The Last Days

  times he would sidle up to the Islamic radicals and encourage their actions.

  At other times, when he had power and was worried the Islamists were

  gaining too much power at his expense, he’d clamp down on them, impris

  oning hundreds of Hamas and Islamic Jihad radicals and even tipping off

  the Israelis and Americans about the whereabouts of wanted terrorists.

  At best, Dahlan’s record was schizophrenic, McCoy observed. A few years

  before, he was the alleged mastermind behind the bombing of an Israeli bus

  in Gush Katif and then another bloody series of attacks against Israelis in

  Gush Katif and Netzarim a month later. A few months later, Dahlan and

  his deputy, Rashid Abu Shabak, were believed to be behind a series of mortar

  attacks against Israelis. Then it was rocket attacks against Israeli buses. In

  one, an American citizen and three kids had their legs blown off.

  “Back at CIA headquarters, we’ve actually got tapes of intercepted telephone calls where Dahlan is ordering rocket and other terrorist attacks. The

  Iraelis have their own tapes. Eventually, the Israelis had enough,” McCoy

  explained. “They realized they’d made a mistake to keep jailing Dahlan and

  then letting him go. So they turned up the heat. Israel tried to take him out,

  but they missed.”

  “OK, tell me about Rajoub,” the president continued. McCoy proceeded to give a brief profile of the longtime chief of Palestin ian security forces in the West Bank. Essentially, she began, Colonel Jibril Rajoub was Dahlan’s counterpart, but he was responsible for a much larger swath of territory and thus potentially more powerful. Paunchy, dark skinned, baIding, and with a small mustache, Rajoub hardly looked like a mafia boss, But he was not to be underestimated.

  Vulgar, crude, and blunt, he had a ferocious temper—frequently on display—and he instilled fear in the hearts of those who lived under his rule. He brazenly took on Palestinian rivals. He was known for organizing bloody attacks on Israeli civilians. He was even known to torture journalists who wrote stories criticizing him. Some on the West Bank actually privately referred to him as the “Palestinian Saddam.”

  Rajoub was born in 1953 on the West Bank, in a little town near Hebron. At age seventeen, Rajoub—a rising young commando and recruiter in Arafat’s Fatah—was captured by the IDF, tried in an Israeli military court, and sentenced to life in prison for throwing grenades at Israeli soldiers. Like Dahlan, Rajoub learned Hebrew in prison and English from television. Released in May of 1985 during a prisoner exchange between Israel and the PLO, Rajoub again became active in terrorist operations against the Israelis, becoming a key commander during the first intifada, which erupted in December of 1987. Like Dahlan, Rajoub was also eventually expelled by the Israelis, in his case to Lebanon in 1988. And also like Dahlan, Rajoub slipped back into the West Bank, and eventually was targeted by the IDF for assassination. Three Israeli mortars landed on Rajoub’s home one night, but he narrowly escaped, unharmed.

  Rajoub’s relationship with Arafat was also complicated, McCoy explained. He’d once been fired by Arafat, and they’d had numerous behind-the-scenes run-ins. The difference with Dahlan was that Rajoub wasn’t so open in public about his interest in succeeding Arafat. But his relationship with the Islamic radical groups was probably just as tenuous as Dahlan’s because at times he’d fought against them to keep them from gaining too much power, while at other times he’d made common cause with Hamas and Islamic Jihad to strengthen his political base.

  On May 27, 1998, for example, Rajoub told an Al Jazeera television reporter that, “We view Hamas as part of the national and Islamic liberation movement. … At the top of my list [to defeat] is the occupation and not Hamas. We are not interested in arrests.”

  Time after time, Rajoub had been quoted supporting an armed campaign of terror against the Israelis. Once, during a lecture at Bethlehem University, Rajoub told a crowd of students, “We sanctify the weapons found in the possession of the national factions which are directed against the occupation. … If there are those who oppose the agreement with Israel, the gates are open to them to intensify the armed struggle.” Another time, he told a reporter that the only way for Palestinian terrorism to go away was for the Israeli prime minister “to remove all the settlers from the West Bank and

  Gaza and transfer them to hell,” and then warned that he and his forces would “distribute weapons to the Palestinian residents and return to the armed struggle.”

