Brownies and Kalashnikovs Read online

  ***

  Ghassan had just turned a year old and was at the height of discovering his gymnastic abilities in reaching previously unattainable shelf heights and opening doors to disappear onto the street, when I discovered I was pregnant again. As surprises come in bundles, the pregnancy was both unplanned and I had twins. Outside of the challenge of suddenly having five children under the age of six by the year’s end, we needed to deal with the more pressing issue of where to have our twins. Abu Dhabi’s hospitals had taken a serious nose dive, its health services stretched to capacity as a result of the population explosion of the newly affluent nationals and expatriates. Lebanon’s civil war had reignited to unprecedented levels of violence and anarchy after the brief pause of comparative quiet.

  We mulled the possibilities over and over until Providence sent us an answer through a close friend of ours, an English author, Peter Snow, who told us in no uncertain terms over lunch, that we should settle on Graz in Austria, “a peaceful heaven on earth” in his words. And Graz was everything he described, a beautiful garden city in south-eastern Austria with ten universities and the cleanest air and water in Europe. Alas, despite having found our safe haven, the war was not going to allow us to have our babies in peace.

  Lebanon imploded that year.

  Raging street battles, targeted killings, kidnappings, and car bombs wreaked carnage and butchery everywhere. But nothing prepared the Lebanese for the most gargantuan bloodbath of all: Israel’s second invasion of Lebanon, code named ‘Peace for Galilee,’ Sharon’s pre-planned second invasion of Lebanon. Again, Sharon’s excuse was rooting out the PLO from the south under the pretext of avenging the attempted assassination of Israel’s ambassador to England by Syrian-backed Palestinians.

  My parents-in-law arrived in Abu Dhabi ahead of Sharon’s assault on Sidon by a hair’s breadth. Both were in a state of shock at having lived to witness the Israeli occupation of their city. Typically, Im Bashar had absolute faith in the Sidonians’ ability to regain their city. Abu Bashar remained uncharacteristically quiet, speaking little, eating even less. He was unable to accept his beloved Sidon under Israeli occupation. The twinkle in his eye and dry humor were replaced with a sadness I had never seen in him before.

  We tried everything to help Abu Bashar regain his zest for life and when he expressed the desire to travel with us, we packed up and flew to Austria earlier than planned. Bushra was already there, having offered to furnish our new country house in Niederschockl, a rural paradise ten minutes outside of Graz, a tiny village with family-owned farms, flowerbedecked homes and cows that grazed placidly in large stretches of pasture.

  As the days passed in Niederschockl, Abu Bashar seemed to improve amidst the tranquility and beauty that surrounded us. One afternoon, as Abu Bashar and I sat in the garden watching the children play with our spitz, Thatchy (she had the same biting habits as Margaret Thatcher), I asked him hopefully, “Are you happy here?”

  He answered wistfully, “It doesn’t compare to the view of the olive groves, orange orchards and the sea that we have from our balcony.” Sensing my disappointment, he patted my hand kindly, “This is beautiful too, Fadia. The Austrians are lucky. They have already had their wars.”

  No matter how hard he tried and how hard we tried, Abu Bashar was unable to shake off his depression. News of his fellow Sidonians baking in the hot sun on Sidon’s beach for interrogation by the Israeli Army and the deafening silence from the Arab world’s leaders over Israel’s invasion and occupation of Lebanon added to his feelings of despair. His dream that one day a strong nationalist movement would overcome those who collaborated with the enemy against his country’s sanctity was not happening. To him, the Sidon that he knew and the Lebanon he had been a part of was no more.

  We were having our tea after dinner one evening, when he put down his untouched drink and announced he was going to bed, as though on a mission.

  “Stay with us awhile Abu Bashar; it’s still early for sleeping,” Im Bashar coaxed him gently.

  He replied without looking back as he continued resolutely in the direction of his bedroom, “Ya reit (I wish), ya Im Bashar. How I wish I could be transported to my bed in Sidon to sleep there forever; my heart can not take any more pain.”

  And after that expression of yearning, Abu Bashar stopped eating. Im Bashar tried to cajole him in every manner possible, but he was adamant. No food was going down his throat until he went home to Sidon. She even sent his favorite grilled cheese sandwiches with Munira and Amer.

