Hadassah Covenant, The (53 page)

He reached to his side and pulled up a third document. “This is a sworn statement, authenticated here in Iraq and just faxed to my attorneys in London. With the full support of my father, World Court plaintiff Anek al-Khalid, in the matter of Iraqi reparations for the holdings stolen from Jewish citizens over the last century, I declare a jubilee. As proscribed by Scripture, a jubilee is an amnesty of all debts owed. I only ask that the government of Iraq set aside an amount equal to our claims for the express purpose of caring for the child victims of this war. That means feeding orphans, treating the injured and maimed, paying caregivers and foster parents, and subsidizing the rebuilding of schools and the awarding of higher educations. To any and all, whatever national heritage or creed.”

At these words, more applause broke out. This time it was the Iraqi watchers joining in—members of the nation’s newly installed government.

P
RIME
M
INISTER’S
R
ESIDENCE
—R
EHAVIA
, J
ERUSALEM

Hand in hand, Jacob and Hadassah ben Yuda sat on their bed, watching the news unfold on the television above their dresser.

“I am not doing this as a public-relations gesture,” they heard Ari continue onscreen, “and I am certainly not doing it to grant the demands of child-murdering terrorists.”

At those words Jacob turned to Hadassah and nodded his relief. That was an essential declaration for his government’s cooperation in unfolding events.

“I am doing this in the spirit of a heritage that persisted for centuries in this country—and this is the message I most urgently want to convey. If you study the history of Iraq and the former Persia, you’ll discover that for long periods of time, there reigned a warm and mutually beneficial relationship between its people and the Jewish leadership. The Muslim population was glad for its Jewish brothers’
large holdings and their managing of national institutions for the welfare of the entire nation. Economies thrived, in fact the glory days of Islam flowered while Muslim and Jew coexisted in this warm and tolerant manner. The large and powerful Iraqi Jewish population was happy to be considered a vital partner in the flourishing of the nation. In fact, there are records of years when every Thursday, the Caliph of Baghdad would entertain the Exilarch like a visiting prince. He would embrace his Jewish counterpart as he would his own brother, grant him a place of honor in his very own home, and the two would feast together while the sun remained in the sky. This tolerance and friendship continued for decades until a time when the next merchant of hate came along to try to shatter the peace.

“My message to the people of Iraq is this—those who tell you that hatred of your Jewish neighbors is an essential part of Islamic faith ignore their own history, and are grievously mistaken. Remember, one does not even need to be Zionist to be an observant Jew. Your neighbors can be both Jewish and strong nationalist Iraqis. So let us resume the old tradition of friendly coexistence. Let us put some reality behind the rhetoric of peaceful religion. Let us work together for a strong and proud Iraq. And let this forgiveness of billions of dollars contribute to the welfare of Iraq’s children as a first step toward that end.”

On the television screen, Ari bowed his head briefly, grabbed up his papers, and stepped away.

On his bed, the Prime Minister of Israel began to clap slowly, emphatically. His wife joined in.

He turned to her and kissed her lingeringly. “Congratulations, honey. You and Ari did it. You made the right choice. I was wrong. My fears were for nothing.”

Hadassah gave him a rueful pat on the cheek, acknowledging his confession, as his cell phone began to ring and he turned away. She, however, returned her gaze to the television news.

“What an amazing turn of events,” the commentator said to a talking head sitting beside him. “Did anyone anticipate that the Exilarch would step forward, only to relinquish the proceeds of his legal battle?”

“No, but keep in mind that he has not yet done what he pledged
he would do,” said the other with a thick accent—a man Hadassah knew as a strong Sunni supporter. “I would caution anyone against drawing favorable inferences from this announcement. After all, we do know that this man is a cousin of the First Lady of Israel, so we know . . .”

CLICK . . .

C
ENTRAL
B
AGHDAD
—K
HUDRA NEIGHBORHOOD—FIVE MINUTES LATER

A thick silence was shattered by the thunderous voice of an American officer on his bullhorn.

“Holders of Hadassah al-Feliz! You have been shown that Mr. al-Khalid’s speech was real, genuine. You asked for the cessation of all Exilarch legal claims against the Iraqi people, and exactly that has taken place. Now comes your turn to honor your pledges.”

A dark shape appeared at the window. Its glass shattered loudly and a blast of machine-gun fire split the late afternoon air.

The terrorists’ defiant response.

At that very second, a black-clad commando leaped over the rooftop’s lip, dangled over the void from a thick rope, and from an upside-down position, fired his pistol straight into the terrorist’s chest. Less than a half second later he was jerked back up just before a crane-mounted, remote-controlled machine gun swiveled into place and began to strafe the room one inch above the windowsill level—a full two feet above where infrared scopes had shown young Hadassah al-Feliz lying prone in a corner. A calculated, but necessarily swift risk.

She blinked through the smoke and once again began to cry, a sound covered by the loud noise.

Strange
—her three tormentors were gone.