  “If someone contacted this guy and asked him to stand down his forces for the sake of peace, would he listen?” the president asked. “Would he do

  “Not likely,” McCoy said bluntly. “He’s got too much invested to go down without a fight. And there’s no way he’s going to let Mohammed Dahlan climb to the top of the greasy pole and rule in Arafat’s place. He thinks Dahlan is a playboy, not a serious player. There’s no way he’s going to bow down to and kiss Dahlan’s ring—and there’s no way he’s going to kiss yours either, Mr. President.”

  The president bombarded McCoy with questions.

  Bennett was impressed with her command of information. So were Ziegler and the rest of the NSC. As far as Bennett could tell, neither Mohammed Dahlan nor Jibril Rajoub sounded like men with whom the U.S. could work, Neither sounded like men inclined to establish the kind of peace treaty for which he’d been sent to achieve. But if there was any hope of salvaging the peace process at all, they had to find somebody they could work with. And then what? Would the U.S. really be in a position to take sides? To influence who seized control and who didn’t? To choose the next Palestinian leader in the midst of a civil war? The whole thing seemed preposterous. But something inside the president drove him to keep looking, and for this Bennett was grateful.

  McCoy moved to the next name on the list.

  Marwan Bin Khatib Barghouti was another “son” of Arafat fighting vi ciously for control, another Fatah member long imprisoned by the Israelis, and then, almost inexplicably, released to cause more death and destruction, Born in 1959, Barghouti grew up initially under Jordanian occupation, and was only eight years old when the Israelis won the Six Day War and seized control of the West Bank and Gaza.

  Barghouti was a natural leader at an early age. At Bir Zeit University, a hotbed of Palestinian radicalism, he quickly emerged as student council pres ident, became active in Arafat’s youth militia and helped organize terrorist attacks against Israel during the first intifada, from 1987 through 1992. Then he, too, was arrested, tried, and convicted, and spent seven years behind bars

  in an Israeli prison before being deported. There he also learned Hebrew, and developed the reputation among young Palestinian militants as the leader of a new and rising generation.

  In 1989, McCoy noted, though he wasn’t even in the West Bank or Gaza, Barghouti became the youngest member ever elected to the Fatah Revolutionary Council. He came back to the West Bank in 1994, and went on to be elected from Ramallah as a representative to the Palestinian Legislature Council in 1996.

  Along the way, Barghouti emerged as the Secretary General of Fatah, rejected the Oslo peace accords between Israel and Yasser Arafat, and became the head of the Tanzim, an armed youth faction of Arafat’s political party. In that capacity, he began stockpiling German MP-5 submachine guns via Jordan and Egypt, building a network of commandos, and accruing a budget of more than $2 million. He also helped create and lead the Al-Aqsa Martyr’s Brigades, one of the most dangerous and radical of the Fatah factions, responsible for many of the suicide bombings that killed Israeli and American civilians from 2000 onward.

  McCoy whispered something to Ziegler, who then opened up a file cabinet, pulled out a floppy disk, and loaded it into the computer on his desk. A moment later, McCoy was directing the president and the NSC principals to a series of Power Point slides on a large screen monitor in the Situation Room.

&nbsp
; McCoy began at the top, reading a quote by Abdel Bari Atwan, editor of the Arab language Al-Quds newspaper: “Marwan Barghouti has always identified with the grass roots rather than the [Arafat] leadership… . His star really came into it its ascendancy after he spoke out against the Palestinian Authority leadership.”

  “That, Mr. President, is what makes Barghouti a potential successor to Arafat,” said McCoy. “He’s got a very strong grassroots network of fighters. He’s willing to do anything to keep and maintain power. And he’s fearless— he and his followers absolutely don’t care if they live or die. They’re not quite as committed as the devoutly religious Islamic fighters. But they’re close. They’re very well organized and, from what my guys can tell, they’re moving into the streets and into the battle against Dahlan and Rajoub’s forces with a vengeance.”

