Exile: a novel (27 page)

“That his murder stirs the deepest passions of our own Jewish community is, again, obvious—I’d be shocked if you haven’t confronted that in your family-to-be. But my deeper concerns only start there.” The senator raised her eyebrows in admonition. “A week or so ago, on television, you floated the idea of a breach in Ben-Aron’s personal security. I cautioned you about it then, and for good reason: I believe that it happened.”

At once, David felt his lawyer’s instincts surface. “Why?”

“Because thus far—and this is between us—the FBI and Secret Service can’t find any deficiency in our procedures. Nor can they find any cop or agent with serious financial problems, or with some grievance with Israel or Ben-Aron. And yet, as you seem to have detected, his route to the airport
did
change at the last minute, and the bombers changed their location
before
they could have observed the changes occurring—as Ibrahim Jefar’s story suggests.” Shapiro pursed her lips, as though tasting something sour. “Maybe they were lucky. But it creates the real possibility of an inadvertent—or deliberate—breach on the Israeli side.”

“Can the Justice Department find out?”

“Not easily. At least for now, whatever the Israelis are doing is buttoned up tight—for their own good reason.” Shapiro paused, then continued in the pointed tones she used for recalcitrant witnesses and feckless bureaucrats. “Your suggestion goes to the heart of Israel’s internal conflicts. The right wing, including the settler movement and those most rabidly anti-Palestinian, is using the assassination to gain and hold power. The only way I can see for the opposition to fight back—the moderates, the left, the peace movement—is to find a way to blame the Israeli right for Ben-Aron’s assassination.

“If that happens, the accusation itself could tear Israel apart along the fault lines of its very fractious society—left versus right, secular versus Orthodox, settler versus nonsettler. And those same fault lines will divide friends in our own community—people like Harold Shorr on one side and me on the other, with anger overtaking reason.”

“I can see that.”

Betsy stared at him. “Good. Because you do not want to be part of provoking that. It would damage you politically, losing you friends you’ll never get back. And for what? Hana Arif? I don’t see how that helps her.”

Carefully, David sipped his herbal tea. “Let me suggest a possibility. If there was a deliberate breach on the Israeli side, then someone potentially within our reach holds the key to what happened, and who was behind it—”

“Either Arif conspired to kill him,” Betsy interjected sharply, “or she didn’t. From the prosecutor’s perspective, who else may have helped to kill him doesn’t matter. At least until Arif tells us who they are, assuming that she can.”

“So Sharpe will say,” David responded. “But if this is more than a Palestinian plot, it holds a funhouse mirror to Sharpe’s narrative. At the very least, one has to wonder what possible connection there could be between Hana Arif and the people guarding Ben-Aron.”

“I’m trying to discourage you, David,
not
intrigue you.”

David shrugged. “I can’t help thinking like a lawyer.”

Shapiro put down her cup. “It’s time to start thinking like a congressman. So allow me to widen your field of vision. This case affects one of our country’s most vital interests: its relationship with Israel, and the rest of the Middle East. The White House, State Department, and Justice Department are all under enormous pressure. Do they prosecute Arif here or ship her to Israel? If her lawyer opposes extradition and wins, does some terrorist in, say, Chicago hold schoolkids hostage with a dirty bomb unless we set her free? And what does Israel do then?”

David had considered none of this; now he did, dismayed. Pressing her
argument, Betsy leaned forward. “And how would a lawyer oppose extradition if Israel demands it? By saying Israel can’t give her a fair trial? If you were her lawyer, David, you’d definitely want to emphasize
that.
” Shapiro’s tone became openly sarcastic. “And if you win and she’s tried here, Sharpe will go for the death penalty. Or maybe—given that she’s a dangerous prisoner to have in
anyone’s
custody—Israel will
want
the Justice Department to keep her, and kill her. Sharpe would be happy to oblige—if the case works out, she writes her own ticket.

“In either scenario, you’d get to oppose the death penalty—another highly popular maneuver, especially in a case involving terrorists. In the meanwhile, all the politicians in our party, your would-be colleagues, will be bending over backward to placate Israel and its supporters. You’d be a pariah—”

“Betsy,” David interrupted softly, “I’m handing over the case.”

