350
CAIRO TO DAMASCUS
Apparently satisfied about me, Moustafa began talking
about himself, a subject he enjoyed. He had plenty of money
now and offered to pay for some of the pictures I had taken
of him. "Give it to the poor," I said, which pleased him. He
told me he had been put in charge of a commando unit called
"men of the sabotage."
"My men of the sabotage—fifty of us—and four hundred
other Egyptians advanced on the Jews of Ramat Rachel under a smoke screen. We started at ten in the morning, under
heavy artillery fire. We blasted at the barbed wire and crawled
under it. Then we bravely walked over the mine fields. Seeing
us, the Jews ran by the hundreds. We killed many and threw
their bodies in the fire."
"How many men did you lose?"
"None. Only one was wounded, slightly," Moustafa said as
I listened soberly to his tale of bloodless victory. "The Egyptian flag was waving over Ramat Rachel by eleven o'clock.
We found cows—beautiful, fat cows. We found chickens—
thousands of nice, fat, plump chickens. Every man grabbed
two, ripped off the heads, and roasted them in the fires of the
burning buildings. We ate chickens all day."
"Then what happened?" I asked Moustafa.
"I was still eating chicken when the cowardly Jews attacked.
They caught us by surprise by sneaking up on us at midnight.
The Jews never show themselves in battle until they are on
top of you. They never fight so that you can see them. Cowards! I took one last bite and ordered my men to retreat. But
we will capture the village back again. We will chase the Jew
out of Palestine. . . .
"Insh'allah," for the hundred-and-first time. "Insh'allah,
Moustafa."
"I will report to Colonel Azziz about you now, and also to
the Intelligence chief," Moustafa said, leaving me under the
fig tree, wondering what he meant.
He reappeared soon. "The Colonel wishes you a good welcome. Later you must be cleared by the Intelligence chief."