The Last Days (24 page)

It was a volatile situation, to say the least. The head of the Shin Bet, Israel's domestic intelligence service, once sent a confidential letter to Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak warning that an extremist strike on the Temple Mount would likely lead to an “all-out war” and “unleash destructive forces that would imperil Israel's existence.” It was a letter passed along to every Israeli prime minister since.

Nothing held the power to trigger an apocalyptic holy war so quickly as failing to protect those thirty-five sacred acres. It was no wonder, therefore, that the Israeli police forces vowed to protect the Temple Mount at all costs. But tonight, Akiva Ben David had found a weak link in the armor.

 

One of the phones on Ziegler's desk rang.

Startled, Bennett grabbed the phone. Maybe it was his mother. It wasn't.

“
Jonathan, it's me, Dmitri,
” whispered an exhausted Galishnikov.

“What's going on?”

He could hear Sa'id in the background, talking heatedly on another phone.

“
You need to hear it straight from Ibrahim. Only him. How fast can you be here?
”

“I don't know. I just woke up—I need a shower, a shave—”

“
No, no, you don't understand—we need you here in five minutes—no more.
”

The line went dead. Bennett wasn't used to taking orders from Dmitri Galishnikov. But this time he didn't seem to have a choice.

The first bullet sliced past his head.

It missed by inches. A second shot ripped through his parachute—then a third, and a fourth. The ground was coming up fast. He had to concentrate. He had to choose.

“Shlomo Six under fire, we're under fire—move, now—go, go, go.”

Akiva Ben David was shouting as he twisted his head from side to side, trying to see who was firing at him through sheets of rain. He only had a few seconds before he smashed down on the stones below. If he wasn't dead by the time he hit the ground, he'd soon be a sitting duck for sure—covered with a parachute, tangled up in cords, exposed and out in the open, a good thirty or forty yards from his target.

He cursed his ground units for not being in position already. He cursed himself for having trained them so poorly.
Fools. How badly did they want this to happen? They knew what was at stake. Weren't they ready to make history? Where the heck were they?

Then he saw the shooter. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see a guard sprinting from the northeast corner. Ben David lifted his M-4 carbine, aimed the laser scope, centered the red dot, and squeezed off two rounds, one after the other. The guard dropped instantly, landing in a pool of his own blood.

Now the entire Temple Mount erupted in a ferocious gun battle. Everyone was shooting. Tracer bullets whizzed back and forth across through the cold night air. Security horns began blasting. Sirens could be heard approaching from every direction. The entire operation was a matter of split-second timing. Ben David figured they had less than fifteen minutes, and that was his best-case scenario. In that time they had to take out the guards already stationed on the Mount, hold off the reinforcements, and rig the two buildings for detonation.

He'd played the scene over and over again in his mind's eye for years, and vivid images now flashed before him. He could see the stunning Byzantine architecture of the Dome, built by Umayyad Caliph Abd al-Malik in the year 692. He could see the somber black dome of Al Aqsa, started by Abdul Malik ibn Marwan, completed by his son Al-Walid in the year 705, reconstructed in the year 1035, then refurbished during the Second World War. He could see the backpacks stuffed with C4 explosives positioned strategically in and around the structures.

He could see, too, the massive, simultaneous explosions—the cataclysmic fireballs—the raging flames and towers of smoke that would be seen for miles, all of which would be captured by at least a dozen security cameras, possibly more.

They would catch the world off guard. No one was expecting this. No one had predicted this. The attacks would dominate international headlines for weeks. The world would be talking about them. Who were they? Why had they chosen to strike? And why now? Was the attack related to the war in the territories? Was it payback for the suicide bombings? Would the Temple really be rebuilt? Was it a sign of the last days, the fulfillment of ancient prophecies?

Soon enough, the Israelis would have to release the videotapes made by all those security cameras. The international media would demand it. And the Israeli Supreme Court would eventually require it. Then, finally, the world would see exactly how Ben David and the Temple Mount Battalion had done it—the first airborne attack on the Temple Mount in history—all to right a wrong and unleash a movement of religious Jews ready to seize their destiny.

