influential than he, have done this, in another day and age: Nikolay Bukharin, Lev Kamenev, Zinovyev—great statesmen, illustrious generals, admired revolutionaries, former companions of Lenin—when their suffering became unbearable. He can’t do it, though he could perhaps advise the Americans and the Israelis to liberate the three Palestinians, but he could not accuse Israel of war crimes or crimes against humanity: His own memory and that of his parents won’t allow it. Yet it would be so simple: Saying yes under threat is not a disgrace. If he gave in, surely Jews would understand. Didn’t he write articles supporting Jerusalem in an obscure Jewish monthly put out by the Department of Literary Studies at a Jewish college in Ohio? He used a Hebrew name, Shaltiel ben Haskel.

He suddenly finds himself trembling. Is it possible these Palestinian terrorists have read his articles and discovered the real name of their author? Perhaps his abduction was calculated. But why would they read a publication whose readership was so limited that it had to close down for lack of a subsidy? Yet in his feverish pain, he says to himself, Now that electronic communications are becoming global, anything is possible. How is he to know? Should he ask Ahmed if he is familiar with the articles? Bad idea. He might torture him even more cruelly.

Clenching his teeth, he decides not to say or do anything for the time being. He’ll wait for the Italian.

In the course of the following night Shaltiel succeeded in persuading the Italian to remove his blindfold.

“In any case, it’s of no use to you,” he said. “I’ve studied esoteric subjects that have taught me how to ‘see’ voices. So I can describe you and your friend, your faces, your bodies, your behavior. Do you want me to prove it?”

The Italian nodded his head silently. He was surprised when his prisoner began to describe facial characteristics of both men—one bearded, the other just badly shaved; the first having well-defined eyebrows, the other bushy ones.