Chapter 75
TEL AVIV, ISRAEL
MR. Friedman? You have a call.”
Friedman looked up from his desk to see his assistant, Miriam, standing in the doorway.
Somehow, he hadn’t heard her approach. It was not because the report he was marking up was particularly interesting.
In truth, his thoughts were kilometers away from his desk.
About seventy kilometers, to be precise.
The distance from his Mossad office in Tel Aviv to the security situation room located in the prime minister’s office complex in Jerusalem.
“Please, put it through,” Friedman said.
He realized as the words left his mouth that he hadn’t even asked who was on the other line, but he was too embarrassed to inquire now.
Not at his slipup. No, Friedman was embarrassed about the reason behind it.
His nation had launched an audacious operation to safeguard its citizenry against a real and present danger.
An operation the PM had undertaken largely on his say-so.
But because Friedman had made a recommendation contrary to his boss’s wishes, he had been banished here, while Rothenberger watched the operation unfold in real time with the PM.
Miriam was a permanent fixture in the Operations Directorate.
The pity on her face suggested that she knew what was going on as well as he did.
“Of course, sir.”
Miriam paused in the door as if debating whether to say something more. Then she gave him a wan smile and left.
For this bit of grace Friedman was thankful.
He didn’t think he was up to receiving a pep talk from his secretary.
The phone buzzed and Friedman perked up.
It was the red handset. The secure one. Maybe Rothenberger had experienced a change of heart or perhaps the PM had inquired as to his whereabouts.
Friedman grabbed the phone thinking that perhaps this was what Moses had felt when God had finally ended his forty-year exile in the Midian wilderness.
“Friedman.”
“We need to talk.”
It was not Rothenberger, the PM, or a staff lackey. Nor was it God. In fact, the voice was not male at all. Or even Israeli.
A woman was on the line.
An American woman.
“Who is this?” Friedman said, feeling every bit the fool.
“I’ll give you a hint—the last time we spoke you told me to scurry back to my director. Ring a bell?”
It did.
“Yes, Miss…”
“Don’t remember my name?”
“It’s been a very long day.”
“It could have been much longer. Our forces almost killed each other in Iraq.”
Friedman straightened in his chair. “What do you mean?”
“I guess the junior, inexperienced person knows something the senior spy does not. But that makes sense, since you’re sitting in Tel Aviv rather than Jerusalem.”
Friedman didn’t hate Americans. Per se. But he might have to make an exception for this one.
It didn’t help that he couldn’t for the life of him remember the young woman’s name.
He had a sense of the word and knew that it brought to mind a U.S.
president. Was her surname Johnson? Carter?
“If you could please clarify those comments, Miss…”
“You can call me Esther because I think we might both be in our respective positions for such a time as this. Your aircraft almost attacked my commandos as they were assaulting the chemical weapons convoy.”
Friedman rubbed his forehead, which seemed to be growing larger by the day. “Was anyone killed?”
“Thankfully not, but we have a problem. The convoy wasn’t carrying chemical weapons.”
Friedman frowned. “Maybe the intelligence was wrong.”
“Or maybe it was a decoy.”
Friedman’s eyes went to the map of the Middle East that occupied an entire wall of his office. “You think the convoy used the Trebil border crossing to the south instead of Al Waleed?”
“We know it did not.”
“Know is a very strong word.”
“We had eyes on the interchange between Highways 1, 10, and 11. No convoy traveled southwest to the Trebil crossing.”
Friedman got up and crossed the room to stand in front of the map. His eyes traveled the length of the laminated surface, trying to make sense of the information the American had just relayed. “You are sure there was a second convoy?”
“Positive. An asset confirmed that it was in Ramadi three hours ago.”
Friedman did the math to convert the elapsed time into kilometers the convoy could have traveled. “You think the actual convoy could have driven north from Ramadi instead and used the border crossing by Qa’im?”
“It went somewhere. I think it’s in your best interest to help us find it.”
The American had a point, but he wasn’t willing to concede it just yet. “How?”
“At our sit-down, you said you had an asset in the DGS. Use them.”
He had said that, hadn’t he?
Friedman cleared his throat. “That was a… mistruth. We have an asset, but he’s in Syria, not Iraq.
He’s also not DGS. He gathers reporting from Iraqi and Syrian truckers who smuggle black market and sanctions-probhibited goods across the border.
The asset obtained information from an Iraqi smuggler who had been coerced by the DGS into integrating a military convoy with his own and helping them cross the border. ”
“How did you know that this convoy was moving?”
“The smuggler’s son made contact with our asset. Based on this information, we used a persistent ISR platform to identify a convoy that was headed west toward Al Waleed and matched the son’s description.”
“Can you use your asset to check with his sub-assets to see if the convoy used one of the northern border crossings?”
“Yes, but I will instruct him to make his inquiries with caution.”
“Why?”
“Because finding the convoy is not worth losing my asset.” Friedman verified the distances on the map a final time, but his conclusion was the same.
The math didn’t lie. “The border crossing near Qa’im is only about two hundred kilometers northwest of Ramadi.
If your convoy went north, it’s already in Syria. ”
A buzzing sounded from the phone. Turning, Friedman saw the flashing light that indicated that Miriam had placed a call on hold for him. He moved back to his desk to see which line was active.
It was the prime minister.
“And if the convoy didn’t go north?”
“Then it probably doesn’t exist,” Friedman said.
“Our asset says it does.”
“Then feel free to give him a call. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have other matters to attend to.
” Friedman hung up without giving Esther a chance to respond.
If Americans could be counted on to do anything, it was to fuck things up in his corner of the world.
Squaring his shoulders, he took a deep breath and then stabbed the flashing button.
“Yes, Mr. Prime Minister?”