  “Eat Jiddo, you’ll grow big and strong,” they would entreat him earnestly as they raised the sandwich to his mouth. Smiling at his grandchildren’s heartfelt concern, he would actually take a bite to humor them, but as soon as they left the room, he would turn in his bed to face the wall, determined not to face life any longer.

  Sharon’s invasion had a far bigger agenda than merely rooting out 7000 PLO fighters. His aim was to establish a new status quo in Lebanon. In addition to occupying a 40-kilometer-long buffer zone along Lebanon’s common borders with Israel ruled by a proxy force, the SLA, Sharon aspired to set up a Lebanese government obedient to Israel. He threw an unprecedented siege around Beirut. For two of the hottest months of the year, Sharon cut off all water, supplies and electricity. He ordered hundreds upon hundreds of bombing sorties that threw every untried and illegal bomb in the book on the hapless poor who had nowhere to run or hide.

  On August 23, Abu Bashar heard the news of Bashir Gemayel’s election as President on the shortwave radio that never left his hands. To Abu Bashar, Bashir Gemayel represented capitulation to Israeli domination.

  “This is it. I will never see Sidon again. The Israelis will not leave until they have destroyed every vestige of civility in Lebanon. The violence from the occupation of the Zionists will not stop here.”

  On August 28 the PLO was formally evacuated from the port of Beirut to Tunis. Multinational forces were called in to protect unarmed Palestinian men, women and children left behind in the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps. Ariel Sharon refused to vacate a key position in West Beirut that overlooked Sabra and Chatila, with the insistence that despite the formal exodus of the PLO militants, not all of the fighters had been deported. He refused to leave his post until the last fighter was handed in to the Lebanese Forces, the militant arm of the Phalange. Sharon solemnly pledged that no unarmed Palestinian refugee would be harmed under his watch.

  The one bright ray of sunshine that summer of 1982 was the birth of our twin daughters, Yasmine and Rola, on September 9. This time it was not only Adnan accompanying me in the birthing room, but Im Bashar as well. Next to my birthing bed were two lace-covered cribs with a pale blue velvet pajama folded neatly in each. I had chosen the traditional boy color in deference to my mother-in-law’s wish, after my obstetrician informed me (unprompted) that the sonogram had revealed two identical boys.

  As the first baby entered the world, Im Bashar raised her hands to God, “Allahuakbar” (God is great), she exclaimed, “What a beautiful baby boy!”

  It was actually a beautiful baby girl, Yasmine. I heard Adnan ask the doctor softly, “madchen (girl), no?”

  The obstetrician sheepishly grunted and I shut my eyes tight, pretending I’d passed out from the painkiller. I could not bear to see Im Bashar’s disappointment. Although Munira was the apple of her eye, Im Bashar could not help always wanting the newborn to be a boy. And she still wasn’t about to admit defeat; there was one more coming. Two and a half minutes later our second baby girl, Rola, was born and laid gently in the adjoining crib to Yasmine, who turned solemnly to stare at her twin sister. And they weren’t identical either.

  After our daughters’ birth, Abu Bashar perked up noticeably and we heaved a sigh of relief when he asked for the toasted cheese sandwich. Yet, our relief at Abu Bashar’s turn for the better was short lived. On September 14, Bashir Gemayel was blown up. Abu Bashar did not celebrate the event; he waved away the news wearily as just more senseless violence and re
peated what he always believed: “violence only begets more violence.” He started to demand to go home. His sons respected his wish, sadly facing the reality that their father was preparing for his death.

  Abu Bashar’s health began to rapidly deteriorate. Speedy arrangements were made for his trip home. I would not be leaving with them; one of my twin babies, Yasmine, had developed an alarming case of septicemia and had been whisked away to the intensive care unit. Thankfully, the septicemia was treated, but the doctor ordered that she remain two weeks longer to regain her strength and immunity. Abu Bashar had been very concerned for his tiny granddaughter sleeping alone away from us in the hospital and asked about her repeatedly, “Who does she look like?” “Are they looking after her well?” “Is she improving?” “When will she come home?” “I wish I had the strength to visit her.”

