Tales from the Nakba
Part one: The Rape of Lydda
In life it always mattered that you were Jew, Arab or Infidel, but once you die, you’re just a shell with inside, your sins, and perhaps the few good things you did whilst Allah gave you life. I died twice, but the first time my yet to be born grandchildren urged me back to life, they needed to be born, they screamed.
Before the white man betrayed us, we were leading a peaceful enough life in our villages. Of course there were those with too much and those they gave too little to in order to make them richer, but we had full bellies, if only with olives and dates, and taboon and humus. And oranges from Jaffa.
The Yahuds, the Rumis and us Muslimun, we were good neighbours. In Lydda and Ramle, you left your doors open, you couldn’t buy a padlock in any shop even if you wanted one. You needed a spoonful of sugar you knocked on the door of the Rumi neighbour for some, the Yahud would give a hungry child matzos and fig jam. Then the ajnabi Yahud began arriving. It was never our fault, it was their own white people who were ill-treating them. Pogroms and lapidations, crystal nights … they arrived here and we let them. In our lands we had the tradition of welcoming the ajnabis.
The people admired the white man, and believed him when he told us that he was imbued with fairness and justice, and christian charity. White men were only interested in looking after us, in educating us, civilkising us, and making sure we were were healthy, and everybody believed them and were grateful to them.
Everybody but a few like me who read newspapers and listened to the radio. We had heard of Lawrence and his seven pillars of wisdom, who told us that he had the interest of Arabs at heart, that he loved us and respected our values; we had heard of Lord Balfour and of Monsieur Picot and Mister Sykes. We did not trust them, but had our trust in Allah. We had never harmed anybody, so why would Allah let bad things happen to us?
When the Yahuds arrived, we welcomed them, but we became uneasy when we heard them saying that this was their land which their God had given them three thousand years ago. They came in larger numbers and we did nothing. The Jewish Agency began by buying a few dunams of land here, a few dunams of land there, and the rich landowners did not worry about the consequences. They took the money and looked the other way. The newcomers created a moshav here, a factory there, and it was only then that we began to worry. But it was probably already too late.
We formed a committee, and met to discuss what we could do, but we could never agree. Someone suggested we got guns, but few of us knew which end to fire from. No, our people were not fighters. It seemed that the new Yahuds had the white man instructing them. We were peasants, fishermen, postmen, fahims, carpenters. I was a school teacher.
Friction between the villagers and the newcomers were inevitable, and the local Yahuds who used to be our friends joined them in demanding the land God had promised them. For our own good, they advised us to sell our lands and move to other parts. Your people have five million square miles of land, in Egypt, in Syria, in Transjordania, in Lebanon, surely it was only fair to let them have a small strip to create their own land? A paltry ten thousand square miles?
Who killed who first? Was it the chicken or the egg? But they had better guns, and their men were trained by the white man. A few among us of their own free will sold everything and left, but most of us did not want to.
Daily we were hearing of our peasants being waylaid in some dark corner and shot dead. Then they began summoning our chief advising us to leave before something bad happened to us. Advices had become threats. Still we did not budge. It was then that we began hearing of the Palmeach, the Yiftah Brigade and Haganah, Moshe Dayan and Yigal Allon, Ben Gurion and Mula Cohen. And seeing them in their fine uniforms and with new glistening guns. Walking proudly among locals.
The United Nations decided to act. We are peacekeepers, they said, we hate to see good people killing each other. Reasonable folks can settle their differences by negotiations. And they proposed that the land be divided into two countries, one for Jews and the other _ we were given a new status _ non-Jews. They were all of ten per-cent and we the paltry remaining ninety. And they had kindly awarded Lydda and Ramle to us, to be part of our new fatherland, but Mr Ben Gurion said, No! I demand these lands in
Eretz Yisrael, and the peace-loving United Nations looked at us and said, sorry, we can’t stop him, they’ll get angry if we try.
The campaign of harassment became more virulent, and Haganah began operating in broad daylight, killing people, pour l’exemple. Mula Cohen_ ah yes. Let me tell you about him, soon to be known as Bulldozer.
A kind Jewish German doctor, Siegfried Lehman from Berlin was horrified at the worsening of the conditions of living of Jews in Europe, and as he had a lot of money, he decided to move to the land of his ancestors. He was a philantropist, full of good intentions: he was going to look after the youths from Eastern Europe who were forced to flee their countries because of persecution. He meant to a ensure they learnt a trade so they could make a good living. He created schools, workshops, ateliers, and finally a moshav, a community centre. He was a man of culture and he provided his disciples with a surrounding of art and music, Mozart and Mendehlsson, preached tolerance for lesser people and cared for their sick in his dispensary. But he also, come night, made sure that they learnt how to assemble, dismantle and shoot guns, for when the time came. As it surely would. Mula Cohen or Bulldozer was one of his stalwarts. I know all that because when you die you learn everything.
Mula Cohen planned a few decisive operations. He began by choosing one narrow street and ordered the Palmeach to break every window and throw in a grenade. Dozens of people died painful deaths from horrible burns. We were afraid to stay in our homes because Bulldozer had said that we had seen nothing yet. I got my new wife, Arwa _ I had only been married three months _ and my in-laws and we made for Dahmash Mosque, where over a thousand of us had sought refuge.
