Esther's Sling (12 page)

“Amit tells me you are a war hero,” Enya stated in a voice that Schechter interpreted as seductive.

David Schechter returned his wine glass to the table, its contents a little lighter. He suddenly longed to be a single man, if only for an evening. “Is that so?”

“The general is one of our leading aces,” Margolis added, clearly feeling honored to be at David’s table.

“I got lucky a couple of times,” Schechter said finally. He was thinking more of the many women he had bedded than the unlucky Syrian pilots who were his victims.

“Lucky?” Margolis blurted out, looking at his girlfriend. “This man shot down eight Syrian fighters.”

Schechter smiled and started to shake his head. “No, no. One of those was a Hezbollah UAV. That definitely doesn’t count.” He laughed the laugh of false modesty.

“Wow. I am eating with a war hero,” Enya cooed.

Orah was not happy as she watched the smile on her husband’s face. It was a smile she recognized. It was her husband on the hunt. This visitor to her right was mak
ing her feel like an old woman.

“Do you still fly?” Enya asked.

“Yes, but not on combat missions anymore. I fly to maintain my rating and be ready in the event of … well, let’s just say that if the country needed me at this point, we would be in a serious situation.”

Amit Margolis found the banter amusing but kept an eye on Orah Schechter. On the one hand, he assumed this dinner would be a one-off event. On the other hand, he figured that there was never a reason to have an enemy on the home front. He turned to his hostess. “I must compliment your cooking. Everything has been wonderful.”

Enya, to her credit, was quick to add her voice. “Yes, Orah, I loved the salad. You have to give me the recipe.” She had spoken only out of a sense of politeness. She was oblivious to Orah’s growing feelings of inferiority because she had no attraction to the general. To her, he held only the fascination of an accomplished fatherly figure.

The next fifteen minutes was a discussion of cooking and children that centered on Orah. David Schechter observed Margolis the entire time, impressed with the young man’s ability to change his wife’s mood.

Another quarter hour later and the men had retired to the general’s office, which was swept periodically for listening devices by IDF internal security. The room was in the center of the home and had no windows. The walls and ceiling were made of reinforced concrete poured just over a foot think. This room had a triple role. In addition to serving as an office, it was the home’s shelter in the event of war, a building code requirement born of unfortunate necessity in Israel. It was also a safe room for the general and his family in the event that he was targeted by any of the country’s many mortal enemies. A gun safe in the corner held a small arsenal, enough firepower to arm every member of the family. Back in the kitchen, the women engaged in conversation with the Schechter’s 16-year-old son, who blushed whenever Enya spoke to him.

In the office, David Schechter walked over to a cabinet, opened it and pulled out a bottle of Fonseca Porto 10
-year-old tawny port wine and two dessert wine glasses. “You will love this port. Perfect complement to any grilled meat.”

Amit Margolis sat down on a leather sofa against one wall. David turned to deliver a small crystal glass to the Mossad agent. “You know your girlfriend is a real knockout.” Amit nodded and smiled as he took the glass of port wine. “Reminds me of the fun days of my youth. Enjoy these years, Amit. Before you know it, you have a family and a mortgage and you are spending every weekend driving your children to football matches.”

“Doesn’t sound so bad,” replied Margolis, raising his glass in a toast to his new partner. “L’chaim.”

“L’chaim,” replied Schechter. “To a successful operation.”

Margolis took a sip. “Mmm. Excellent. Your knowledge of wines is impressive, General.”

“Okay, let’s get over the first important hurdle right now. There is a tradition in the IDF. Peers call each other by their first names. You may not accept it yet, but as far as I am concerned, we are peers. I have already developed a real respect for your mind, Amit. And I already like you a lot. Okay?”

“Okay, David.”

“Better. Now you call me David in every setting. Especially when we are in meetings with the Yahalom Group or at the
Campus or any IDF facility. I want everyone to know that we are peers. We are partners in this endeavor. If this ever goes operational, you will be at my side. This is going to be our baby and we will either succeed or go down together.” Schechter extended his right hand to Amit.