“To whom?” The senator paused, moderating her tone. “I know you say that, David. I believe you mean it. But you haven’t yet, and I worry, because I can’t for the life of me understand why you ever touched this in the first place. So out of an abundance of what I hope is needless caution, let me finish.

“You’re living in an America redefined by its fear of terror. For you, defending Hana Arif would be the gift that keeps on giving, with consequences that will reverberate in your life long after you’re on Social Security. Assuming there’s any left.”

The monologue had left David slightly shell-shocked. But beneath Betsy’s vehemence, he knew, she intended a kindness: the preservation of his future—in politics, and with Carole. “Thank you,” he said simply. “I appreciate your taking all this time.”

“Consider it my wedding gift,” she answered with the slightest smile. “I’m sure that Carole has all the china and crystal you two will ever need.”

Driving to his office, David found that the two conflicting conversations— one with Salinas, and the other with Betsy Shapiro—echoed in his mind, forming and reforming in a plethora of confusing patterns, reason colliding with emotion, the only constant his repeated image of Hana alone in a cell. Then he reached the office and found two messages from lawyers he respected, both turning down her defense, and an anguished one from Harold Shorr.

9     
D
avid found Harold Shorr at the head of the broad dirt path winding along the bay between the St. Francis Yacht Club and the foot of the Golden Gate Bridge, where Harold chose to take his daily constitutional. The afternoon was atypical of summer in San Francisco—breezy, crisp, the sky electric blue—and bikers and runners, the healthy young people the city drew like a magnet, passed them in both directions. But Harold trudged heavily, his hands thrust in his pockets, eyes fixed on the path in front of them. David knew that hard emotions, hurt or anger or disappointment, were painful for Harold to express: whatever he was feeling now seemed lodged in his throat.

At last, Harold spoke. “Forgive me,” he said softly. “I promised myself never to intrude in your affairs, or come between you and Carole. But I’m afraid for her, and for you.”

David turned to him. “It’ll be all right, Harold. Really.”

“Will it?” Harold gave him a sideways glance of appraisal. “Carole wouldn’t tell me. But between you and this Palestinian woman, I think, there is something more than Harvard Law School.”

David felt a profound discomfort. “Was,” he amended. “I’m just trying to stay right with myself. As a lawyer, and as a man.”

“And as a Jew, David?”

“I didn’t know that they were different.”

Harold emitted a weary sigh. “As a Jew, you have no right to such innocence.”

David chose not to answer. Harold’s steps quickened, as did his speech, rising with emotion. “As a Jew, you’ve chosen to help a murderer of Jews, this Arafat with breasts.”

“I’m finding her a lawyer, Harold. Was I just supposed to run away?”

“Run away?” Harold stopped in his tracks, speaking to the ground at David’s feet. “You have no idea of what the world is like. In America, you’ve seen nothing. They hung my father in the public square. The worst thing that ever happened to your father was to be excluded from some private club. And even then, he had his own club—the safe world in which you were born, filled with books and music. The world of the German Jews until Hitler broke their windows—”

“And slaughtered them like dogs,” David cut in sharply. “Because the Nazis had no rule of law.” In a more level tone, he added, “No doubt the people you saw die at Auschwitz remembered they were Jews, all too well. But only a society that gave them rights could have saved them from the ovens.”

“Hana Arif,” Harold snapped, “is not a Jew.”

“The rule of law is for everyone. In any other context, Harold, you’d be the
first
to see that. Why have Jews in this country always fought for minorities? Because they know the cost of denying people rights—no matter who they are—better than anyone. And it starts well before the government begins rounding people up.” David paused, searching for an analogy. “Why did Alan Dershowitz help defend O. J. Simpson?” he asked. “Not to strike a blow for spousal abuse but to vindicate the rule of law. Surely you still know the difference.”

“So now you presume to lecture me from a civics book.” Harold looked into his face. “You risk your future, and my daughter, for such abstractions, all for a woman who seeks to drive a stake into the heart of Israel. And then you tell me, as a Jew, that I should feel pride in you.