  On September 16, I bade farewell to the kindest, most gracious man in my life, a father I loved dearly. As he climbed into the taxi taking them to the airport, Abu Bashar apologized to me for leaving me alone and for not being able to visit his newborn granddaughter in the hospital. I gave him one last hug, painfully aware of its finality as I felt how thin and frail he had become. When their taxi was no longer visible, I turned back into the house carrying Rola in my arms and Ghassan toddling behind me. Feeling a need to hear voices other than my own, I turned on the television. Sensing my sadness, Ghassan climbed onto my lap and in a rare gesture of empathy sat quietly, while I aimlessly switched from one station to the next.

  Suddenly, a news flash appeared in German about Lebanon. Fearfully, I leaned forward closer to the screen to catch what few German words I understood. I did not need to hear any words to understand the news bulletin. It was the massacre of the Sabra and Chatila refugees by the Phalange militia. Women wailed and pulled their hair crazed with grief and men sobbed loudly into their hands as they moved from one shrouded bloodied body to the next, searching for their dead loved ones. Children stared mutely at the camera as they stood motionless in the midst of violent death. I struggled to absorb the magnitude of the evil and horror displayed before me; only one thought crossed my stunned mind repeatedly, “Thank God Abu Bashar is not here to see this.”

  The first stop for Abu Bashar, Im Bashar, Bushra, Adnan, Munira and Amer was in Abu Dhabi to make arrangements to enter Lebanon through special contacts via Syria. But before doing anything, the most important matter at hand was to make sure Abu Bashar had no access to television, radio or newspapers … no small feat. Five days after arriving in Abu Dhabi, Abu Bashar suffered a minor heart attack and was rushed to the hospital. To everyone’s intense relief, he survived, but was kept in hospital for observation. Adnan called to inform me with intense relief at his father’s improving health.

  “He’s still as sharp as ever,” Adnan told me happily, “He’s himself again and has already managed to give his doctor a piece of his mind.”

  His doctor, a good-humored Egyptian, was reassuring Abu Bashar about his health, “You’re a spring chicken again. Get well soon so we can go to the Hajj together.”

  Abu Bashar had straightened up, removed his oxygen mask and with the old familiar twinkle in his eyes had retorted in his customary defiance of tradition, “I’ll save my energy for more entertaining events. I’m afraid you’ll have to go without me.”

  This was the indication Adnan, Bushra, and his mother needed to feel that Abu Bashar was on the mend. He still had the ability to shock.

  The following morning, on September 24, at a moment when Abu Bashar was alone and wide awake, with Im Bashar, Bushra and Adnan on the way for visiting hours, a nurse turned on the TV to entertain Abu Bashar and left the room. On the screen before Abu Bashar’s horrified eyes was a replay of the Sabra and Chatila massacre. He saw in grisly detail amidst the smoldering ruins of their shacks, the bloated bodies of young men shot with their arms tied behind their backs, the sprawling bodies of old men next to their canes caught in flight, pregnant women and mothers with their dead children under their bodies in failed attempts to keep them safe, babies shot in the head while suckling at their mother’s breast, and dead grandmothers still clutching their Lebanese IDs in failed attempts to stay alive. My father-in-law went into irreversible cardiac arrest despite the oxygen mask over his mouth. It was ‘code blue’ as the doctors and nurses rushed to his side, simultaneous with the arrival of Im Bashar, Adnan, and Bushra.

  Im Bashar turned to the unattended television. She saw the massacre on the screen and knew that this was the end for her husband and friend of fifty-two years. He had seen the horrors on television and had irrevocably given up the fight to live. She began to recite words from the Koran as a gesture of acceptance of God’s will and asked Abu Bashar for his blessings for his children and grandchildren naming them one by one. In one final breath, my father-in-law opened his eyes wide and breathed, “Allah yirda alayhun kullhun” (God bless them all) and left this disappointing world.