Amit shifted his glass to his left hand and reached out to Schechter with his right. They shook hands firmly. “Agreed.”

“So be it, Amit. So be it.” Schechter sat down on a chair that was perpendicular to the sofa, a small coffee table now the resting place for the open bottle of Fonseca. Around the walls were photos of Schechter in front of various aircraft, mostly F-15s, or standing next to each prime minister of Israel since the early 1980s. Margolis was struck by the fact that in each photo, the prime minister was the more excited of the pair. On the desk were a number of photos of Schechter’s kids and a handful of Orah Schechter. Margolis noticed that there were two photos of Orah alone and both were probably a decade old, when the woman was at least thirty pounds lighter.

“You and Enya seem to be in love. Are there wedding plans in the future?”

Amit was shocked back into the moment. Neither he nor Enya had yet said those fateful three words to each other. But it hit him at that instant that he was falling in love with her. He had been ignoring the feelings and she had been doing the same. But she had recently started joking with him about what she would do when her lease expired in the summer – joking about moving in with Amit. As the man that was quickly becoming famous for his analytical abilities sat and pondered his personal life, he realized that he had simply been denying what was happening between him and Enya. “Oh, no. We have only been dating a few months now. We met on New Year’s Eve – Gregorian new year, not Rosh Hashanah.”

“Well I have to say that watching you two together, I don’t know.” David shook his head and then took a sip of port wine. “You are a lucky man. I wouldn’t let her go if I were you.”

“So far, so good.” Amit raised his glass in salute to the thought and then took another sip.

“Are you religious?
” the general asked. “I have always heard that Mossad is a great bastion of secularism. I am guessing that the secular thinking goes out the window about the same time it does for fighter pilots – when the shadow of death is stalking your aircraft.”

“I suppose Mossad is similar to that. Not too many men seem to be torn between attending rabbinical school and joining Mossad. But if we are being honest, then the fact is that we all turn religious when, as you put it, death is stalking. But do I regularly attend synagogue? No. If that is the measure of my faith, then I guess I am a secular Jew. But in my heart I do believe in my faith even if I am not strictly observant.”

“I think we are very similar, Amit. I always think of the term ‘silent majority,’ which was a hot phrase when I was in college. We are they.” David Schechter had attended Ben Gurion University of the Negev, starting there in 1975 as he went through the IAF two-year pilot training program. He had been recruited while in high school to attend the
gibush
, a weeklong selection to pick the smartest and most physically appropriate Israeli males to receive flight training upon entering the IDF at the age of 18. Because he chose one of the hardest degrees offered, mechanical engineering, he continued his studies even after being assigned to an active fighter squadron. He had finally earned his BS degree in 1981.

“You are not driven by religion,” Schechter continued. His statement was an observation.
“So what motivates you? Why join Mossad?”

Amit slowly sipped his port wine, taking the time to think about a response. He suddenly felt as if he was in a job interview. The last time he had been asked questions like these was when he being interviewed for Mossad. It dawned on him how similar were the personalities and traits of those who joined Mossad and those who became pilots for the IAF. “Probably no different than you, just a later realization. I attended business school in the States at Duke …”

“So did I,” said Schechter, smiling.

“Oh, yeah? Duke?”

“The IDF sent me to Harvard, the Executive MBA Program. I spent a year working on it with very little flying. Not sure what it did for me, but looks good on the resume. When I got back, the 69 Squadron was reactivated with F-15I fighter-bombers. I was named the commander and kept going up the chain from there.”

“Very nice.” Both Amit and David forgot the question that had led to this mutual revelation of business school experiences. But now each man realized the many things they had in common. For Schechter in particular, this was unexpected. The thought entered David’s mind that Amit was exactly what he hoped his sons would grow up to become. The connect
ion was set. The bond was real.