Three police officers burst out of a guardhouse. Ben David saw them immediately. He raised his weapon, fired two bursts, and saw two of the men drop instantly to the ground. The third dove into a grove of trees and began returning fire. Three of his fellow commandos were about to touch down. One, if he were lucky, might even land dead center on the golden Dome. Perhaps he'd be able to attach explosives far above where anyone on the ground could easily get at them. They'd thought about that. They'd trained for it. But Shlomo Five might actually get to do it.

More machine-gun fire. Two more teammates were already on the ground, about forty yards away. They were unhooking their parachutes and about to sprint to the octagonal base of the Dome, spectacularly adorned with brilliant blue hand-painted tiles. But again Ben David cursed to himself.
Where were the ground units? Why weren't they providing cover fire?

A scream suddenly exploded through his earpiece.

“I'm hit, I'm hit.”

In all the gunfire and noise, Ben David couldn't make out the voice. He didn't have time to figure it out either. For a moment, he let go of the M-4 strapped to him, pulled down on the cords dangling close by to slow his landing, bent his knees and touched down perfectly, just as he'd mastered it in months of training in the western deserts of the United States. He dove to the ground for cover and began rolling right.

Bullets were slicing the night sky above him. He needed to get the chute off quickly and get moving. He was now exposed on the southeastern corner of the massive plateau. The Mount of Olives was behind him. The Al Aqsa mosque loomed dead ahead. Over his headset he could hear more screams. The crackle of gunfire was almost deafening. But somehow the cries of a dying man—a friend and comrade-in-arms—cut through it all.

 

Bennett showered and threw on jeans, a white T-shirt, and black sweater.

They were Ziegler's. He'd give them back later. Seven minutes later, he was punching in Tariq's code number and opening the door. Galishnikov and Sa'id were sitting on the couches near the TV, huddled around the coffee table with McCoy and deep in discussion. All three looked up to greet him, but it was McCoy who immediately noticed how pale Bennett looked.

“You OK?” she asked. “You don't look so good.”

“It's nothing, I'll be fine,” Bennett lied, not sure where to begin.

“Jon, obviously you're not fine, what's the—”

“I
said
I'm fine,” Bennett shot back, more abruptly than he meant.

He didn't mean to be harsh, certainly not with her, and he was surprised by the edge in his voice. But he didn't have time to process all the thoughts and emotions roiling under the surface. He felt lazy for sleeping so long and guilty for being out of the loop. He wanted time alone to talk to Erin. But for now his top priority was to get back up to speed as fast as possible.

“Erin, I'm sorry. I really am. It's just—I'm sorry.”

They were all punchy. They were all under a lot of stress. Certainly McCoy was, and she hadn't gotten anywhere near the sleep Bennett just had. She could feel herself ready to fire back. But she held her tongue. Now was not the time to get into a fight. Too much was at stake. She nodded, accepted his apology, then looked over at Ibrahim Sa'id, the man whose news was about to change everything.

Marsha Kirkpatrick was suffering from sleep deprivation.

So was the rest of her team. Now they were tracking a series of suicide bomber attacks throughout Israel. The carnage began with the bus bomber and then the “Walkman Bomber” at Tel Aviv University. But those weren't isolated incidents. Another bombing ripped through a nightclub along the beach in Tel Aviv. Ten minutes later, another incinerated a bus stop in the French Hill section of Jerusalem. Eight minutes later, a bomber attacked the bus terminal in Haifa.

Prime Minister Doron and his Security Cabinet were meeting behind closed doors to discuss their options. They knew full well the risks of launching an all-out invasion of the West Bank and Gaza, and they knew the American president had asked them to stand down just the previous day. But if a Palestinian civil war was going to mean a new wave of attacks against innocent Israelis, the prime minister and his government could not afford to sit on their hands, no matter what the international repercussions might be. That was the message Doron had delivered to Kirkpatrick by phone ten minutes earlier, just before going back into the emergency session with his top advisors. It was a message he needed to have passed on to President MacPherson, immediately.

Kirkpatrick promised to get back to him quickly, but asked that Israel do nothing until the two leaders could speak. Doron agreed, but he made it clear—they were running out of time.

