Burnt Arabs

Gerda Cohen

Samaria My cousin Patricia, unbelievably, had gone to live in a new settlement bang in the middle of Occupied Territory. She had never shown the least interest in pioneering. Her parents, who live in Hove, disapproved. Bred on genteel home coun- ties Judaism, the family felt perplexed. The Palestine Liberation Organisation, for its part, had long ago proclaimed the death penalty for any Arab selling land to a Jew: Conversely, only since Begin assumed power have Jews been permitted to buy land in Occupied Territory. Then, of course, her particular new settlement was headline stuff: the Israel Supreme Court held back its start for a year, with acid rec- titude, until the military government con- fiscated land for security reasons, compen- sated Arab owners and protected the first settlers. Among them, Patricia.

`Meet you at Tel Aviv bus station,' she told me airily over the telephone. 'Nahum has the Peugeot so we'll have to go by smel- ly old bus. Commuter service — they pre- tend housewives don't exist.'

It sounded like Slough. 'Should I bring a gun?' She laughed. 'Bring your woollies, dear, it's quite nippy up here, commanding height you know, for security reasons.' Tel Aviv bus station has more litter than Liver- pool, without the jokes. I felt relief when Patricia whizzed in, wearing an Afghan knit, mohair and lurex, like a crossbred mountain goat. As our bus yoicked through the dreary porridge-colour tenements of Tel Aviv, strewn with Coke cans and garbage and emaciated cats, Patricia said: 'That's why we moved to Ariel; lots of space for the children, clean, air, and garden for me. Nahum commutes to the office in half an hour. Trouble is, the neighbours ...' Naively I assumed she meant the oppressed Arabs. 'Oh no, I mean the Russians. They're Israeli really, but they're so

ideological.'

A friend sitting behind took up this plaint: 'For them, it could be Leningrad. Our neighbours came in 1973 and already — already! — they've grabbed the jobs. Chairman of this, president of that ...' Another woman joined in, viciously jabb- ing her cigarette into the vinyl seat: 'Sure they'll tell you, we moved for ideology. Some joke! They moved like us, to get sub-

sidised housing away from the slums.'

One could see their point. The dingy purlieus of Petah Tiqwa abruptly gave waY to olive groves, small rocky pastures where sheep tore at thin vivid grass. Incredibly bright oxalis yellowed the verge; almonds In blossom, frail as breath, and the road steadily climbing. Up it went, to the ashen hills of Samaria. Where was the frontier? People shrugged, incurious. One could be driving from Ruislip to the Green Belt. on- ly on maps in the foreign press will you find that erstwhile 'Green line' boundary of the West Bank.

Soon the foetid city air sharpens to a sword-edge. Up curves the road, past great humps of calcined hill, bare as gravestone. Wadis wind far below, creased and waterless. It is a drought year, aching for the rains. Where the humped hills are cleft, Arab villages lie white as bone. 'Afraid our place doesn't fit in,' said Patricia, apologetic; Ariel appeared high up, rows of slightly discoloured dentures clamped onto the bare terrain. 'They're pre-cast concrete.'

Patricia rushed to make China tea. Her own modular cube was a home of unpreten- tious warmth. 'There isn't room to swing a cat, so we've got a dog.' Everyone ap- parently owns a dog, an alsatian lounging on the lawn among daffodils and garden furniture. You had to look at the view, the hard, ashen hills of Samaria, to recall it was not Denham. 'The next settlement does have a cricket team.'

Nahum came home for dinner, a calm, kindly man with precise British Mandate English. Their children exhibit prep school behaviour quite untypical of Israeli youth. One reason for moving here: immigrants from North Africa have ruined schooling in town.' To ensure that Ariel remains a select neighbourhood, prospective residents must own a saleable property, a good job and few children. 'Otherwise', pointed out a bus driver who had recently moved in, 'it would degenerate into a "development area" full of Moroccans living on relief.'