Spring months quickly merged into the Israeli summer of 2010, hotter and drier than average. General David Schechter restructured the Yahalom Group. Only the navy officer and one of the two ground force officers were retained. All three IAF officers were dismissed from the group, replaced by General Schechter and two combat veterans. The new officers represented all of the areas of expertise necessary to make Esther’s Sling a real operational battle plan. One of the new air force officers was considered the top logistics expert in the IDF, having previously commanded the airlift and aerial refueling assets of the IAF. The other new air force officer was a man Schechter had worked with over the years. He was a helicopter pilot who earned his reputation under fire in Lebanon and had since become known for his ability to turn a conceptual plan into the actual steps necessary make that plan a successful reality. Finally, on the suggestion of Amit Margolis, the dismissed ground forces officer was replaced by a special operations veteran and senior officer, a legendary commander in the IDF who knew and understood intimately the capabilities of all of the IDF’s growing special operations groups.

Yahalom Group moved shortly thereafter to an underground bunker beneath the
Campus in downtown Tel Aviv. Its computers were joined into a small network but cut off from the outside world. Two separate computers were set up for any internet research activity, their search activities routed through a series of servers outside of Israel that were maintained by Unit 8200 and that made the searches impossible to trace back to Israel. These two computers had no USB ports or ability to connect to the computers used for detailed operational planning. They contained no microphones and no video cameras. No one could use them to quietly eavesdrop on the activities in that room as Israel and the U.S were doing in Iran at that very moment. Any virus that made it through the various firewalls maintained by Unit 8200 would end on those two computers. Signs maintained on the wall behind the two computers warned any user to never, ever conduct any personal activity on the computers. No checking on email accounts. No banking. No visits to a personal Facebook account. All of these instructions were to ensure that no user of these two computers could be identified by any outside intelligence agency that somehow defeated the firewall and routing safeguards set up by Unit 8200.

Only the seven members of the group had access into the bunker room where maps and grease boards soon occupied all available space on the walls. Each man in the group knew
he had two leaders. As Eli Cohen had predicted and David Schechter had ensured, Amit Margolis, the youngest member of the group, was respected by each of the six career military officers, both for his brain power and as the clear co-leader. Schechter reinforced this by having Amit lead morning status meetings. The thoughts and ideas were materializing into a methodical plan that, step by step, would culminate into what the politicians like to call an actionable operation.

On Tuesday, September 7, 2010, a meeting was held in a conference room
on the Campus. Nine months had passed since Prime Minister Cohen had invited Amit Margolis to join the Yahalom Group at the start of the year. The outlook for Esther had evolved from a frustrated stalemate into a plan that now excited everyone in the small circle privy to it.

Outside
, the gathering morning light struggled to pierce through low hanging clouds over Tel Aviv. Inside, the most powerful group in Israel assembled to make a fateful decision. General David Schechter wanted sign-off and authorization to move forward with Project Block G as an operational plan. He wanted it in writing and signed by the prime minister, the defense minister and the chief of staff of the Israeli Defense Forces. He needed a working budget and real funds to begin acquiring all of the required assets and pay for the training and preparation to enact the plan. And he explicitly wanted the concept of Esther’s Sling to be authorized – he would not be the scapegoat if something went wrong with a concept that would, after it was used, alter international relations.

Amit Margolis and General Schechter entered the conference room a little before 10 a.m. as requested. As they walked in, they realized that a meeting had been underway between Prime Minister Cohen, Defense Minister Avner, Chief of Staff Natan Fishel, Yavi Aitan and Danny Stein. Eli Cohen was in a side conversation with Danny Stein, who had been tasked by his prime minister with finding the funds to pay for Project Block G. Stein, the minister of industry, trade and labor, would act as the negotiator and intermediary with the Ministry of Finance. An elaborate cover story had been constructed to justify the request for up to $300 million, a sizable amount in the tiny nation, to pay for items that could not show up on the IDF budget.

Eli Cohen noticed the pair walking in and broke off his conversation with Danny Stein. The prime minister stood up and walked toward Margolis. “Amit, how are you?” Cohen was excited to see the two men who now formed the most important team in Israel as far as he was concerned.

“Very good, sir.” The two men shook hands. Cohen then turned to Schechter and repeated the process.

