The smoke billowed from the targeted frontline village as the shells fell on the ramshackle farmhouses that spread across the hillside in the ‘security zone’. Two Israeli jets flew over the hill dropping their load of bombs. The ground shook and the rumble of reverberation from the explosions echoed across the fields; vineyards and fruit orchards blazed with fire. Villagers scurried for shelter in the village only makeshift shelter, which hoisted a faded UN flag.
Two Israeli soldiers were killed in an ambush by Hezbollah this morning. A roadside booby trap was detonated killing two soldiers and wounding three others. An Israeli war general rumbled a threat quoting the Holy Scriptures.
“An eye for an eye,” he thundered on the radio. I assumed he meant a soldier for a soldier.
I loaded a new film in my camera and rushed to take closer shots. The small church was hit by a rocket and one of its walls crumbled. An icon of the Virgin Mary lay there in the rubble; the blast had charred the bosom of the Mother of God. The nearby mosque was hit as well.
Puffs of smoke spiraled from the burning house beside me. A woman grabbed her two-year-old daughter and rushed out screaming. The little girl was dressed in white; red stains smeared her dress. As the woman was fleeing the inferno of her house she fell to the ground in a pool of her own blood; the little girl scampered alone toward the shelter.
I followed the trajectory of another rocket with my camera; it hit the shelter. My heart sank with fear and I stood petrified as I heard the big explosion that rocked the village. The villagers were gathered in the safety of that UN camp.
Two more rockets were fired. One of them fell a few meters away from the camp. When the smoke cleared I saw a headless little corpse clad in white lying a few meters to my right. The wounded woman crawled toward the corpse. She put the headless child in her lap, ripped her headscarf and pulled her hair. She screamed maddened with grief. She raised the corpse toward me and I took a shot.
Flurries of rockets were fired on the camp for twelve minutes. Smoke reeked from the yard; fireballs were rising toward the grim sky.
A scene from hell unfolded before me as I walked inside the UN camp. Heaps of mangled bodies scattered across the undersized ‘battlefield’. Blood and severed limbs covered the ground.
A young woman was crawling on her hands and knees, bloody tears trickled from the sockets of her eyes. A man had lost his arm, the other one was hanging off by bits of his skin. Another man was rocking a dead boy in his arms; the corpse was burnt and maimed.
“Ali,” he screamed. “My son, Ali. They killed my son.” His wife was lying beside him; her bulging stomach was oozing blood.
Eyes wide open stared at me. Some could see the camera flashing every second to capture this indescribable horror; other eyes were stone dead.
Ambulances raced to the village with sirens screaming. Scores of injured people were crying for help. An EMT held two bleeding babies in his arms and crammed them into the ambulance while his partner was trying to pull their mother from under the debris. The rest were busy saving women and children with missing limbs from bleeding to death.
Fifteen minutes later, an American-made Apache helicopter was hovering over the camp spitting ‘Hellfire’. There was a big flash and I found myself bathed in blood. Those horrors were the last thing I saw.
Part Two
“Israel air-raided five villages in southern Lebanon on Tuesday. Over one hundred civilians sheltering in a UN camp were killed, mostly Lebanese and Palestinians women and children. Israeli jets fired rockets on the camp for twelve minutes killing and wounding scores of unarmed civilians. An American reporter was seriously wounded in the attack as well, while documenting this massacre…”
I was listening to the radio in my hospital room in Beirut. When they started talking about me, I turned it off.
“Hezbollah retaliated by shelling Israeli northern borders,” I sat in my hospital bed dictating to my wife Rebecca, “killing one Israeli soldier and wounding five others in its latest round of mortar attacks...”
I was tugging nervously at the bandages that covered my face. She held my hands and kissed them.
“It’s OK, Marc. Please calm down,” she said and took me in her arms; I shuddered.
I was very excited at hearing the news. Mohammad my Lebanese colleague kept me up to date as the confrontations escalated by the hour.
