It begins with a suicide bombing. An explosion in a
restaurant in central Tel Aviv. At least 17 people are dead, including a group
of teenage girls celebrating at a birthday party. Ambulances race to Ichilov
Hospital, where doctors and nurses labor around the clock to save as many lives
as possible. One of the surgeons is an Israeli Arab citizen, Dr. Amin Jaafari, who
has been trying to contact his wife, due to return to the city from a visit to
her grandmother in Nazareth.
After endless hours in the wards, Amin returns to his home
in an affluent neighborhood only to be woken hours later by police knocking at
his door. He is called back to the hospital to identify the body of one of the
victims. In the morgue he sees the remains of his wife. The police tell him
that the extensive wounds she suffered are due to the fact that she was the
suicide bomber who detonated in the restaurant.
The victims of terrorism
Those who survive a suicide bombing, both the injured and
the families of the dead, will carry the scars of the tragedy forever. Amin's
colleagues reach out to help him but he turns them away.
"I'll never understand why the survivors of a
tragedy feel compelled to make people believe they're more to be pitied than
the ones who didn't make it," a Holocaust survivor tells Amin. Amin
refuses to be pitied and instead sets out on a mission to confront the Islamic
terrorist leader who sent his wife on her suicide mission.
For Israelis, it will not be easy to learn what Amin hears
on his journey into the refugee camps of Bethlehem and the rubble of Jenin
after an Israeli military action. Nonetheless, this is how it is. Palestinians
are separated from their agricultural lands and their former lives by a Wall
(the author's capitalization) that runs through their territories. Idealistic
(some would say brain-washed) radicals are willing to give up their lives and
kill others if they can't reclaim their homeland.
This is not a pleasant story but it is a very true portrayal
of all sides of terrorism. As such, there is no happy ending. What comes as a
surprise is that the Algerian-born author manages to tell the story without
judgment. There are stories, victims and tragedies on both sides. As difficult
as it is for Amin, who has taken an oath to save people's lives, it is hard for
readers to accept the reasons why someone would take the extreme action of
becoming a suicide bomber. Nonetheless, it's important to hear those reasons,
and one can trust the author to inform and not preach.
A woman's pseudonym
Yasmina Khadra (green jasmine in Arabic) is the pen name of
former Algerian army officer Mohammed Moulessehoul. Moulessehoul adopted a
woman's pseudonym to avoid military censorship and only revealed his identity
in 2001 after leaving the army and going into exile in France. He is the author
of several novels depicting the lives of Muslims in the turbulent Middle East.
"Because fanaticism is a threat for all, I contribute
to the understanding of its causes and backgrounds. Perhaps then it will be
possible to find a way to bring it under control," Moulessehoul said in an interview with the German radio station SWR1 in 2006.
"The Attack" has just been released as a feature
film and is being screened in France and at film festivals in the United
States. A reviewer in the Chicago Tribune noted that it was not an easy
transition to the screen. Along the way it lost the important introspection
that was so vital to the novel's uniqueness. I imagine that it would not be an
easy film to watch. To get a better understanding of the cause of Islamic
fanaticism, it's better to stick with this excellent, thought-provoking novel.
Buy The Attack and read it now!
Buy The Attack and read it now!
Originally published at The Times of Israel.
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