The Jerusalem Puzzle. Laurence O’Bryan

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      6

      In front of us in the queue there was a bald-headed giant of a man and his stony-faced partner. He must have been six foot eight. I was six one and he towered over me. I overheard a few words in Russian between them.

      ‘They look like they’re auditioning for the Organizatsiya,’ whispered Isabel.

      I shook my head.

      ‘The Russian Jewish mob,’ she said.

      ‘That’s a bit harsh,’ I said. ‘What does that make us?’

      ‘Generation Z dropouts.’

      ‘Speak for yourself. I haven’t retired at thirty-six like some people I know.’

      She gave me one of her smiles, then glanced away, as if she was looking for someone. I turned. There were too many people behind to work out who she’d been staring at.

      ‘Expecting a friend?’

      ‘No, it’s not that.’ She leaned toward me. ‘I thought I saw someone I know.’ She shook her head. ‘But it wasn’t him.’

      On the plane I spent most of the time reading a guidebook about Israel. About halfway through the flight a small group of skull-capped men went to the front of the cabin and swayed back and forth, their heads down. They were praying.

      Later, I looked out of the window when I heard someone say they could see the island of Mykonos. It was barely visible through a blue haze near the horizon. There wouldn’t be many people on the beaches there now.

      As we began the descent and the seatbelt sign turned on again, I saw a plume of smoke spreading across the sky.

      ‘It’s a forest fire on Mount Carmel,’ said Isabel.

      ‘How the hell do you know that?’

      ‘There was an article about it on the Jerusalem Post website this morning.’

      When we landed at the airport near Tel Aviv I felt the buzz of excitement around me. We reached immigration by passing along a wide elevated sunlit passage. There was a big queue for passport control in the area beyond, but it was moving quickly. Isabel’s ‘Russian mob friends’ allowed us to pass in front of them. I nudged her. There was a rosary in the woman’s hand.

      Isabel made a face at me, as if to say, okay you were right.

      We passed through immigration quickly. Outside the building there were young soldiers to the left and right in brown, slightly oversized uniforms with machine guns hanging from their shoulders and watchful looks in their eyes.

      We took a taxi to Jerusalem, to the Hebron Road not far from the Old City. Coming towards the city on a modern motorway, with large green signs in Hebrew, Arabic and English was a surreal experience. We passed dark green tanks on dark green transporters going the other way. There must have been ten of them. As we neared the city, a glint of gold sparkled near the horizon, set against low hills and a crust of buildings.

      ‘That must be the Dome of the Rock,’ I said, pointing out the window. ‘Where Solomon built his famous temple.’

      Isabel held my hand. ‘I’ve always wanted to come here,’ she said.

      The highway turned. The spark of gold was gone. Pale cream, modern two and three-storey apartment buildings filled the low hills around us. As we got close to the city there were older buildings, and long tree-lined boulevards of apartments.

      There was a lot of traffic too. Sunday’s the start of the week here, our driver said.

      He had given us a running commentary on the latest news from Egypt and on the situation in Israel almost all the way from the airport. Our hotel, the Zion Palace, was a four-star, but it didn’t look it from the outside. The entrance was down a set of wide steps, like descending into a cave, but inside, the lobby was wide and marble-floored. There were brass coffee tables at the back, surrounded by chocolate-brown leather high-backed chairs. Huge blue ceramic pots sat in the corners of the lobby and paintings of Old Jerusalem hung on the walls.

      The view from the small balcony in our room made me want to hold my breath. We stared out at the city. To our right were the pale gold sandstone walls of the Old City.

      The hill of Mount Zion, crowned by the high upturned-funnel style roof of the Dormiton Abbey with its dome-capped tower was just visible to the far right.

      There was an ancient magic to this view. There was history and religion in every glance, and something older overlaying it all. Countless wars had been fought over this patch of land and its fate was still in bitter dispute.

      The hum of traffic, honking car horns and occasional shouts came up from the road below. Leaden clouds rolled slowly overhead.

      I pointed at the Old City walls.

      ‘Just a bit further up that way is the Jaffa Gate,’ I said. ‘Do you see the valley to the right of the walls?’ Isabel nodded. ‘That’s where the followers of Ba’al and Moloch sacrificed their children by fire, while priests beat drums to hide the screams.’

      ‘Yeuch, that’s too sick.’

      ‘They call that place Gehenna, the valley of hell.’ I went to the edge of the balcony, as if drawn forward. The start of the valley, the part we could see, looked dried out, rocky, its low trees withered and dusty.

      ‘That’s where the entrance to hell is for a lot of Jews, and for some Christians and followers of Islam too. They think that’s where the wicked will line up to be punished at the end of the world.’

      ‘And now you can find СКАЧАТЬ