The Caliphate Read online

  First, regardless of time and place, Islam is Islam, given to the Prophet by Allah and immutable. Any changes are treasonous and constitute apostasy, or takfir.

  “So, I guess that all interpretations over the last thirteen centuries are out the window. And the last thing they want is a discussion over the reliability of this particular version of the Quran as the word of God.”

  “Exactly! Then, if being a good French citizen leads to being a bad Muslim, being a good French citizen is unacceptable. Here is a quote: ‘We are under constant pressure to reform, to modernize, and I can understand this impulse. But the answer is not the modernization of Islam, but rather the Islamization of modern life. Islam is the answer.’”

  Steve was actually paying little attention to the duck with orange trimmings Benjamin had spent hours preparing.

  “Since Islam can’t change, it’s up to us to change? So we should all accept Islam, just like that? Not a lot of flexibility. By the way, ‘Islam is the answer;’ that’s a Muslim Brotherhood slogan.”

  Kella nodded and shifted in her seat.

  “Someone asked about the oppression of women in Islam. His answer was that Islam has actually been in the vanguard of equality for women, that the Quran has raised them to full status. He quoted from a Sura, 33:35. I meant to look it up. Then, and this is why I had to find my notes today, someone else asked ‘If women and men are equal under Islam, would it be all right for women to kill their husbands or fathers if they commit adultery the way that men can commit honor killings upon women suspected of having been unchaste?’”

  “That must have hit home.”

  She had an oyster before continuing.

  “He almost lost it. He was trying to see who had asked the question. He said, ‘you should look at your own society, which debases women by using their bodies to sell cars, to sell anything.’ Frankly, he was scary. Finally, he said that what Westerners call democracy is insulting to Allah and to all Muslims. And then he turned and left the room.”

  “I don’t think I understand why. Do you?”

  “Well, since our laws are man-made and not straight from God, our laws aren’t worth the paper they’re written on. Any law other than God’s is an insult to God. Right? I’m glad that I don’t have to live in his world.”

  Steve took their dinner plates to the kitchen and returned with their desserts.

  “So, how do you like my going away dinner so far?” he asked. “How was the duck?”

  “Memorable. I’ll tell my grandchildren.”

  Between bites of mousse au chocolat, Kella said, “Okay, your turn. What’s your al Khalil story?”

  “Somehow, fine food and wine don’t go together with al Khalil. I’ll make it short.”

  He had another taste of the mousse au chocolat. In spite of the topic, the bitterness of the chocolate and the aftertaste of Cointreau liquor that complemented the duck sauce of the last dish satisfied his taste buds. He put his spoon down.

  “I was a student in Brussels when my father was assigned there at the embassy. He captained the American team in the annual diplomatic tennis tournament and recruited me to be his doubles partner. It turned out that al Khalil was playing for the European team and I played against him. When a point went against him, he almost brained the referee with his racquet. His partner was barely able to stop him.”

  “Same deal I guess,” Kella said. “Western rules, rules that have not come from God, don’t have to be honored. In that setting, Mr. al Khalil was a misfit.”

  “You said it. After the match, trophies were awarded and we had dinner. Al Khalil’s intense stare caused one of the female guests sitting across from him to move to another table. Al Khalil doesn’t know how to behave in the presence of free-range western women. Oh, by the way, our team won.”

  Kella took a sip of her Chateau-Potensac.

  “There’s something I’ve been thinking about all day,” she said.

  Steve gestured with his spoon that she go on.

  “I want to take a break from school and go to Timbuktu to see my relatives. On the other hand, I can’t just pick up and leave ENA. I may have to wait for a vacation or a holiday period when the school is closed. Frankly, I’m having a difficult time making decisions right now.”

  “A change of scenery might do you good. Why don’t you come and visit me in Virginia? I’ll be back there in a week or two after my Moroccan trip. I have an apartment, with a guest room.”

  “Thanks for the offer; it sounds lovely. But I do want to spend some time around Timbuktu where I grew up. My stepparents are off to Tel Aviv and they’re busy settling in. They don’t need me underfoot. Anyway, we’re not going to lose sight of each other, right?”