Cohen next introduced each of the men first to Yavi Aitan and then to Danny Stein. Next at the table was Lieutenant General Natan Fishel, Chief of the General Staff of the Israeli Defense Force. Amit Margolis had never met the career infantry officer. Fishel, like the eighteen men who preceded him in the position, was now one of the highest profile persons in Israel. The job thrust the holder from professional obscurity into the limelight as the commander-in-chief of a military machine widely viewed to be the best in the world man for man. In the era of 24 hour news coverage, the position tested the political skills of the man in the seat, a fact that affected the decision by Avner and Cohen on whom to nominate. General Fishel was widely respected for his planning and leadership
talents
, but he was every bit as comfortable at a party full of Knesset members as he was in a command bunker.

Cohen introduced Margolis. “Amit, this is General Fishel.”

Amit Margolis shook hands with Natan Fishel. “It’s an honor to meet you.”

“I have heard much about you, Mister Margolis.” Fishel did not finish the narrative, leaving Margolis in suspense as to whether the general was favorably impressed or not.

Fishel turned his attention to Schechter. “David, how are you this morning?”

The men shook hands. “Very good, Natan. It is good to see you here.” Schechter was not being truthful with his boss. The air force officer was wondering if he would still be in command of Project Block G at the end of this meeting.

Each man next shook hands with Defense Minister Avner and took his seat to the right of Prime Minister Cohen, who sat at the head of the table. Schechter immediately spoke up, not waiting for anyone else to take the lead. “I want to thank Defense Minister Avner for arranging this meeting. I am very pleased to report to all of you that the Yahalom Group has unanimously and enthusiastically agreed to a plan for Project Block G. The purpose of our meeting today is to obtain your authorization to go operational.” Schechter lifted up a Redwell expanding file from the side of his chair and placed it on the table. He pulled out seven printed and bound PowerPoint presentations and passed six of them out to the men around the table. Each presentation had a cover sheet with the simple title “Esther” and the classification “Top Secret – Limited Violet” written on it in English and Hebrew. Nowhere in the document did the phase “Project Block G” occur – either you knew what that phrase referred to or you didn’t; there would be no written reference. The presentation was just short of one hundred pages, the planning having been developed down to tactical detail at the unit level.

Schechter and Margolis spent the next three hours reviewing all of the detailed information of Project Block G. For General Fishel, this was the first time he had heard the concept of Esther’s Sling. When asked by Cohen what he thought after hearing it, he had smiled and simply given the table a thumbs up sign, the gesture saying more than any words could. But the most heated exchanges had come from Cohen and Avner’s questioning of the timing necessary to implement the plan. Schechter and Margolis were adamant that Israel could not be ready to launch Project Block G prior to the fall of 2011. The prime minister did not like this timing at all, wanting the plan to be ready to go by the coming spring. Only a detailed review by Margolis of the steps necessary to prepare Esther’s Sling convinced Cohen of the necessity of waiting. The long list of munitions still needed by the IAF only reinforced the timetable. Reluctantly, Cohen and Avner conceded the point, surrendering implementation of the plan t
o the men who had conceived it.

As the review of the presentation finished, Schechter summoned the courage to ask the question that had been in his head since he entered the room. He looked directly at General Fishel. “Who will be in operational command?”

Fishel did not hesitate. He had never questioned the appointment of Schechter, even though it had been made without his input. “That question was settled months ago, David. This is primarily an air force operation. Don’t let your nation down.”

Schechter relaxed for the first time since entering the room. “Thank you, sir.”

Natan Fishel sensed the right timing and looked at Margolis. “Mister Margolis, I have to admit that I was very skeptical when Zvi told me about your role. But listening to you has alleviated my concerns. I officially endorse your appointment as co-head of this operation.”

Margolis had not been pondering the general’s reaction to him, so the statement caught him off guard. But it was welcome nonetheless. “Thank you, sir. I hope to live up to the trust you have all placed in me.”

Fishel continued. “All IDF forces utilized for Project Block G will come under the command of General Schechter when we launch. Mister Margolis, you will be in command of all aspects of Esther’s Sling.”