By now Mula Cohen was on fire. He got a PIAT launcher which his English friend general Orde Wingate had given him, and made for the mosque. In a frenzy he directed his fire at the walls of the Dahmash, which crumbled down like a child’s sand castle.
Allah allowed over a hundred to perish in that attack, but chose to spare us.
Mula then spoke to us in his megaphone. My dear Muslim and Christian friends, he said, I regret that I was driven to this extreme action, but you left me with no choice, ignoring my friendly advice to pack up your things and go to Ramallah. So, unless you wish greater misery on your people, go home, pack your things and leave in an orderly fashion. My men have strict orders not to harm you.
We had no choice.
We rushed home, put our most precious possessions in a couple of suitcases, and in no time we were on the road to Ramallah. We had just reached the gate of the city when we were stopped by a dozen men from the Yiftah Brigade. They acted like they were drunk, but if they were it was not alcohol. It was the knowledge that they had power of life and death over us. They opened our suitcases and threw everything on the ground, and took the most valuable things we had, the women’s jewellery, watches, pewter teapots and plates, silk scarves and blouses. Then they said the women can go on their way. As for you, they told me, Bulldozer said he has a job for you.
Allah keep you safe, I told my family, you go to Ramallah and insha Allah I will join you soon.
Altogether, between 60,000 and 70,000 locals were soon on the death march, and four hundred and twenty-six people lay dead all over the village. Mula greeted me and five others with great courtesy. All these people who have sadly died cannot be left to rot in the sun, don’t you agree? he asked us. I knew that he cared not a fig for dead Arabs, but the astute Ben Gureion had said that evidence of massacres must be hidden as far as possible. He gave us shovels and spades and said, go dig a grave, thirty metres long, ten metres wide and two metres deep. Then help my men bury them. You can of course make a prayer for their souls. When you’ve done, you will be free to rejoin your loved ones. God be with you.
The ground was sandy, and it took us about six hours to finish the task. Then another three hours to carry the corpses of the dead to the grave. We covered our dead with earth. We could hardly move when we had finished. Mula seemed very pleased. Give them some water, he ordered his Palmeach men, and they did. Thank you very much, dear friends, he said, and we were all surely wondering where we would get the strength for the long walk ahead. We needed not to have asked, for at a signal from Bulldozer, the Palmeach men aimed their guns at us. Shot in the head or chest, five of us immediately fell to the ground and must have died instantly. I was only shot in the leg, and I knew that my best course was to fake death. The Palmeach men then dragged us to the grave and threw us wherever there was a little hollow, and covered us.
I knew that one can die through loss of blood, and indeed was convinced that I had expired. Funny, I remember thinking, one’s brain can still function after one has died, for I found myself thinking of Arwa and the family, wondering how much progress they had made. If I don’t get some air now, I was thinking, I’m gonna suffocate. By now I was completely unaware of the pain in my leg. I placed my right hand in front of my mouth and opened it to create a little empty space, and found that this enabled me to breathe. I am not dead, Allah be praised, I said to myself.
I must have fainted at some point, but when i came to, my leg began to hurt. It was to keep my mind off the excruciating pain that I started digging the earth away with my bare hands. Fortunately the layer of earth and sand was fairly thin, and soon enough I found my head free. I pulled myself out and studied the lie of the land. In the distance I could see some tents with light coming out of them, and could also hear the laughter of Mula’s men, who were probably drinking.
My leg suddenly began to smart and I was unable to stop myself howling, and knew that the only way to stop the pain was to do something physical. So I dragged myself out and began crawling, propelling myself with my hands. How long I took to reach the palm grove, I had no idea. However was I going to reach Ramallah in my condition? Please Allah, don’t let him die, I heard my unborn grandchildren beg.
By now the sun had set and it was quite dark, but the sky was clear with stars and soon the full moon. I will rest until dawn tomorrow, I said. I was dying of thirst and had not had anything to eat in almost fifteen hours.
But it was about to get worse. First I heard whispers, then footsteps, and soon enough I caught sight of two Haganah men. They reminded me of my cousins Ismail and Yahya. The moonlight that I had been blessing only minutes ago, had now made me visible to the two Yahuds. They laughed as they saw me, and one of them raised his gun as he advanced towards me. Shall I shoot the fucking cockroach Ben, he asked his companion in Hebrew. Ben shrugged, but said nothing for a minute. Then he said, the only good Arab is a dead Arab, and the other fellow cackled with laughter. Perhaps we should use a knife, he said to Ben, save a bullet. Thy looked at each other and said nothing for a while. Let’s just leave him, Avi, look at his leg, he’d gonna kick it soon enough. Yea, you’re right. They both shrugged and then they stared at each other. I swear that I could read on both their faces the same sentiment. They shook their heads and almost tearfully one said, No, we can’t just leave him to die. The other one said, You’re right buddy. And I knew. Suddenly they were both squatting by my side. They took some bandages from their kitbag and began dressing my wound. It was Avi who found a bottle of water and made me drink from it. Then Ben, laughing merrily found some bread and meat and breaking them into small pieces, put them in my mouth, and still laughing said, it’s halal, we don’t eat pig either.
After they had finished, they said, You might as well sleep here under the palm tree, but make sure you’ve disappeared before sunrise if you don’t want to get us in trouble.
The moment I heard the dawn chorus, I began crawling. In a race with a snail I’d have come third.