B
EN
G
URION
A
IRPORT

The wide-eyed little girl passing through the Ben Gurion customs booth in the arms of an American soldier did not react at the
sight of the woman striding toward her—for the simple reason that she did not recognize her face. Nor did she recognize the pale, blue-starred flags overhead, marking the country whose soil she had just entered.

What she did recognize, however, and recoiled violently against in the process, were the
Uzi
machine guns gripped by the large men on either side of the lady. Hadassah al-Feliz’s eyes widened suddenly—she let out a plaintive whimper, then a piercing scream, and began to climb up the GI’s shoulder to escape the shining black spitters of death.

The approaching woman with the shining eyes turned frantically to every side and realized at once the source of Hadassah’s distress. She motioned swiftly to the men beside her and the terrifying reminders were immediately hidden away, out of sight. Then she stepped forward, just as the same soldier who had saved the tiny Hadassah lowered her little body to the floor.

To comfort her, the same commando squad which had rescued her was allowed to convey her to Israel.

As the lady grew near and crouched low, peering into her face, little Hadassah could see that she was very pretty, and that she was crying freely. Though it did not seem the same sort of weeping that had overtaken her mother and sister before their deaths, Hadassah’s fear remained. The lady was actually smiling through her tears.

“Hello, Hadassah,” the First Lady spoke, in surprisingly fluent Arabic. “I’m sorry you saw things that frightened you.”

The little girl had no response. She merely bit her lip and glanced back at the men standing now a few paces behind the lady.

“They’re not going to hurt you in any way,” the woman soothed. “In fact, they’re here to make sure no one ever hurts you again. Just like the brave soldier who brought you here. Do you understand?”

Hadassah thought about the word
brave
and decided that she did understand. She nodded slowly.

“I’m so glad to meet you, Hadassah,” the lady said, and she extended her hand. Hadassah reached out and softly gripped it. The two clasped and shook tenderly. “I want to tell you my name, and you’re going to laugh when you hear it. It’s a very pretty name, I’d bet you’ll agree.”

“What is it?”

“My name is Hadassah, too.”

The little girl cocked her head back in surprise. “My mommy told me there was no other Hadassah anywhere in the land.”

“She was right. But you just came to
another
land. It’s a place where lots of Hadassahs can live together and be
protected
by the men with the big guns instead of hurt by them.”

“Men with big guns and knives hurt my family,” Hadassah said, the fear flickering back into her face.

“I know they did, honey,” the lady said, and more tears reappeared in her eyes. “I’m so sorry. So sorry.”

Then the woman did something the little Hadassah had not expected. Something that would change the little girl’s life forever. She reached out slowly, caressed her hand, and held out her arms. Without even meaning to, the tiny form stepped between them.

They stood that way for a very long time, not even worrying about all the people crowded around them now, both of them crying for inner reasons that must have been different and in some ways very much the same.

At some point the lady Hadassah drew back and took a deep breath.

“Hadassah, I have a house that’s very big and very safe and very empty without any little girls to keep me company. I haven’t been able to have any children out of my tummy, but I love kids very much. And I have a husband who couldn’t be here today, but who very much wants to meet you. We’d love it if you’d come live with us for a while. Does that sound like something you’d want to do?”

Without answering, the little girl stared hard into this new woman’s face.
Hadassah
. Another—who would have thought it? The lady was nice, and she definitely cared about her. And Hadassah cared about being safe.

That was important.

Little Hadassah nodded yes, and reached her finger toward the lady’s eyes, pointing.

The woman peered into the little girl’s eyes and her own grew wide with surprise.

“O dear G-d in heaven,” Hadassah ben Yuda said, laughing and
crying at the same time. “I can’t believe this. And you saw it, too, didn’t you, sweetheart? Mine are the same as yours. Just like yours—isn’t that wonderful?”

The little girl nodded and smiled.

And that was enough.

J
ERUSALEM
P
OST—FRONT PAGE, BELOW THE FOLD—THREE WEEKS LATER

The Office of the Prime Minister of Israel has confirmed that Mr. ben Yuda and his wife Hadassah have in fact arranged to adopt the nearly four-year-old Jewish Iraqi girl who appeared on television screens worldwide during the hostage drama that brutally claimed the lives of her family.

The girl, whose name is also Hadassah, was taken into Israeli custody when Mossad operatives, working together with American Delta Force commandos, stormed the Baghdad apartment where she had been held at knifepoint before a global television audience. She was rescued and taken from there to the Baghdad Airport, where in an unusual transfer of custody, she was flown directly to Ben Gurion Airport in Israel and met at the terminal by First Lady Mrs. Hadassah ben Yuda in person.

“I dedicate my life now to soothing this precious one’s wounds and giving her a warm new family where fear no longer reigns,” she told reporters. “The fact that she bears my name is only the smallest, although amusing, of coincidences. So is the completely unexpected discovery we made upon our first face-to-face meeting. That she shares with me an infrequent family genetic anomaly: a pair of green eyes.”

Our reporter concurs—a double set of the most unusually luminous green eyes.

Tommy Tenney often prays for the peace of Jerusalem and Baghdad. While writing fiction, one can wish for reality.