Rebecca was a Jewish reporter. I met her in South Lebanon in 1993. She was covering operation ‘Accountability’ for a French newspaper. I was very impressed by her daring reports. We got married last year in Paris.
“My face is burning, Becky,” I whimpered.
“Do you want me to call the doctor?” she said.
“No, just give me another pill. The doctor said I could have another one if the pain gets worse.”
My cell phone buzzed, “It’s Mohammad again,” she said and placed it in my trembling hand. He told me that Hezbollah had launched several Katyusha attacks killing five soldiers including an army Colonel in retaliation.
Part Three
Several blasts rattled the city that night; the Israelis had bombarded the power station in Beirut.
I was listening to the radio when my cell buzzed frantically. I picked it up; a British colleague delivered the bad news. A reporter was killed in his car by a missile near the power station, south of Beirut.
“Who was it, Dave?”
“I believe it was a Lebanese reporter. I don’t know his name yet.”
I hung up and dialed Mohammad’s number; the phone was disconnected. My heart was gripped by a rush of anxiety and I called the agency. They told me he was killed.
Part Four
Against my doctor’s advice, I decided to go to Mohammad’s funeral. When I stood up, I fell with a dizzy spell. The doctor suggested that I should use a wheelchair.
We arrived at the house before the time of the noon prayer. The Imam was reciting the Holy Koran. I also heard the women wailing their grief.
Mohammad’s father met us by the front door. He shook my hand with reverence.
“Mr. Ashford, I’m really sorry about what happened.”
“You have my deepest condolences, sir. Mohammad was a very good man.”
When Mohammad’s mother saw Rebecca she howled,
“Get out of here, wicked. You are desecrating my son’s funeral.”
Rebecca was left speechless. She pushed my wheelchair; I stopped her.
“I’m staying, Rebecca,” I rasped. “You can go alone.”
Zeina, Mohammad’s sister, apologized to me.
“I understand, Zeina. I understand.”
After they lowered the body into the ground they recited some Koranic verses for a while. I felt as if I were suffocating and clutched my throat gasping for air.
His father asked me if I would like to say something. I ripped the bandages that covered my burnt face and hollered,
“An eye for an eye; a wound for a wound; a life for a life.”
Part Five
I woke up choking and drenched in sweat. Rebecca was startled and rushed to me. She held me in her arms; I loathed her touch and recoiled in disgust.
“What’s the matter, Marc?” she wept. “What is wrong with you?”
“I’m dying,” I rattled. “I’m dying.”
I was tossing, turning and whimpering in agony. She touched my head and screamed, “You’re burning up.”
I fought her grip that tried to restrain me from pulling the IV lines.
“Wicked,” I screamed at her. She was horrified by my unexpected verbal abuse. My heart throbbed and my body was racked with pain. I started thrashing around and then collapsed. She rushed to get a doctor.
I lay with a violent fever that fried my brain for two weeks. My temperature had risen to 106 that night. My head injury was aggravated; I was slipping in and out of consciousness.
The fever went away with my hearing. When I couldn’t hear my voice; I stopped talking as well. The doctors installed a hearing-aid. Nowadays, I communicate through a computer.
I live with Mohammad’s family now. Zeina and I got married. Rebecca left me a year ago to live on the other side of the borders in a country I now call the ‘enemy’.
Part Six
Last May, I marched with Zeina to the liberated South. For the first time in four long years I smelled the fresh breath of the orchards without smoke or fire. I couldn’t hear the cheers of the marchers and my heart was throbbing. I desperately read the signs with my poor Arabic; Zeina had tried her best to teach me the language.
We marched together toward the border fence. Hundreds of People converged at the border fence. They began banging on the fence and throwing stones at a fortified Israeli position. Israeli soldiers opened fire across the fence. Scores of stone-throwing youngsters dispersed; two fell in a pool of their own blood. I grabbed my camera and started shooting.
Part Seven
I played the footage of the 12-year-old Palestinian, Mohammed al-Durra, as he huddled next to his father on a street in Gaza, for a hundred times, feeling angrier each time I watched the father pleading to his child's killers to stop the shooting but in vain. The boy died in his father’s arms as the soldiers shot an ambulance driver who rushed to help the dying child.