  ***

  It was Abu Bashar’s dying wish to be buried in Sidon, and Adnan and his brothers were determined to carry out his wish, occupation or no occupation. Chartering a private plane, they flew with Im Bashar and Bushra to Damascus. An influential Syrian Alawite neighbor, Buthaina As’ad, a pretty young dentist married to a childhood Lebanese friend of the Khayyats, Jawdat Dada, waited for them at Damascus Airport, ready to smooth what obstacles might arise. There was a loophole in the red lines drawn between Syria and the occupying Israelis that allowed them to enter Lebanon through Buthaina’s connections. Passage through the Syrian border went smoothly. Once past the borders, they faced the difficult task of negotiating their way past the Israeli checkpoints in Lebanon. Their convoy was halted by an Israeli military checkpoint at Sawfar, once a bustling summer resort overlooking the Beka’a Valley, the same area where Fatin and I had had our magical encounter with snow. The coffin and the family’s grief stricken faces said it all, but not to the Phalangist co-manning the checkpoint with the Israelis. He gave a harsh disrespectful order that the coffin be opened to check its contents. What he never expected was the invective that rained upon him from Im Bashar.

  “Your dirty hands will not tarnish my husband’s coffin. My husband is a Lebanese nationalist. He lived for his country and he died for his country, and he will be buried in his country. He was a patriot unlike you … you despicable traitor.” She seemed to have hit a nerve as, to everyone’s surprise, particularly the Phalangist’s, the Israeli officer overrode his order and waved them on.

  How difficult it was for them to enter Occupied Sidon. The streets were empty; there were checkpoints every ten meters, and a silent miserable pall covered the town. Throughout the week-long condolence ceremony for Abu Bashar, men and women sobbed over the loss of this gentle, dignified man who had never found any point in war, preferring the power of the written word and debate instead. The written word counted for nothing now. Any thought of cohabitation amongst confessions had become buried by Arab collaborators and the calculating foreign policy of the superpowers.

  A simple fellow whom Im Bashar had raised from infancy, Ali Majjaj, recounted to me many months later the days of the Israeli occupation as he had experienced them. With the rest of the rounded-up men, he had endured three days on the beach crouched on his haunches with his hands on his head, while the Israelis processed their prisoners one by one, taking away those suspected of sympathy with the PLO. Ali Majjaj’s turn came up with four other Sidonians. It was easy to figure Ali Majjaj out, but the Israelis underestimated the Lebanese defiance that surfaces in the simplest to the most complex of the Lebanese when cornered. The Israeli interrogator, who spoke Arabic, started with Ali first.

  “What is your name?” Ali gave it to him.

  “Do you know any mukharribbeen (terrorists, the Israeli name for the fedayeen) here amongst you?”

  Ali sneered back, “Even if I did, do you really think I’d tell you?”

  Here, Ali’s facial expression changed to one of horror at the memory of what happened next
, “The Israeli picks up this huge piece of wood with rusty nails in it and slams it into my back, and he asks again, ‘Do you know any mukharribbeen here?’ So I thought to myself, I’m going to have a hell of a time recuperating from my injury from that damned piece of wood he’s waving around so I answered, ‘No, I’m just a poor peddler who sells vegetables; I don’t have time for anything else.’ And I was saved from another whack and you know what? That beach was teeming with Sidonians who fought with the PLO. The man next to me refused to be humiliated by the arrogant Israeli interrogator, and before the son-of-a-bitch could begin his interrogation, he looked at the Israeli square in the eye and spat into it. They killed him on the spot. They did not know that he wanted to die a martyr and that they had realized his wish. He was a Sidonian fighter with the PLO.”

  The resistance to the Israeli occupiers of Sidon was already beginning in small spurts and starts. Housewives with shopping bags filled with vegetables, and children playing on street corners, signaled with a backward wave of their hand to young Palestinian and Sidonian men of any approaching Israeli troops who were hauling in men and boys based on their age. Sheikh Salim, the mufti who had written our marriage contract, had refused to meet the Israeli occupiers when they commanded the elders to convene a meeting with them, and had been placed under house arrest for doing so. Sheikh Salim went down in Sidonian lore for his bravery and patriotism. On meeting President Amin Gemayel, Bashir’s brother, in a first official visit of its kind by a Lebanese President to Sidon, Sheikh Salim refused to shake his hand, and rebuked him instead for pandering to the Israeli occupation with a line from a poem by a venerated Egyptian poet Ahmed Shawki: