She
pulled her coat more closely around her. It wasn’t cold but she needed to feel
the security that it offered. Her rucksack was firmly wedged between her feet,
its strap clutched in her hand – she must not lose its precious contents. Besides
her an older woman, sat nodding – already falling asleep before the train had
even set off and despite the clamouring noise of the station announcer and the
other passengers.
She
had been lucky. First in the carriage. She knew the train would be full; she
could not stand all the way. Once past the barrier she had walked as fast as
her tired legs and aching back would allow. Other travellers were simply
getting into the first carriage they came to. She knew better. She knew how to
find an empty seat. As she looked through the window she smiled and idly thought
to herself; “rush hour” – it’s the
same everywhere. She knew, for she had spent much of her short working life
travelling in big cities. She knew all the tricks – how to use her elbows to
push through a crush, how to use her heels to stand on the toes of a man who
might try to grope her in the crush, and yes, while others scrambled into the
first carriages they came to she knew it was best to walk to the far end of the
train, the furthest from the barrier, to find an empty seat.
The
carriage filled up. People standing now. It was going to be a long, hot journey
– but she had a seat. Her back ached these days and she was tired. She looked
around her. Here was all life – old, young, babies, men, women, families all
thrown together. Across the aisle a young woman, shielded by her husband, was
feeding a baby. The older woman at her side opened her eyes and smiled. She offered
the girl a sweet. Smiling, the girl took it and thanked her. The two of them sat
silently sucking their sweets watching the people hurrying past, peering into
the carriages looking for space. And then, slowly at first, the train began to
move and the platform began to glide by. A huge cheer rang through the train as
the young men, who seemed to fill the carriage, slapped each other on the back,
punched the air with their fists and laughed. They stood there as if part of
the crowd at far away Stamford Bridge, the Nou Camp or Old Trafford – places
they would probably only see on SKY or their smart phones - their football
shirts emblazoned with their footballing gods: Messi, Van Persie, Rooney ....... . But for the moment they, like her, were homeless, flotsam from the troubles of the middle east and further afield and now flooding into Europe to find a new home, a new beginning - economic migrants, asylum seekers, refugees from bombs, terror and poverty - all seeking a fresh start on the gold paved streets of northern Europe. She, too, was a refugee, but different from most of those who filled the narrow aisle of the carriage - for she had money, she had a passport, she was "legitimate" - an "ordinary traveller" - but she too was escaping her past and making a new life with what little remained of her family - for her own sake and for the sake of the unborn child in her belly. The train began to pick up speed; faster
and faster as they left the station and slid out into the city landscape. She
watched as tall city buildings, offices, flats slowly gave way to the suburbs
where there was more greenery and then, at last out, into the countryside. She
let out a long sigh – she was on her way. At last. Soon she would be “home” –
it felt strange to think that – for she had no home.
She
reached down into the bag and found the plastic bottle of water and took a sip.
It was slightly warm and she offered it to the woman besides her. Her companion
shook her head. She smiled and pulled out a bottle of her own. As the girl put
her water back in her bag she quietly, secretly, peeped into the rucksack to
check that her precious package was still there. It was. Safe and sound. She smiled, pulled the bag
closed, wrapped her ankles around it and grasped the strap firmly between her
fingers. And then she closed her eyes, they were already drooping – it had been
a long day and she was tired. In a matter of seconds she was asleep.
When
she woke up the sun was low on the horizon, already evening. She looked at her
watch. She had slept for almost an hour. Around her those lucky enough to have
a seat were dozing, the young men, many of them unshaven were talking in whispers, sitting on the arms of seats, bedding down in the
narrow aisle or just standing, swaying silently looking out of the window across
the fields and forests or at the occasional village that flashed by. Already
lights were going on in the houses; pinpricks against the darkening
sky. Someone was humming a tune. Further down the carriage a baby cried. She
looked at her watch again. Seven hours the timetable had said. It would be
early morning, after two o’clock when she arrived. But no matter. She would soon be with what
was left of her family. And then a meal, maybe a shower and perhaps a long
sleep. And then she fell asleep again.
When
she woke all was dark, torch lights were piercing the darkness. The train had
stopped. There was movement in the carriage. Men in uniform pushing their way
through holding out their hands. She rummaged in her bag and her hand clasped
the two precious passports. She pulled them ready to hand to the soldier. He
took them, flicked them open to the photographs and peered at her face as she
sat there in the half darkness of the torch light. She knew that she was one of
the lucky ones – how ironic it was after the last four months to think that.
But she knew that she was indeed lucky; she held her own passport issued by the
Palestine Authority but also another and this with the priceless, gold legend “Bundesrepbulik Deutschland: Reisepass” –
a result of her marriage. How grateful she now was to Dietrich – unknowingly -
he had left her with this chance of a new life when he married her. She had
automatically become a German citizen on marriage as would her unborn child who
she could even now feel kicking in her belly. The soldier smiled and said "Danke Fraulein" and handed
back the documents which she stowed away deep in her bag. The German passport gave her status and commanded the policeman's respect and for that she was grateful. These passports were her very
life lines. Lose them and she was a non-person adrift in the world. The train sat in the sidings for what seemed
an age and then after an hour or so it began to move again. The moon was high
now and her sleep had refreshed her. She sat wide eyed watching the dark fields
slip by.
She
calculated that they were probably in Austria. Occasionally they passed a neatly tended station and she caught a few
words of German – a language that she spoke with moderate ease – on advertising
hoardings.
The
older woman sitting beside her wore a traditional hijab, and had fallen back to
sleep, resting her shoulder on the girl. The hijab had slipped exposing the
woman’s hair. The girl gently pulled it back into place; it would not be seemly
for this older woman to be seen by these young men without the head covering. The
girl had never worn a hijab. From her earliest days, as the daughter of a
university professor at the University of Palestine in Ramallah, she had been
brought up in the western tradition. Ramallah, in the occupied West Bank, was a
quiet, laid back university place and cultural centre, where western
lifestyles, dress and ideas were common. Her family were Muslims but rarely
visited the mosque. As she sat in the half light a tear ran down her cheek as
she remembered the sun, the olive groves and the quiet seclusion of the
University Campus which had once been her world. A life which, less than four
months ago, was ripped apart. She and her elder sister, Fae’da, had lived a
cocooned life – their father quietly getting on with his teaching and his
research, her mother serenely running
the house. As the girl had grown and attended the University herself she went
out into the world more but still mixing with other young, western dressed
Palestinian men and women. Life was good. At 22 she had left University with a
good degree in foreign languages: English, French and a little German and at
about the same time her sister had married a fellow student, Aneed, who had
just qualified as a doctor. Within a year they had gone – he had taken a post
at a German hospital near Munich - and she was left alone in Ramallah. Her
language skills, however, were prized. She landed a job with a company
exporting fruit to Europe and beyond and so she travelled: London, Paris,
Milan, Oslo – wherever she was sent: discussing sales, setting up contracts.
Once she managed a brief few days with her sister and brother in law in Germany.
She got used to the western life style – hotels, airports, western food, the evening
rush hour on trains! On her twenty fourth birthday she met her husband. Dietrich
a young German teacher and relief worker for the United Nations posted to Palestine
to help in the densely populated ghettos and with the never ending violence
between Arab and Jew in the Gaza Strip. Dietrich was involved in setting up
educational programmes for Palestinian teenagers and had come to her birthday
party as the friend of a friend. She had been entranced by this young man; they
had “clicked” immediately. Within a year they were married and within another
six months she was attending the University Hospital being told that she was
pregnant. They were overjoyed as were her parents. Life was good – even here in
Palestine. She lived a privileged life – seeing the day to day problems and
shortages of the people but never herself exposed to them; isolated and
cosseted in her university and western enclave.
But
then the world crashed into her life. A week after she had announced that she
was 3 months pregnant her father arranged a celebration. The first grandchild –
there could be no finer reason to celebrate. An expensive meal was booked at a
local restaurant; old friends and family alike invited. For once they would
leave their quiet University life and celebrate into the night. They might even
break with custom and have a few glasses of champagne. “On such a day, Allah surely would not deny us that little pleasure!”
laughed her father. And they all laughed with him. The laughter, however, did
not last. On that fateful evening, just
as the sun was setting and the muezzin was calling the faithful to worship from
the distant minaret they walked the short distance to the restaurant, smiling
and chattering. Then, she suddenly remembered; she had left her mobile phone at
home and was expecting a call from Amsterdam – the final decision on a new
contract she had agreed to supply olives to a chain of Dutch supermarkets. With
a smile she waved to her family, her husband and friends and trotted back
towards the flat that she shared with Dietrich. Having recovered the phone she
set off back the restaurant.
As
she strode back to her flat and sixty kilometres to the west, a helicopter
gunship rose into the evening sky from the Tel Nov Israeli military air base
near Rehot. It momentarily hovered, and then swept east towards the occupied
West Bank and Ramallah. Inside the gunship First Officer Benjamin Radnitz
checked the sixteen digit coordinates again: 0345 7088/2565 3889. Satisfied, he punched the numbers into the on
board computer: 0345 7088/2655 3889.
“Done” he muttered through his mouthpiece. The gunship travelled along the border
being careful not to intrude into the occupied West Bank and so that it
remained out of the reach of Hezbollah ground to air rockets. “Twenty seconds and good” announced the
second officer. “Ten.....Five....Three...”.
There was a slight jolt as the Nimrod missile detached from the belly of
the gunship and the crew watched as it wobbled away on its preset course
towards Ramallah, the coordinates guiding it to the building identified as
where four high ranking Hezbollah officials – terrorists – were, according to the latest Israeli intelligence, gathered.