This footage brought back the memories of what happened four years ago. The headless child in her mother’s arms, the burnt boy in his father’s arms and what happened to me as I recorded the Qana massacre. I watched my photo album; Mohammad’s picture was right next to the headless child photograph that won me a prizer.
Zeina came rushing to my room and grabbed my arm. She pulled me downstairs to the basement. I saw fear in her eyes. The glass of the small window was shattered.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
She pointed her finger toward the sky; I saw an Israeli jet flying over our building.
Part Eight
Young rock-throwing Palestinians have been at the front line of the street battles that erupted last Thursday in Jerusalem. I watched the news on CNN and Zeina explained to me what was going on in Jerusalem; a new Intifada was taking place.
In 1987 I was stationed in the West Bank when the Intifada broke out to protest Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. I watched unarmed men and children throw stones at soldiers who answered with rubber-coated bullets. I took pictures of little boys get shot in the head or chest; Israeli soldiers always aimed at upper body areas. I photographed youths draped in the Palestinian flag being carried on the shoulders of people shouting, “Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar,” only to fall themselves the next day.
I stood fast behind my rolling camera when three Israeli soldiers were beating a Palestinian youngster on the head with batons. He fell to the ground, his face bathed in blood. I stood between them and the youngster; my camera still documenting the savage attack. One of the soldiers snatched my camera and smashed it on the sidewalk. The others shoved me shouting nasty words; I stood fast. One of the soldiers slapped me on the face; I pushed him back. The other hit me on the head from behind, I fell to my knees and blood gushed from my ear. The soldiers laughed and fired two rounds of bullets at the Palestinian youngster.
He shuddered then lay motionless. I rushed to check on him; his body was riddled with bullets. I knelt beside him and checked his pulse; his heart had stopped beating.
“Breathe,” I screamed and pressed his chest several times until I passed out.
Part Nine
I woke up in the hospital screaming and my head throbbed with pain. The memory of that horrible execution was haunting me. I was thrashing and screaming at the soldiers to stop shooting. A sturdy man grabbed me in his arms and said,
“It’s over, son. It’s over. You’re OK now.”
I looked up; he was wearing a kuffieh and he had a thick beard.
“How are you feeling?” he asked. “Your head still hurts?”
“Who are you?” I said.
“Hassan’s father,”
“I’m so sorry that he died.”
He held my hand and said, “Think not of those who are slain in Allah’s way as dead. Nay, they live finding their sustenance in the Presence of their Lord.”
He put a chain of gold around my neck; a small Koran was attached to it.
“This was my son’s. Now it’s yours.”
Since that day, I never took it off.
Part Ten
October 12th, Israeli helicopter gunships fired missiles at Palestinian targets in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Smoke rose from the city as the missiles hit residential areas. People gathered in the street to form a human shield in order to protect the Palestinian authority headquarter. I emailed my agency to be dispatched to the West Bank; they rejected me. They said I was ‘biased’.
Part Eleven
Zeina was in labor. I was pacing frantically in the hall when a nurse came smiling.
“A baby boy,” she said. “You can see her now.”
I rushed to her room; she was holding a beautiful little baby in her arms. Tears rushed to my eyes as she handed him to me.
I took the chain off and placed it around his little neck. The Holy Koran was shining on his white swaddling clothes.
“Marc, what are you going to call him?” she asked.
“Mohammed, I’ll call him Mohammed.”
Part Twelve
I sent my resume to several news agencies in America; I was rejected by them all. Finally, I got an assignment for a German newspaper to do a special report on the new Intifada. I went with my crew to Jerusalem.
I was dodging bullets to get good shots. I let my camera roll as I followed a group of small children, barefoot children carrying their school bags and running toward their school, their school was closed but they went there anyway.
“You American?” said one of them.
“Yes,”
“Welcome,” he said smiling.
