The Haj - Leon Uris [193]
Instead, Abdullah ordered parades in the major West Bank cities. He massed his supporters and lieutenants to make certain the Palestinians erupted in a spontaneous show of support.
The Allenby Bridge rumbled and buckled under the hooves of his Bedouin camel corps and horses of the desert police. The Legion poured over the river in Land-Rovers and armored personnel carriers and tanks. Infantry and the bands were trucked over. They dispersed in battalion strength to Hebron, Bethlehem, Jericho, Nablus, and Ramallah.
East Jerusalem was avoided in fear of a Jewish military reaction. Abdullah had not kept the terms of the truce and continued to refuse to allow the Jews access to the Western Wall, their holiest site. He did not wish to risk provoking the Jews into throwing him out.
On the great day of the celebration, everyone had been rousted from the camps and cities into the main streets, where banners, flags, and garlands awaited our saviors, the almighty Jordanians.
Father fumed his way down to Jericho with me, as usual, at his right-hand side, a step behind him. We went atop Professor Doctor Nuri Mudhil’s building, where we would have a perfect view over the procession.
The parade was led by the king’s own elegant band, which had played concerts for us when we were in Amman. The ‘Colonel Bogey’ March incongruously filled the air of ancient Jericho. Platoons of armored carriers bearing Legion warriors were followed by batteries of artillery and a tank battalion that shook the buildings and drowned out the music with their mighty roars. Overhead airplanes in elements of threes zipped down at low level.
Now we could hear the honking of the camels ridden by the desert police who patrolled Jordan’s vast sand-lands along its border with Saudi Arabia. The soldiers swayed arrogantly atop their lofty perches. As fast as one could say ‘Allah is great,’ the street in front of the camel corps was filled with dozens of youths wearing the orange headbands of the Avenging Leopards. In the following seconds, they unleashed a devastating barrage of stones at the camels and their riders, then fled into the crowd.
One of the camels fell to its knees, dumping its rider, and several others bolted in confusion. They broke into an uncontrolled gallop and plunged into the crowd, grinding onlookers underfoot, scattering the rest, then smashing into peddlers’ stalls. There was shrieking, and some shots. The crowd dispersed in panic while the Jordanians organized themselves furiously and bore down on the place of the ambush. Soldiers leaped out of their vehicles, bashing madly with their rifle butts at anyone near them. More shots. A woman fell in the street and was very still.
That night we huddled about the radio and dialed East Jerusalem and Amman, but there was not a word about the incident. We tried Radio Damascus and Cairo. All we were told was that there was a news blackout over the entire West Bank.
The next morning still brought no mention in the newspapers, but as the day wore on we learned that the Jordanian troops had also been stoned in Ramallah and Nablus and that six people had been killed.
The camp was ablaze with conversation as many of the ardent Abdullah supporters began to look around, thinking of new alliances. There was a constant pilgrimage to our hovel, with one sheik after another now pledging loyalty to Father. He accepted their homage with a well-disguised cynicism.
Jamil’s eyes alone bore the tale that his generation was, in fact, the generation of liberation. All right, Father, his expression said, take glory in the victory but remember who struck the blow.
When the grovelers were gone Father took me aside, excitedly. ‘The time has come for us to take our destiny into our own hands,’ he said with a power I had not seen from him since the exile. ‘You will travel by bus tomorrow to Ramallah, to the Birah Camp, where you will find Charles Maan.