  They got up from the dining room table and went back to the den where they sat on the sofa. Steve put his glass down on the coffee table, and took Kella’s and put it down next to his. Pushing Vera to the back of his mind, he cupped her chin in his left hand and drew closer. They kissed softly.

  She smiled and said, “I see that free-range Western women don’t scare you.”

  Gradually, they slipped lower on the sofa, but then the doorbell rang. They looked at each other and laughed at the timing of the interruption. Like a software program that is open but not currently in charge of the computer’s operations, part of Steve’s mind had been thinking of Vera the whole evening. The doorbell was a welcome distraction. Was he betraying her? It had been just over a year. Was he being callous by being attracted to Kella? The bell rang again and someone pounded on the door with a hard object. He went downstairs and opened it.

  Two policemen held a woman by each arm. She wore a hijab. Steve thought she looked like many of the women he had seen in St. Denis the day before. The older policeman asked Steve, “Do you know this woman. She said she works here.”

  “You better ask Benjamin. He’s the cook. I’ll get him. One second.”

  Steve turned and knocked on Benjamin’s door.

  “Yes, what is it? How was the dinner?” he smiled proudly.

  “Great, but the police want to talk to you.”

  “Again? Tell them I’m not here.”

  “No, you’d better come,” said Steve, gently pulling him by the arm into the hallway. Benjamin looked toward the open door and exclaimed, “Achoura! That’s her!”

  The police asked Benjamin to come outside and Steve joined them. He noticed several police vehicles with their lights on and engines running in the street. He looked to his left, toward the Bois, and saw that the street was closed off. He assumed it was closed at the other end as well.

  “We arrested this woman before she rang your doorbell. She was acting suspiciously. My men had to restrain her. Here is what she was wearing under her clothes.”

  He led them to one of the vehicles and pointed to the open cargo space of one where one of his men was taking photos of an explosive belt.

  Steve went back upstairs and left Benjamin to the tender mercies of the gendarmes. He explained what was going on to Kella.

  “Like you said,” she replied, “these people are serious. I hope your friend Mr. Coogan is all right. Well, I think better go home. I’ll call a taxi.”

  She made the call, and as she gathered her coat and purse she said, “Ever since my father’s reception, ever since I met you, I’ve been on a roller coaster. Going back to school and normal life in Paris is going to be a relief, and a bore.”

  She smiled.

  “I don’t know if I can return to normal. Faridah’s death has changed everything. I’m now anxious to get into the real world. I want to get involved in something more meaningful than studying. I think I’ll actually miss you. Who’s going to listen to me and get me out of trouble?”

  “You’re strong. You’ll be fine. Think about coming to Virginia. But I admit that I’m not being totally altruistic here.”

  Now he smiled.

  “Thanks. First I’m going to go to Timbuktu as soon as I can. I think that spending some time with my cousin
Thiyya, who helped raise me, will be a good thing. I will visit you in the States. I’ll work it out, I promise. And I want to take you to the airport tomorrow.”

  The doorbell rang again, and Steve knew that Kella’s taxi had somehow made its way through the security gauntlet.

  7. Blida, Algeria

  Tariq al Khalil and Hussein al Kaylani followed El Maghrebi’s men out of the city and headed south toward Ghardaia, where al Khalil hoped to meet with a local leader. They expected to get to Timbuktu in about ten or twelve days, struggling through heat and the occasional sand storm during the day and stopping in oasis towns at night.

  So far, the road to Ghardaia was broad and paved. Both cars were equipped for desert travel with special sand filters for the air intakes, an extra jerry can of water and another of gasoline in retaining holders on each side, an additional spare tire, and tools that neither Al Khalil nor Hussein knew how to use.

  Hussein, normally physically unimposing, now was even less so in his oversized jellaba. His eyes, slits in his dark face, reflected an alertness and cleverness that some had under-appreciated at their expense. Keeping his eyes on the road and the watery-looking mirages that shimmered in the distance, he asked, “What did you think of El Maghrebi?”

