Amsterdam 2012 (4 page)

We barely said a word to each other until we got to London and were riding the train from Gatwick Airport into the city.
 
“Their throats were slit after they were killed,” said Peter, gazing out the window.
 
“Bodies don’t bleed after the heart stops.”
 
He squeezed my hand and turned to look at me.
 
“They slit their throats in homage to Allah.”

“What are you talking about?”

“‘When ye encounter the infidels, strike off their heads till ye have made a great slaughter among them.’ The
Quran
commands Muslims to cut off the head of anyone who insults Allah and his prophet.
 
It’s their signature.
 
The ritual killing.”
 

“How did they insult Allah?”

The train rattled into London Victoria.
 
“We get off here,” Peter said.

Chapter Two

At an Internet Café at Piccadilly Circus, we found a room listed on Craigslist.com, a small flat south of the Thames near
Kennington
Park.
 
A college student was renting out his ex-roommate’s bedroom by the week.
 
Unlike a hotel or bed and breakfast, he didn’t ask for our passport or for identification.
 
We gave him false names and told him we were Canadian.
 
We paid two hundred pounds for a week in a tiny room that was cold and decorated with travel posters taped over stained floral wall paper.
 
I was fine with it—at least we had our own bathroom.

After dinner at a Chinese restaurant, Peter and I headed to a pub to watch the evening news.
 
There was nothing on British television about the murders.
 
I began to relax a little.
 

The next morning, Peter returned from an early morning walk with the
International Herald Tribune
and the
London Times.
 
The story made the front page: “Terrorists Strike in Amsterdam, Six Dead.”
 
The Dutch medical examiner estimated that by the time the bodies were discovered by
Marjon’s
mother, who had stopped by to pick up
Marjon
to go shopping in the early afternoon, the bodies had been dead for twelve hours, placing the murders at 3 A.M.
 
The papers revealed the six victims were members of the avant-garde
Jenever
Theater troupe in Amsterdam that performed improvisational political satires on current events.
 
On more than one occasion they had presented sketches highly critical of the way Muslims treated women and homosexuals.
 
“Police suspect the murders are political in nature,” reported the
Times
lamely
.
 

There was no mention of us or the possibility of other visitors to the house.
 
No immediate suspects were named.

“Didn’t they find our hair?” I fretted.
 
“What about the wet bedding in the washing machine?
 
Didn’t they count the dinner plates in the dishwasher?
 
The wine glasses?
 
We couldn’t have wiped clean all of our fingerprints.
 
It isn’t possible.”

“Forensics takes time,” said Peter, “and police don’t release everything they discover.
 
Besides, the number of plates and glasses doesn’t necessarily mean anything—the extras could be left over from lunch.
 
I’ve never been arrested.
 
My prints aren’t on any database.
 
Are yours?”

“I don’t think so.”

By the time we caught the evening news at our pub, twenty-six Muslim mosques and a dozen Muslim schools or
madrassahs
had been torched in the Netherlands
.
 
The Muslim districts in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, and Utrecht had erupted in heavy violence.
 
Cars were torched, store windows broken and vandalized, public buildings set aflame.
 
Police flooded the streets trying to contain the looting and were attacked by excited rioters.
 
They defended themselves with tear gas and rubber bullets.
 
Hundreds were arrested.

At a press conference in which he assured the city the murders were not endorsed by the Muslim community, the mayor of Amsterdam revealed the contents of the note pinned to Nicholas’s dead body.
 
It was addressed to the people of Amsterdam.
 
The writer stated that the
Jenever
Theater group was a sacrilege to Allah, that the actors were killed in self-defense because they “terrorized and mocked Islam.”
 
The note protested a Jewish conspiracy to control the Netherlands and subjugate Muslims, and blamed Jews for a global battle against Islam as evidenced by the new immigration laws in Europe and the Palestinian struggle.
 
The writer claimed the murders were motivated purely by faith.
 
There was no signature other than
Allah
Akbar
written in blood—Allah is greater.
 

The following day separate
jihadist
cells blew up three dikes and two train stations.
 
Dozens of blocks were flooded.
 
Public transportation was completely shut down.
 
Ten thousand people marched in a demonstration in the Dam, the huge square in front of the royal palace.
 
The Dutch prime minister declared a state of emergency.
 
Troops from the Royal Netherlands Army were deployed to control the streets of Amsterdam and The Hague.

Dutch intelligence revealed to the newspapers that they had arrested eight young men, members of
Hizb
ut-Tahrir
, a terrorist organization dedicated to restoring a global caliphate under Islamic law and every bit as radical as Al Qaeda.
 
Their phones had been tapped and had been heard discussing the
Jenever
Theater Group, as well as a string of attacks against the Dutch Parliament,
Schiphol
Airport, and a nuclear reactor.
 
Their apartments were raided, and police found bomb making materials, several “martyr’s wills,” and videotapes of beheadings.
 
There was no
proof,
however, these men were responsible for the
Jenever
Theater murders.

Peter and I tried to do some of the things we had planned to do in London—the Tate Gallery, the Tower of London, the British Museum, but we couldn’t concentrate.
 
We were still badly shaken.
 
We headed to an Internet Café.
 
I had a somewhat hysterical e-mail from my mother.
 
She asked me to telephone as soon as I could.
 
I used a calling card from a pay phone.

“I thought you were flying into Amsterdam,” my mother said, trying to keep the scold out of her voice.

“We were, but we ran into some people on the plane.
 
They invited us to stay in London, so we changed our plans and got off at Heathrow.”

“Do you have a number where I can reach you?”

“We’re not staying with them anymore.
 
We’re subletting a room in a flat, but it doesn’t have a telephone.
 
Everyone uses cell phones here.”
 
I could’ve given her our roommate’s phone number, the one we called to rent the place, but some lingering adolescent rebellion wanted to make it a little hard for her to reach us.
 
Childish I know, but then I was young and on my own for the first time.
 

“Are you all right, dear?” my mother asked.
 
“You sound stressed.”

“We’re fine.
 
Just tired.
 
Probably jetlag.”

“I would feel more comfortable if you came home, Ann.
 
This business in Amsterdam.
 
I know you planned to go there.
 
I’m concerned about you.”

“Don’t worry, Mother.
 
London is perfectly quiet.”
 
I didn’t tell her about the sudden appearance of police on every corner.

“How is Peter taking it?”

“He’s fine, Mom.
 
He’s more interested in the museums than whatever else is going on.”

“Have you had any problems?”

“No, Mom.
 
We’re great.”

“Well, I guess
it’s
okay, honey.
 
I trust you.
 
Use your good judgment.”

#

The next day sympathy riots broke out in France in many of the same areas wracked by riots in October 2005.
 
The unrest started in
Clichy-sous-Bois
, a working-class commune in an eastern suburb of Paris.
 
Muslim youth burned cars and attacked police stations, which quickly spread to poor housing projects.
 
Violence spread to Toulouse,
Lille
, Strasbourg, Marseille, and Lyon.
 

British papers reported a handful of demonstrations in Muslim communities in East London, but otherwise the city was quiet.
 
As a matter of safety, several tourist sites were closed.
 
Peter and I spent our time wandering the streets, popping into pubs when it rained.
 
Londoners were fomenting in the bars, suggesting to one another to “just line ‘
em
up and shoot ‘
em
” and to “drop a bomb on the bloody lot of ‘
em
.”
 
Peter and I got out of there quickly.

We walked until we got to
Soho
.
 
We browsed the aisles at
Blackwells
for a while—I bought a couple of British murder mysteries—then stopped at another Internet Café for a cappuccino and to check our e-mails.
 

Peter looked angry when I glanced up from my screen to tell him what my mother wrote, angry not at me but at what he was reading.
 
“Mom bought us return tickets,” I said.
 
“Unrestricted.
 
We can pick them up any time we want at the ticket counter at Heathrow.
 
I wrote her we’d play it by ear.
 
Anything from your parents?”

He asked me to hold on a second while he fired off an e-mail.
 
“You ready to go?” he asked when he was done.
 
He almost never told me about his e-mails—a guy thing, I assumed—and I didn’t ask.

We left the café and stepped into the thick of it.

#

Earthquake was my first thought.
 
I was from California.
 
It wasn’t the kind of earthquake that rumbles through the earth like an approaching train, starting out as a little nudge, then a shake, then a paroxysm of rocking and reeling like someone trying to wake you out of a sound sleep, but a sudden hard jolt, walls crumbling down into the streets, billowing gray clouds of dust and smoke.
 
Two distinct blasts followed.
 
Then screams—which struck me as out of place because in Los Angeles people don’t scream during earthquakes but duck for cover—and then alarms and sirens, brakes and crashing automobiles, glass smashing on cement, the air thick, impossible to breathe.
 
Flames shooting out of windows like long tongues.
 
Reams of paper flying like confetti from above.

Someone, something shoved my shoulder and I fell down.
 
Peter yanked me up.
 
People pushing and running.
 
I felt their bodies, but saw only their terrified faces.
 
A car caught fire and people began running in the other direction.
 
We were blinded by the black air, roiling and hot, our eyes stinging, leaking tears.
 
We ran with the pack, stumbling on bricks and pieces of insulation.
 
There was no choice.
 
The herd was panicking, pouring into the streets like water released from a dam.
 
We were carried away in the rapids.

Within minutes there were policemen every fifty feet, telling us to walk calmly and directing us away from the fires.
 
How did they get there so fast?
 
We felt another blast a few blocks away, and a cloud of black smoke rolled toward us.
 
We ducked into a doorway, tripping on debris, pulling our T-shirts over our mouths to block the choking dust.

 
In a moment it was as dark as night.
 
We were covered in ash, soot, and debris.
 
Glass showered from the sky.
 
Pieces of buildings—aluminum, bricks, and roof tiles—crashed around us like hail.
 
As the worst of the blast passed, we fell back into step with the crowd.