His hand was cut off at the wrist. An older boy approached me and said,
“Hand cut... bullets from Israelis.”
I fixed my camera and took a closer shot.
Violence spiraled out of control in the West Bank and Gaza. Six Palestinians were killed today, including a fourteen year-old boy who was shot in the chest. The Israelis sealed the area and closed the cross-points along the borders. The Palestinians were living under siege.
Part Thirteen
I ran into Rebecca the other day. She was sitting in an Internet Café with her French colleagues. I didn’t say hello and sat on the other side of the Café ignoring her burning looks. I connected to the Net and emailed the pictures to my newspaper in Germany.
Someone tapped my shoulder; I looked up.
“I missed you,” she said.
“Rebecca!”
She gaped, “You’re talking!”
I showed her the hearing aid that was plugged into my ear.
“It helps a little.”
“I’m very happy for you, Marc.” She noticed the ring on my finger.
“You’re married!”
“I married Zeina. We have a baby boy.”
“What’s his name?”
“Mohammed.”
She gasped and pulled her hand. Her face turned white and her lips twitched; I looked at my monitor.
“File transferred,”
I shut down my computer and got up.
“I have to go,”
“Wait,” she pleaded.
“I’m sorry, Rebecca. We have nothing to say to each other.”
“I do.”
“What’s the matter, Becky?”
“Marc, please forgive me.”
“I can’t,” I said and stormed out of the Café.
Part Fourteen
I was chatting with Zeina on the Internet that night. I told her about this encounter with my ex-wife Rebecca; she said I should have forgiven her. I couldn’t. She walked out on me in my hour of need. Zeina wrote that I was pretty difficult at the time. It took a saint to tolerate my unbearable behavior and mood swings. My hands started trembling but I forced myself to type; I wrote: “I was in a horrible pain.”
I spent a restless night, troubled by nightmares. I saw my friend Mohammad and the headless child. I woke up startled and drenched in sweat. A severe headache excruciated me all night. In the morning, I drove to Ramallah.
I went to see Hassan’s family. His father, Abdul-Kareem, was very pleased to see me. He asked me about the Koran; I told him that I have given it to my son Mohammed. He smiled and said,
“God bless you, son. God bless you.”
I spent the night with Hassan’s family. They gave me Hassan’s bed to sleep in and Abdul-Kareem treated me like a son. I woke up in the middle of the night screaming and clutched my head. Abdul-Kareem rushed to me and held me in his arms.
“What’s the matter, son?” he asked. “Are you having nightmares?”
“My head,”
“You’re still hurting?”
“It never stopped.”
He sat beside me reciting verses from the Holy Koran. He placed his hand upon my forehead and said,
“And when I am ill, it is He Who cures me.”
He kept reciting until I fell asleep.
Part Fifteen
I drove back to Jerusalem the next day. The Israelis gave me a hard time at the borders. They inspected my car thoroughly, destroyed my films, and confiscated my camera, laptop and even my hearing aid. They found some shell cases in my glove compartment; this was enough reason for them to detain me.
“I can’t hear you,” I screamed at the officer who was interrogating me. He slapped me on the ear so hard that it bled. I did not understand what he was saying. Somehow, I don’t think he was speaking English.
He left me in the room with three sturdy soldiers. They took turns beating me until I passed out. They put me in Jeep and threw me somewhere near the airport. Some Palestinians driving by took me to a nearby hospital. I lost my hearing completely after that incident.
The doctors advised me to go home. They said that I had a concussion and needed medical help they could not provide at their crowded hospitals. I wasn’t ready to leave; my assignment was not done yet. I lost all my pictures and reports when the Israeli soldiers seized my films and my computer.
I bought a new camera and filmed the wounded Palestinians who were rushed to the hospital. A fifteen-year-old boy lost his eye due to a rubber-coated bullet; another ten-year old girl was in a coma after inhaling teargas. The wards were full with wounded Palestinians.
I wrote the reports from my memory; I took new pictures of the horrors in the West Bank. Two hundred and seventy-five civilians were killed in the recent clashes; a hundred and nineteen of them were under eighteen.