“I cannot. Non-Jews will scorn you as a pathetic seeker of attention, so intent on self-promotion that you will take on any cause, even of an assassin who despises us. As for our own community, some may see great principle in defending the murderer of Amos Ben-Aron. But more will see you as naive or worse—a traitor.”

“I’m not defending her, dammit. But if I wanted to, I wouldn’t take a poll to find out if I should.” David fought to keep his voice low. “Or seek anyone’s permission—even yours. It’s my job, and no else’s, to decide what kind of man I am.”

They stood facing each other, oblivious to the joggers swerving to avoid them. Harold’s face was etched with pain. “Let us sit,” he said finally. “Fighting with you makes me tired.”

This was Harold’s way, David knew, of stepping back from the precipice. “It’s been a long day,” David responded. “This is making me tired, too.”

They found a bench in the partial shade of two wind-blown pine trees and sat, gazing at the white-capped expanse of the bay, the gold-brown hills of the Marin headlands. Harold hunched forward, elbows on knees, hands clasped in front of him. “Do you truly not understand,” he asked, “that this woman is poison to us? Your defense of her is a denial of self, and of our history. Israel is our refuge.”

“Not Carole’s,” David answered softly. “Her refuge is America.”

“Where this Hana of yours has now brought us suicide bombers. This crime endangers America, and guarantees the killing of more Jews. As an American, or a Jew, you must shun this woman.”

“And as a lawyer?”

Harold turned to him. “Are you the only lawyer in America? You’re certainly not a doctor in an emergency room, where only you stand between Hana Arif and death, with no time for moral choice. Let some other lawyer do it.”

“I will—I just have to find one. So why are we even having this conversation?”

Harold contemplated the question. “Because this is more than civics,” he said finally. “It’s not just legal abstractions that drew you into this, but a woman. And what you do because of her can’t be predicted—as I never would have predicted that you’d take the risks you have so far. Knowing, as you must have, what that might mean for you and Carole.” Tears came to Harold’s eyes. “I’m her father, David. And you’re hurting her. You, of all people, who she’s trusted with her heart.”

At once the anger drained from David. “I’m sorry, Harold. Please believe that . . .”

“I love my daughter more than life. Perhaps you cannot love her quite that much. But more, I hope, than this woman you’re hurting her for.”

“Do you doubt that?”

Harold turned to him. “Why else do you make me worry for her? Have you stopped to think that because of what you’ve done already, someone may seek to do you harm?”

“What do you mean?”

“What you may be bringing to our door is more than hurt, or even shame.” Harold’s voice was rough. “When I left the Nazis behind, I swore that no one would make me cower again. But then I had the child I had prayed for to the God I no longer believed in.

“For myself, I fear nothing. But I can never escape my fears for her— that is why I did not wish for Carole to marry her Israeli. But it is
you
who
has made me most afraid. Not only for her heart, but for her life.” Harold looked into David’s eyes. “In Israel, there are fanatics who would have gladly murdered Ben-Aron. Here there are extremist Jews every bit as angry, in a country that protects their right to arm themselves like terrorists. Do you think that they will choose to kill you in a manner that keeps my daughter safe?”

Gazing at Harold, David felt the gulf between them: the instinctive fear of enemies was as embedded in Harold’s psyche as the first human’s fear of snakes. “Carole,” David told him, “is precious to me. All I’ve been hoping for is peace of mind. I’m sorry that I’ve shattered yours.”

Harold shook his head, speaking slowly and sadly. “At my own wedding, there was no one from my family, or my childhood, to share our happiness. And so I’ve imagined Carole’s wedding, surrounded by the people who have watched her grow, a community of Jews who love her. I’ve imagined her children, my grandchildren, with her strength of mind and heart, unscarred by all I saw. They would be our future, a vindication of all that happened in my past.

“And they would be
your
children, David—smart like you, confident like you, not afraid of anything.” Harold brushed his eyes, then looked away. “I have loved you as you are—as a son, and as the man my daughter deserves. I beg you, do not take this from me.”

When David tried to answer, the words caught in his throat.

“Wait,” Barry Levin said over David’s cell phone, “you’re asking our office to take on the defense of Hana Arif—the supposed linchpin of a conspiracy of unknown dimensions—in the murder of Israel’s prime minister?”