“Mr. President, I'm so sorry to wake you. It's Marsha in the Situation Room.”

“What…what's going on?” MacPherson stammered, barely conscious.

“We need to meet. All of us.”

He tried to focus on the small digital clock beside him.

“Right now? The whole team?”

It was just after eleven at night. He'd been asleep less than two hours.

“I'm afraid so, sir.”

Kirkpatrick knew the president was still recovering from his own life-threatening injuries sustained during the terrorist attacks against him in Denver just before Thanksgiving. She knew the immense pressures he faced and how badly he needed some rest. She also knew that the White House doctor had insisted that MacPherson break away from the almost nonstop NSC meetings just a few hours ago to get some sleep and try to regain his strength. But the president also knew that his National Security Advisor wouldn't call—wouldn't insist on a meeting—if it wasn't absolutely critical.

“OK, gather the team. I'll be right down.”

 

Ben David pressed himself to the ground.

He flipped on his night-vision goggles and scanned the courtyard. Two of his men were sprinting for the Dome. He could see they had bags of C4. They were firing off bursts of machine-gun fire on the run. An Israeli opened fire from behind a stone. Ben David could clearly see the muzzle flashes. He took aim, and squeezed off six rounds. The flashes stopped, but not for long. By his calculations, they now had less than three minutes before Israeli commandos would swarm in from every direction.

“Shlomo One, this is Shlomo Six—where are you guys?”

It was chaos on the radios. Gunfire, men screaming—he'd never heard it this bad. His men were rattled. The Arab guards and Israeli first responders were putting up a far tougher fight than they'd expected.

“I'm at Mughrabi Gate—we're under heavy fire. We've got two KIA. Repeat, two KIA. Taking sniper fire from one of the minarets. Shlomo Nine and Eleven are badly wounded. Don't think they're going to make it. Shlomo Ten and Twelve are pinned down in a gun battle on the North Portico.”

Ben David's mind reeled. They were on the cusp of victory, the cutting edge of history. They were so close. They couldn't fail now. His people had trained so long and so hard for this operation. They knew the stakes, and he wanted desperately to believe they were uniquely chosen for this moment in history, in Jewish history.

They all knew that in the “last days” the State of Israel would be reborn after two thousand years of desolation and exile, and that Jerusalem would—someday, somehow—once again become the eternal, undivided capital of the Jewish people. They knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that the Holy One of Israel would supernaturally draw the Jewish people back to the land of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And they knew, too, that the day of Israel's eternal redemption was drawing near.

They knew because he'd taught them day after day, verse after verse. The “Day of the Lord” was almost here. Events were already in motion. The Divine Clock was already ticking. Akiva Ben David could still hear the scratchy, crackling voice of Israeli general Mordechai Gur on his parents' transistor radio in June of 1967, announcing for all the world to hear, “The Temple Mount is in our hands.” It was a moment he would never forget, a moment of electrification, a moment of instant identification with five thousand years of Jewish history. It was as though in a split second, something inside of Ben David—something deep inside millions of Jews worldwide—clicked on, a palpable sense that he was part of something larger than himself, something transcendent and real.

Ben David's family was not religious at the time. They were all agnostic, secular Jews. Living on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in a world of wealth and sophistication, they barely even thought of themselves as Jews. They were Americans. They were modern, hip, cosmopolitan, not a bunch of knuckle-dragging Neanderthals trying to find the source of fire and the meaning of life. But something happened. Israeli forces were standing on Mount Moriah.

For the first time in thousands of years, Jews were standing where Abraham once stood, where he nearly sacrificed his only son, Isaac, until God intervened and provided a ram as a substitute. Moreover, these Jews weren't simply standing at the epicenter of monotheistic faith. They now controlled it forever—the Temple Mount, the site of two great Temples, and a third yet to be built.

Ben David's stomach tightened. A wave of nausea swept over him. But he couldn't stay where he was. He began racing for the mosque.

CRACK, CRACK, CRACK.

Bullets smashed into walls and pavement all around him. He was twenty feet from the side door. The stones were slick from the rains. Ben David worried he'd—