  Al Khalil replied, “El Maghrebi said he was a Salafist, committed to pushing the borders of the Land of Peace back to their former boundaries and to impose Sharia law. I think that he just wants to rearrange Algerian furniture. We will rebuild Allah’s house.”

  “We need activists, doers, more than we need ideologues,” Hussein said. “Your vision is our guide. I wish we had somebody like El Maghrebi in Morocco.”

  “You’re right. In forging a pure faith, in the heat of fire if need be, to the glory of Allah, the Beneficent, the Merciful, we need no more interpreters of the faith. But we can use all of the El Maghrebis we can find.”

  He paused for a second then continued.

  “You’re right about Morocco. It’s been very quiet. The leader of the cell, Lahlou, is neither a thinker nor an activist. Maybe you should pay them a visit, soon.”

  The men lapsed into silence. The world was losing its color; everything was becoming a sun-worn brown collage of sand and rock.

  Al Khalil dozed off but Hussein’s voice woke him. Hussein gestured at the desert and said, “I hope that you have thought about this strategy very carefully. Is governing this sandbox really the way to recreate the Caliphate that you want?”

  Al Khalil looked out the window at the arid, monotonous ground with the occasional group of nomads riding, or walking alongside their camels. He woke from his reverie and looked at Hussein.

  “The Prophet, may Allah bless him, started from Medina and conquered Arabia. His companions and successors then conquered most of the known world. They started from the desert. We, too, can start from the desert.”

  The thought provoked a vivid memory of Al Khalil’s uncle Said, and of his protégé Salim Salheldin, who were the reasons he was now driving through what Hussein called the “sand box.” The decision point for al Khalil had occurred after Said’s death. Drinking dark coffee in a Brussels apartment on Avenue Albert 1er, he had listened to Salim, his uncle’s protégé and replacement.

  Salim was tall and spare. Although dressed in a double-breasted suit, he could have spent the last forty days and nights in the desert. He had a hawkish profile and his hairline had receded to the top of his head. Al Khalil had always thought he dressed like a banker.

  “What the movement needs you to do in the countries bordering on the Sahara is what your uncle and I did in Europe. Already, we either control or can control entire towns in France, in Holland and Belgium through Sharia law.”

  Al Khalil knew that immigration combined with a high birth rate made Islam the fastest growing religion in Europe. He also knew that alienation was driving many immigrants to the mosque. Some immigrants were more Muslim in Europe than they ever were at home in Algeria or in Pakistan. One only had to look at the growing number of the faithful, especially the young, dressed in Levi jeans, Harvard sweatshirts and Yankee baseball caps, crowding around the mosques of Europe. It was easy to screen and recruit the more zealous.

  Tariq hadn’t replied right away, thoughtfully taking Salim’s cup and his own and refilling them. When he came back with the small, steaming cups with their scent of cardamom, he stood by the window and looked down at the traffic on the broad avenue below.

  “Isn’t putting my efforts in the Sahel a waste of my time when the countries of the Middle East, especially Egypt and Saudi Arabia, are ruled by apostates? Our future, the Caliphate, needs those countries as the pillars of our empire.”

  Salim leaned back in his chair.

  “If you go to Cairo and speak out you’ll be killed just like your grandfather and what will we have gained except another martyr? Martyrs are plentiful. Besides, playing the Americans’ game of democracy is helping us make inroads through elections.”

  Tariq savored the irony of taking over through democracy for the purpose of later imposing the dictatorship of the mosque through Sharia.

  Salim went on, “Others are focusing on the Far Enemy, the United States and the other Western countries supporting the apostate leaders in the Middle East. If you can bring the populations of North Africa home, the tide will be irreversible; the Near Enemy, the corrupt leaders in Egypt, Syria and other countries will fall like ripe dates.”

  He paused. Tariq felt Salim’s eyes fixing on him over his Sèvres porcelain cup.