I was disappointed that Ariel had no link with Shakespeare. General Ariel Sharon, the Defence Minister, was even more piqued to learn it had not been named in his honour. The Hebrew word means 'Lion of God'. He above all Israeli politicians had pushed for colonising land won by war. 'Okay, so he's a hero,' conceded the bus driver, 'a hero gone to fat. We don't love Arik Sharon.' Due to his policy, dozens of similar villages have sprung up within commuter reach of Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. No risk of this Occupied Territory ever being handed back on a plate like Sinai. Land speculation has forced up Prices. 'You pay millions of shekels for a bit of rock.'

But how, in view of the PLO death penal- tY,,could this happen? "Burnt" Arab,' said Nahum coolly, 'they sell through a "burnt" Arab who has already been condemned to death by the PLO or the Jordan govern- ment.' Every deal involves a chain of dealers. Burnt Arabs, apparently, are abun- dant and anonymous. All this took some believing, so I talked to other residents. Jonathan Dauber, once a refugee, now a designer of military aircraft; sardonic yet awkwardly honest. 'My conscience is clear. Arabs are glad to sell, many became pro- fiteers.' And what about autonomy for the Palestinians? Jonathan uncurled his bony hands: 'What about autonomy for Northern Ireland?' he asks, and does not expect an answer. 'Politicians talk . ' Indeed, they were talking then in Cairo. Egypt must put uP a show of interest in Palestinian autonomy, in order to regain the trust of other Arab states. 'Once Egypt has regained Sinai, we shall hear less talk of Palestine.'

After dinner we stay up, dead tired, to watch Brideshead Revisited. The entire Population of Israel and Jordan stays up to watch Brideshead, put out by Jerusalem and Amman around midnight. Prime time is reserved for propaganda by both stations. Israel television is even more boring than French TV (if that can be credited); Talmud chat alternating with obsequious ministerial cant. Sub-titles in Hebrew obliterated Lord Marchmain. Early next morning in bright razor air, the winter sun cauterising Samaria to limestone ash, a bull-dozer is already at work, tearing out almond trees. Their pale florets flutter like paper-chains left over from a children's party. 'We're razing the Orchard for factory units. Military industry will come here soon.' The foreman is a great fellow who put me in mind of some Yob from Fiddler on the Roof. His Hebrew grated. 'The local Arabs are useless on a building site.' He jerked a thumb at the minaret yonder: 'They're useless peasants. I

bring my blokes every day from Nazareth.' His boar nostrils dark with hair, his hairy forearms too, he was almost, perish the thought, a Nazi cartoon of a swag-bellied Jew. Than I saw the crucifix at his throat. From Nazareth? 'Sure, I bring 50 blokes here at six on the dot' Their vans were drawn up alongside the new modular housing. Pre-cast walls and floors, made near Nazareth, drop into place by crane. 'We do the skilled work plaster, electrics, plumbing. We're Arabs,' he said with a huge lewd laugh, eyeing me up and down. 'Are you English?' He added that my Hebrew did sound odd. All his workmen were Israeli Arabs (some of the 600,000) apart from one: 'He's the best labourer I've got, from Jenin. Impudent sod, can he lay tiles.' The foreman yelled

him over, 'Ibrahim, you mother's 1' The man from Jenin stood out, bold impudent eyes and bare shoulders burnt brick red. He had saved up money from working in Saudi Arabia, and built himself a posh villa in Jenin, a West Bank town noted for ter- rorism. The foreman said with relish, `Ibrahim hates Jews, don't you Ibrahim?' The man flashed a satanic gold grin. 'He'd rather work in Arabia but they lock up the women!' Together we walk past the felled silver almond boughs to admire this cham- pion from Jenin laying floor tiles. 'Our next job is up the road, Immanuel, 600 units for orthodox Jews.' The foreman landed Ibrahim a friendly punch: 'You and your Palestine .. .