The Nimrod disappeared in to the distance, its fiery tail like a shooting star
in the darkening sky, its own onboard computer circuits making minor adjustments
to its preordained course which would send four terrorist enemies of Israel, to
oblivion.
She
heard the whistle of the Nimrod just as she turned the corner and saw the
restaurant in the distance. She knew exactly what it was. Palestinians were
used to the sound and she threw herself against a wall. The whistling grew to a
scream and then a brilliant explosion sent fire and rubble everywhere. She was
thrown to the ground as dust, bricks, plaster, wood and bits of metal showered
down on her. As she lay face down, her new dress already ruined and pin pricks
of blood seeping out from a thousand little shrapnel wounds there was silence. Then
the screaming began. She crawled to her feet. The dust was clearing. The
restaurant had gone – just a pile of rubble and smoke. The call of the muezzin
silenced. She stumbled towards the restaurant, to her family. There was nothing,
just a pile of smashed wood plaster and stone. She stumbled through the
detritus; personal possessions, smouldering wrecked furniture, bloodied limbs,
broken crockery and smoking table cloths mixed with clothing, pools of water,
and above all the stench of burning flesh. Her family, her husband were gone.
It was then that she screamed; her demented bellows mixing with the sirens of
emergency services already cutting through the Ramallah evening air.
In
the days after she had sat in shocked silence watching the TV. Israel, grudgingly
admitted responsibility but was brazenly defiant. The raid had been, what did
they call it? - “a legitimate action” against
“proven killers”. But “a very regrettable computer failure” meant
that it had “misread” the coordinates.
They would be taking this “unfortunate matter”
up with the suppliers of the software. When she heard this she broke down –
horrified at the lies that could so easily pour from the mouths of politicians
and generals. It was never broadcast that First Officer Rabnitz’ minute error
in punching in the numbers was the computer failure. She didn’t understand high
politics but she was well versed enough to know that computers do not make
mistakes – it is only those who operate them that make errors. But it was
easier, and safer for generals and politicians to blame the computer for
targeting the restaurant rather than the Hezbollah hideout. And such is the
delicate diplomatic balance that operates, even between Israel and Palestine, that
no one, not even the Palestinian Authority questioned this explanation by the
Israelis. What did the Israeli spokesman call it?... “unfortunate and regretted collateral damage”. Yes, she thought that it is – my mother, my
father, my husband, my family and my friends......me and my baby.....we are
just small, unimportant damaged pieces in the great game of war and peace. And
the world will move on and then she cried again. Later, as she listened to another
Israeli spokesman, again defiantly reject world opinion, she remembered a
French book read long ago when she was French studying at University. What was
it? Then it came to her – it was something said by Albert Camus. What was it
Camus had said?.....”Every wrong idea results in bloodshed – but it’s always
the blood of others”. And she had
sobbed for the blood of her family and
her husband now gone and for her safe cocooned world now violated. She wept for
her husband and her unborn child – who
were just “regretted collateral damage”. And
she wondered how much more callous was it possible for mankind become?
So
here she was, speeding through the night in a foreign land. Her German passport
gave her the right to access Europe freely and to a place where she could find
a safe place for her unborn child to grow. She looked at her watch wondering if
her sister had already set off for the railway station in Munich? People were
already wakening, some sub conscious awareness reminding them that their
journey was nearing its end. There was yawning and a rubbing of eyes. She heard
the quiet voices of the other refugees – many with so little compared to her – no
sister to go to, no prized German passport, short of money, few skills.
Syrians, Jordanians, Iraqis, Iranians, their voices mixed together in the
cramped early morning carriage. The whole world it seemed was on the move. She felt again the kick in her belly and
smiled to herself; yes she was lucky: her family had been modestly well off so
she had money and her qualifications and business contacts meant that some kind
of job would be possible. And above all, her baby was alive and would live – so
she, too, must fight for life, look forward and live for the future. Trying not to wake
the sleeping woman by her side, she bent down and picked up the bag. There were
the two precious passports. Besides them, safe in a leather wallet, her
personal belongings: credit cards, bank account details, photographs of her
lost family. Three priceless letters: one from a German Human Rights lawyer in
Wiesbaden explaining that he represented Dietrich’s family and was seeking reparations on
behalf of them and their unborn German grandchild. A second letter from the
Israeli Department of Justice which, while it did not admit responsibility and “subject to certain caveats”, hoped that a “satisfactory
understanding” might be arranged between Israel and her unborn German
child. And a third – from the United Nations expressing their grave concerns
about the incident that had taken her family and husband. Their employee, it
noted, had full diplomatic immunity whilst working in Palestine and they were
currently working with the German government in Berlin and with the Israeli
government in Jerusalem to ensure that “commensurate
reparations for her and her child’s loss and an acknowledgment of guilt” were
forthcoming. She knew that the latter requirement would never come and nothing
in the end could replace Dietrich but she could, and would, somehow start
again. She held the little parcel; it contained her life, and passports to her
future. She had to start again – and she would.
Tony Beale: November 2016
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