The Woman From Tantoura by Radwa Ashour Read Free Book Online

of them returned at mealtime; the food stayed as it was, we did not dish it out or eat. In the village there was a strange silence that made the call to prayer seem nearer and clearer, when it rose at the time for prayer. It was interrupted only by the whispering of the sea, the neighing of a horse or the bleating of a lamb.
    In the evening the news was confirmed. It was no longer a matter of apprehensions or expectations but a written statement signed by the leaders of the Jews and announced by Ben-Gurion at exactly four o’clock in the afternoon, amid a gathering in Tel Aviv that was recorded by photographers and broadcast by Hagana Radio and greeted by the settlers with dancing in the street. It was said that the statement would be in force beginning with the first minute after midnight, when the British Mandate ended and they would take its place in governing Palestine. The country would become a state for the Jews and its name would become Israel.
    All I remember from that evening is the silence.
    But at noon the next day we heard gunshots and uproar, voices cutting across each other. Wisal and I ran to hear the news. All the people of the town were telling each other what the radio had broadcast, repeating the broadcast as if every one of them, young or old, had turned into a moving radio, connected by a wire to the radio playing in the headman’s house, and to the ears of the men gathered around it. Everyone was saying it, everyone was repeating it and adding to it. Even the young men in the guard posts suddenly appeared to hear the details. As for the ones who shot off their rifles in the air, they had been forced to stop after the older men reprimanded them for wasting ammunition; they were still standing there, not knowing what to do with themselves. I saw one of them running in a back street, then he jumped and yelled at the topof his voice “Wiiiiii,” spinning around like a crazy man. Another was turning somersaults in the air, his head down and his feet up, and a second later he would be standing on his feet again like the rest of God’s creatures.
    We returned to the house. Our mothers already knew about it. We repeated to them some of what we had heard: “At dawn today the Arab armies entered Palestine. Egypt crossed at Rafah and al-Awja. Syria came in from south of Lake Tiberias, the Sea of Galilee. The Lebanese were at Ras al-Naqura. The army of Jordan crossed over the Sheikh Hussein Bridge and the Damia Bridge. The Iraqi army had arrived at the Majami Bridge, and… .”
    Wisal cut me off: “And the Egyptian planes shelled Tel Aviv. Twice.”
    My mother suddenly shouted, “God protect them. God give them victory. God keep them from harm. God bless them and their families, God raise their banner in victory and bring them back safe and sound.”
    Then she looked at Wisal’s mother, who was crying, “Pray with me, you are a good woman and are raising orphans, and your prayers will be answered.”
    It looked as if the sudden, intense prayer was going to interrupt the news that we wanted to broadcast in its entirety. I cut in: “Listen to all the news first and pray later!”
    Wisal laughed, and said, “The Syrian forces are shelling Samakh and two settlements nearby, one of them a big settlement.”
    Her mother asked, “Where is this Samakh? And Majami Bridge and the other bridges you mentioned?”
    Wisal said that she didn’t know, and I said I would ask my brothers. Wisal went back to finishing the newscast: “The Iraqi forces entered the Rutenberg power station and occupied it, and took prisoner forty Jews who were working on the project.”
    My mother asked, “You mean, when they first entered they went right to the power station? By God, good for them! How could they, didn’t the Jews land a blow as they were getting near the station?”
    “The station is on the other side of the border. In Jordan. The Iraqi forces occupied the station and then they crossed the border.”
    “In Jordan?”