(CHAPTER X I I I )
MEDINAT YISRAEL IS BORN
"It is because America has such an abundance of
everything that I have come. I shall not be missed.
Here they need me. I have come to help, to build a
new country."
"Many of my . . . friends have died here. I cannot desert them. . . . Israel, their graveyard, will
become my new home, my country. Every dead
friend I shall try to replace with a living baby."
American Pioneers in Israel
E-M DAY—End-of-Mandate Day—dawned as lovely a morning as man could have wanted. Moustafa was stirring. So were
a score of Arabs on cots and mats. I wanted to be with the
Jews on the first day of the new Jewish State—to see history
being made in the New City of Jerusalem. All the American
reporters were there; our Consulate was there; and there I
ought to be. It was time for me to take leave of the Arabs
with whom I had shared experiences so long. I took a last look
at Moustafa—in the same suit he had lived in and slept in
and fought in. He was anything but handsome, or neat about
himself, but I loved him as a friend. Not for his views but for
what he was: honest, rugged, simple. He had proved himself
staunchly loyal and understanding, and had saved my life time
and again. Should I disclose my plans? If I did, I knew he'd
stop me. I did not want to fight Moustafa.