  “You will realize our dream of recreating the time of unqualified glory when Islam ruled. Your mission must be to politicize minorities living on the edges of the Sahara. The way to attract them is to provide what they don’t have, starting with pharmaceutical goods. Your key to success may start with the lowly aspirin,” Salim laughed.

  Relenting a bit, Salim added, “Of course, your work in the Sahel can’t take all of your time. It will not help us for you to become forgotten in the sands of the Sahara. You must also continue your speaking and intellectual discourse in Europe. It’s what your uncle would have wanted.”

  Tariq furrowed his brow as he paced.

  “Islam is submission. Those who will not become Muslims must still submit―they will acknowledge the dominance, the superiority, of Allah, Lord of the World, the Merciful. Or they will die.”

  Tariq liked Napoleon’s characterization of his foreign minister, Talleyrand, as an ‘iron fist in a velvet glove.’ Talleyrand had begun his political career in the Church and al Khalil knew he could also use his religion as the path to power.

  ***

  Until they neared the wilaya of Ghardaia, the view from the car was made up of rocky, sometimes gravelly, ground punctuated by tufts of brownish grass, bizarre black rock formations and leafless shrubs. At the initiative of El Maghrebi’s men, they had stopped once, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. However, they had almost immediately been surrounded by a dozen curious nomads. For a few dinars, they had gone about collecting enough twigs for a fire over which the driver of the lead car had made tea. The nomads had displayed a few items for sale, including “desert roses,” petrified sand shaped in the form of roses by the wind.

  The scenery changed as they entered the stony M’Zab Valley, a conglomeration of five walled towns each built on a hill and dominated by its own minaret. They drove into Ghardaia, the largest of the five and followed the lead car driven by El Maghrebi’s men. As they passed by the mosque, its height and location symbolic of its importance, it reminded al Khalil of medieval Europe when the church dominated society and its cathedrals commanded the skyline. Later, government buildings had grown higher, and today, all over the world, the highest structures were those of businesses. It was fitting, he thought, that the most horrendous blow against the West in modern times was the attack on the Twin Towers in New York City.

  Tariq noticed the different dress of people in the street. Men wore baggy trousers, beige was a favorite, and flat round hats. There
were few women in the street, most totally covered in white cloaks, only one eye visible.

  That night, he and Hussein walked back from the house of a religious leader they were hoping would join them when Tariq said, “I’ve been thinking about Morocco. What’s going on there? I think you made a mistake in appointing this fellow Lahlou to run our operations there.”

  Before Hussein could reply, they heard singing and shouting. They turned the corner and saw two tipsy Europeans, probably French oil workers from the Total operation in Hassi-Messaoud about two-hundred-fifty miles to the East. Hassi-Messaoud was Algeria’s main petroleum center, operated by French, American, and Italian oil companies. These foreign expats did not normally come to Ghardaia for their R&R. Their companies paid their trips back home for a month before they returned to their oil camps in the middle of the Algerian desert for another month.

  In Brussels, when confronted with repulsive behavior, he had not been able to act. Here, he had no doubt as to what he must do.

  “Hussein, let’s go,” Tariq urged.

  They quickened their step to catch up. It was dusk and very few people were out. As the Frenchmen became aware of the approaching men, one turned to the other and said, nodding toward Tariq and Hussein, “Look, Arab indigenes—locals.”

  Addressing them, he said, “We thought your town was deserted. I am so glad to see a human, even an Arab.”

  He winked at his friend.

  “We came all the way from Hassi, you know, Hassi-Messaoud―we’re making Algeria rich! What is there to do here?”

  To al Khalil, the tone of their voices was insulting. Here were infidel outsiders, exploiters of Arab resources and defilers of Islamic law. Tariq glanced at Hussein. Each understood the other.

  In French, Tariq said, “It looks like you’re having fun. You deserve it. Hassi must be hard work.”

  The drunker one said, “Yes.” Tariq noticed that the other’s eyes were well focused and that he was evaluating the situation.

  “You won’t find any restaurants open now,” Tariq said, “None that serve liquor anyway.”