Selected Detective
IF ONLY

So much “LAUJ” that might be able to save his father's life,

Had they not gone to Jerusalem to celebrate his fifteenth birthday;

If only they had come home early;

If only they had not diverted the journey to the camp;

If only the Israeli army had been thrown somewhere. Above everything, though,

If only his father wasn't that good.

Finally, it was what killed him, as the baseball bat struck that he was so considerate of others, that he was a man who could do nothing but help.

The one who is lacking will pass and live.

But his father was no less, and for that reason he had been struck. They found a soldier on the side of the road on the outskirts of Jabaliya refugee camp late at night, on their way home from lunch to celebrate his birthday at the Jerusalem hotel, and switched from military outposts to Gaza City streets to take something from his father's surgical room at the camp center. Their car lights caught a figure in the darkness and, while slowing down the car, they found a young man half-naked and unconscious, his face so badly injured that he was barely recognizable as a human. I stopped, went out and approached him.

“Still alive?” ask mother.

Father nodded.

“People Israel?” Nod again.

“Christ.” The First Intifada is on the cusp and anti-Israeli feelings are so strong, especially in the push from the Gaza Restrictions, where the uprising broke out for the first time in December. How and when the soldier ended up on the side of the road is uncertain. What is clear is that to help him now, in this place, would be very dangerous.The Palestinians who give aid to Israel are hated as strongly as the hatred against Israel itself. Even more.

“Leave him,” says Layla.

“Jews don't care about us. Why should we take care of them anyway?” His father shook his head.

“I'm a doctor, Layla. I can't leave someone dead on the street like a dog. Whoever he is.”

“Hold his hand, Layla,” his father gave the order.

“Try giving her strength.” He did what his father said.

This was the first time he touched an Israelite. After that, when they had taken care of him as much as they could, they wrapped the soldier in a warm cloth, put him back in the car and took him out of the camp, he said, with the intention of lowering it again at one of the military guard posts that make the road narrow.

They had just moved a hundred meters away, when, irritatingly, two units of cars appeared out of nowhere, being by their side, forcing them to pull over.

“Oh, God,” mom Layla whispers.

“Oh Lord, help us!” Who was that man, what faction, how did they know about his father's good reputation and so quickly, Layla never knew the answer.

The only thing he remembered, suddenly the crowd was already swarming in their car, their faces hidden behind keffiyeh, the sound of a gun as they shot the Israeli at close range through an open window, and then his father pulled out, shouting Radar! A’mee

“Traitors! Foot hand!” His mother tried to follow, but they slammed the car door into his head, rendering him unconscious.

They beat his father very viciously and repeatedly, while the crowd together watched, many of them his patients. But no one tried to help, none of them offered, not even the lightest protest.

They then handcuff Layla's father's hands on her back and pull her out onto the sandy soil surrounding the campground. Layla chases after them, weeping wailing shrieks and pleading for her father to stay alive, but to no avail. They push him into the valley, a baseball bat appears out of nowhere and is smashed into the back of the father's head, and put his father's face to the ground. The next three blows were smashed, opening his skull like a watermelon, before, as quickly as they came, the men left, leaving Layla crawling and hugging his father's shattered body in his arms, his black hair was covered in his father's blood. The howls of stray dogs were heard in the distance.

God, dad! God, my poor father!

After the incident that night, Layla never spoke to anyone, not even her own mother. The next day, after his father's burial, he immediately picked up the scissors and cut his hair, unable to bear the feeling of his father's blood appearing to be alive no matter how many times he washed it. Two days after that he and his mother packed up and left Palestine for good, returning to England to build their home with Layla's grandparents, which has a large inn in the countryside on the outskirts of Cambridge. He stayed there for four years before, which frightened his mother, he decided to return.

“But, why?” mother's crying.

“For God's sake, Layla! After what happened? After what they did? How can?”

He cannot explain, other than that he must put things right, forgive the past and start a new beginning. In that respect, which he has been and is doing ever since.