  McCoy flashed more Power Point images on the screen, all excerpts from Barghouti’s thick CIA dossier. Much of the material was obtained from the Mossad and Shin Bet and it was a chilling read.

  Slide 37: “On April 14, 2002 an IDF force in Ramallah arrested Marwan Barghouti, head of the Fatah supreme committee in the West Bank and

  :leader of the military wing of the Al-Aqsa [Martyrs] Brigades, which between September 2000 and April 2002 carried out thousands of terror attacks against Israel, including suicide bombings.”

  McCoy nodded to Ziegler. He pushed a button and the image changed. Slide 38: “Marwan Barghouti served as Secretary General of Fatah in Ju dea, Samaria, and Gaza, a member of the Palestinian legislature, head of the Tanzim, and the founder of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which has carried

  out a large number of deadly terrorist attacks killing scores of Israelis and wounding hundreds. In the framework of his activities, he has received large amounts of funds from different sources both inside and outside Israel, Among these sources is the Palestinian Authority. The specific allocations of these funds were authorized by the actual signature of Yasser Arafat. These funds were used by Marwan Barghouti to finance many activities carried out by terror cells in the West Bank.”

  McCoy had Ziegler advance the image to the next slide, but this time she stayed quiet. Everyone read the material silently. The evidence, a partial list of “the more heinous terror attacks” for which the Israelis believed Marwan Barghouti was implicated, spoke for itself.

  January 17, 2002—the shooting attack during a bat mitzvah celebration at a banquet hall in Hadera. Six Israelis were killed in this attack, twenty-six were injured.

  January 22, 2002—the shooting spree on Jaffa Street in Jerusalem. Two Isrelis were killed, thirty-seven wounded.

  February 25, 2002—the shooting attack in the Jerusalem residential neigh borhood of Neve Ya’acov. One Israeli policewoman was killed, nine Israelis were wounded.

  February 27, 2002—the murder of an Israeli at a coffee factory in the Atarot industrial zone of Jerusalem.

  February 27, 2002—the suicide attack perpetrated by Daryan Abu Aysha at the Maccabim checkpoint in which two policeman were injured, March 5, 2002—the shooting spree at the Tel Aviv Seafood restaurant, Three Israelis were killed, thirty-one wounded, March 8, 2002—a suicide terrorist was killed in Daheat el Barid as he

  was on his way to carry out an attack in Jerusalem.

  March 27, 2002—the interception of an ambulance and the confiscation of an explosive belt that was being smuggled from Samaria into Barghouti’s terrorist infrastructure in Ramallah.

  The president closed his eyes. The list of horrors went on for pages. But he couldn’t take any more. What if one of these thugs actually ended up in power? What if he let it happen?

  He called an end to the meeting. They’d been going for more than an hour. Now he needed time to think, and Bennett and McCoy needed time to rest. He ordered both of them, and Ziegler, to call it a night. They’d all regroup at 9:00 A.M. Wednesday, Washington time.

  Ten minutes later, Bennett was out cold.

  It came without warning.

  One minute the Hotel Baghdad was standing. The next minute, it was

  not

  The attack came at precisely 4:49 A.M. local time. Without warning, the five-story structure above Gaza Station began to implode, rocked by three massive explosions and an eighteen-hundred-degree firestorm, The east face came down first, followed by the south portico. Then, just a few seconds later, the rest of the building came down in a deafening roar of shattering glass and disintegrating concrete. The street filled with smoke, Flames shot out from every crevice, and thick clouds of smoke and ash began rising into the night sky.

  Bennett was thrown to the floor. Covering his head with his arms, he desperately tried to shield himself from chunks of ceiling crashing down all around him. Everything in the room was shaking violently. He could hear the pipes in the bathroom being ripped through the tiles and erupting into a ceaseless spray of water. The lights flickered, sparked and then all shorted out, and then several more explosions rocked the so-called safe house, Disoriented and half-asleep, Bennett was overtaken by an almost paralyz ing sense of fear. His thoughts were racing. He tried to make sense of what was happening around him—on his stomach now, coughing, gagging, strug gling to fill his lungs with anything but the hot, toxic gases rapidly filling the room. There’d been three successive detonations, followed by two or three more. It was a devastating surprise attack. But by whom? Was it a car bomb? CouId that be causing so much destruction so quickly? That might explain the first explosion, but what about the others? Missile attacks? Mortar rounds?