Part Sixteen
I went to the Café to email my pictures. I sat at my usual table and logged on to the Net. Someone tapped my shoulder; it was Rebecca. She started talking. I opened a new Word document and wrote:
“I can’t hear you, Rebecca. You have to write down.”
Her face turned completely white.
“What happened?” she wrote.
“I was beat up on the head by Israeli soldiers. I can’t hear anything.”
Tears rushed to her beautiful green eyes. She took my hand; I shuddered. She knelt before me and kissed my trembling hand. I pulled my hand away.
“Marc, you have changed.”
I scribbled a few letters on the computer then turned to face her. I tried to speak but I felt I was choking. I forced myself to say her name. I don’t know if she heard me. I wiped the tears from her face and wrote: “Too many are killed on either side. What can we do to bring peace?”
Part Seventeen
Yesterday five Palestinians were shot by Israeli soldiers on their way to work. Today a little girl was hit by a settler’s car on her way to school. He drove over her little body and crushed her skull.
Part Eighteen
Friday morning, the prayers were conducted outside al-Haram al-Sharif. The soldiers prevented the Palestinians from entering the mosque. I stood there filming as a wave of people knelt in awe and prayed for God on the streets.
As I was filming, my lens caught sight of a hair-braided settler walking toward the crowd; something was hidden under his black garment. My heart was gripped by a rush of anxiety and I followed him until he affronted the crowd. He drew a machinegun from under his garment, aimed at the kneeling crowd; I hit him with my video camera as he was about to open fire. He staggered and I hit him again and knocked the machinegun out of his hand. He grabbed his spare pistol and shot me.
Before he could shoot again, a group of Palestinian men were all over him hitting him with stones and their bare hands. Israeli soldiers opened fire at the crowd and the men fell one by one under this barrage of bullets.
I picked up my video camera and started filming in frenzy. Through the lens, I caught sight of an Israeli soldier aiming his weapon at me. As he was about to shoot, someone pushed me to the ground. I looked up; it was Rebecca.
Huda
Marc is an incredible character, multi faceted and dimensional....
And it is true..." It is He that cures all ills "...
There is no such thing as a just war....only the eternal battle between Light and Darkness....Good and Bad.....Right and Wrong...
God works in mysterious ways his wonders to perform....and The Supreme Being is the Creator of All...
Love, Peace and Harmony
Peter
Reviewed by Kisha Cowan
1/15/2006
I enjoyed reading this short story. Your use of imagery is great (although sad). I found myself wondering if this was a true story or a fiction story based on the true experiences of others. I found it to be a little bias, however I really am the last to make that type of judgement. I have never left the United States and have never travelled to the Middle East (I hope to visit Israel and the West Bank). I don't care too much for the news here (in the US)because I find it to be bias also. Therefore, I cannot honestly make a judgement on the "one-sided" view of your main character.I hope to read a memoir of an Israeli photographer/journalist or civilain and get his/her point of view on the violence.I didn't want the story to end so suddenly. How did the character evolve? Then again, maybe it is perfect the way you left it because war and violence is ongoing. Maybe the truth lies in the comment your character made "Too many are killed on either side what we can do to make peace". Overall a powerful piece that I would recommend to anyone.
Excellent writing Huda, enough to curdle anyones insides,and I commend you for it! Even though I think it is too one sided.
Be Well,
Eileen
Reviewed by Michael Wells
11/18/2005
I felt as if I was with this newsreporter on his journey and I even wanted revenge if he hadn't said, Too many are killed on either side, what we can do to bring peace?”
Keep up the wonderful work, prophet
Reviewed by Chris Archer
11/18/2005
Another horrible image of war. It's not different than the ones in your poem only this time it is through the lenses of another photographer. Very powerful documentation despite the masking aspect.
This is so graphic and poignant, Huda. It brings me great sadness to see that the horrors of war continue unabated year after year, century after century. Thank you, Huda. Love and peace to you.