  RPGs? From where? Who was firing at them? Who knew they were there?

  He knew the questions had to wait, but more kept pouring in. Where was McCoy? Was she safe? What about Galishnikov and Sa’id? Had they told anyone where they were? How could they have? They didn’t know. Not precisely. He needed to get his team out of there alive. But how? And where would they go? The minute they surfaced outside—assuming they could find a way out of the rubble, through the raging fires and the suffocating smoke— weren’t they likely to get cut down in a hail of machine-gun fire?

  The explosions stopped. Debris stopped falling. The temperatures were spiking quickly and it was getting more and more difficult to breathe.

  Bennett crawled his way through the broken glass of the television and shattered mirror and picture frames over to the door. He put the back of his hand against the door, just like his father had taught him when they’d stayed in hotels. It was hot—too hot—and he winced in pain and quickly pulled his hand back and blew on it. He could see an orange glow through the cracks in the door frame. The fires had to be close. But he didn’t really have any choice. If he stayed in Ziegler’s room, he was a dead man. That much was certain. He decided right there—he might not make it out of this place, but at least he was going to die trying.

  Bennett took off his right shoe, pulled off his sock, and put it over his left hand. Then, using that hand, he turned the handle and pulled the door opened. A blast of superheated air hit him in the face and he drew back, using the door as a shield. He put his sock and shoe back on and looked around the room. The fires in the hallway provided more than enough visibility to see the destruction that had been wrought all around him. He’d been lucky to survive the initial blasts. It was an oddly comforting thought, but it didn’t last long.

  Suddenly he heard the crackle of automatic gunfire. It was muffled and distant. For a moment, he couldn’t tell if it was above ground or from the other side of the sprawling Gaza Station complex. Either way, a shot of adrenaline coursed through his veins. He had no way of knowing who was shooting at whom. But how was he supposed to defend himself if he had to—when he had to? McCoy always had that 9-mm Beretta with her, usually in her bag. His eyes darted around the room. He didn’t see it. Maybe she had it with her now. He hoped she did. Maybe she was working her way back from wherever she was to him? Then again, maybe she was dead.

  The thought terrified him. She couldn’t be dead. He was falling in love with her. He couldn’t even explain wh
y. Not exactly. She had something he didn’t have, and he had everything. She knew something he didn’t. She was something he wasn’t, and it drew him to her like a magnet. Better yet, she

  loved him. She’d never said it. But she’d never had to. He just knew it. It was instinct, and he had great instincts. That was his job—finding buried treasure—and he’d found it in McCoy.

  Another explosion ripped through the building. Bennett wiped his face,

  It was soaked in sweat, as was his entire body. The temperature in this room

  had to be heading past a hundred degrees. Out in the hallway, it had to be

  fifteen to twenty degrees worse. He was out of time. He couldn’t stay there.

  He needed to make his way down the hall, to the main control room, to

  Galishnikov and Sa’id’s room. He needed to find McCoy, to make sure she

  was safe, to get them all out of there, come what may.

  First, though, he moved to Ziegler’s desk. The heat was unbearable. The

  floor was rapidly filling with water from the shattered pipes in the bathroom.

  He tore open the desk drawers and began ripping out everything he could

  find. But it wasn’t until the bottom file drawer on the right-hand side that

  he found what he was looking for—two .357 Magnums, locked and loaded,

  Bennett clicked off both safeties, used his shoulder to wipe the sweat off his

  face again, then moved toward the hallway, holding both guns out in front

  of him. His heart was racing. His mouth was dry. His head was pounding

  with question after question. What if he didn’t shoot fast enough? Or worse,

  what if he shot one of his own? v

  He worked his way to the door of the main control room.

  He was on his stomach, on the floor—the only place he could breathe— covered in at least a foot of water. The water was ice cold now and pouring out of a dozen other shattered pipes. But in forty-five minutes to an hour,