Nir peeked around the corner, then ducked back. His target’s head was barely showing over a low wall. Taking a quick breath, he slid into the room and fired two shots from his Jericho 941 9mm. His target went down.
Serves him right. These are the idiots who took out Yossi. They all deserve what they get.
Yaron, Imri, Dima, and Gil fanned out around him as he pressed forward. He heard two shots from his right and two from his left. By their positioning, they would have come from Imri and Gil.
“Room clear,” he said into his coms.
“Clear,” came the responses from his team.
“Yaron, Imri, kitchen. Dima, Gil, hall.”
“Root,” came the replies.
The room ahead of Nir led to what appeared to be a back storage room. His gun in firing position, he moved steadily forward, step by step.
Two shots sounded from behind him.
“Target down,” said Dima.
Good. One less to worry about. Hopefully, you’ll find someone in the room in front of you. Chalking up the body count.
Nir didn’t stop. He didn’t acknowledge. He kept advancing on the closed door ahead. When he arrived, he lowered his left hand from the grip of his pistol and carefully twisted the knob. It turned.
Once again, he breathed in and brought the handle down until there was movement in the door. He pushed it just enough so that the latch cleared the jamb, then he returned his left hand to cover the fingers of his right around the Jericho’s grip.
Okay, let’s play.
He counted down in his head, 3, 2, 1…
Nir bumped the door with his hip. It swung open. Immediately, he saw a man to his right. Two bullets burst from Nir’s gun, hitting the man center mass. More movement caught his eye to his left. He spun and fired again. Two more bullets hit his target.
The little girl fell to the ground.
A buzzer sounded and the duskiness of the course was illuminated by white light.
“A civilian is down,” said a husky voice over the loudspeaker.
Nir walked toward the target. There were two holes in the pretty dark-haired toddler—one in her chest, and one just under her left eye. Without looking away, he released his mag from his pistol, slipping it into his tactical vest. Then he racked back the slide, catching the flying round with his left hand in a motion he had carried out hundreds of times before. That, too, went into his vest.
“Dude, it happens,” said Gil, who had walked up next to him. He put his hand on Nir’s shoulder.
But then a shove to his back sent him stumbling forward. It was Yaron, and he was hot. “That’s the second time you’ve done that in the last four weeks. Yeled, you’ve got to get your head back in the game. If you can’t tell the difference between a haji and a little girl, then you need to rethink whether you’re the one to lead this team.”
Anger welled up in Nir, but he pushed it back down. Yaron was right, and if it had been any of his men who had taken out a civilian twice in a month, he would have been saying the same thing. He stood there staring at the older man, not knowing what to say. Was he unfit? Had he let October 7 get so deep into him that he was now trigger-happy?
The confusion on Nir’s face must have softened Yaron a bit. “Listen, I get it,” he said in a calmer voice. “We’re all wrestling with it. But these are people’s lives we’re talking about. You’ve got to think it through, achi.”
“No, you’re right. You’re right.”
Dima stepped up and grabbed Nir by the arm, leading him off the course. “We trust you. You’ve just got to get your head together. This may be personal for all of us, but you’ve got to find a way to stop making it so personal. You’ve got to get Yossi out of your head. We don’t have the luxury of vengeance. We’ve just got a job to do. Comprende?”
Gil spoke up. “Comprende? What’s a Russian Jew doing speaking Spanish?”
Dima looked offended. “That’s not Spanish. That’s pure Russian Cubano.”
Nir couldn’t help but laugh quietly. “Dumb Cossack,” he said to himself.
“Let’s go regear and run it again,” Gil said, putting his arm over Nir’s shoulders.
But Yaron stopped him. “You guys go ahead. We’ll catch up with you in a few minutes.”
“Oh, Nir, you are in deep now,” said Imri as the group walked off.
Yaron walked Nir another direction out of the practice house. A couple dozen meters away, they found a bench. “Sit,” said Yaron. Nir obeyed.
“You know that there’s no way you could have saved him,” Yaron said, settling down next to Nir.
“Who?”
“What do you mean, ‘Who?’ Who do you think?”
Nir did know who he meant. He just felt foolish admitting it. “I was the one he called, achi. When he was being shot at and he had to find a way to escape, he turned to me. He didn’t call the cops. He didn’t call his folks. He didn’t call you or anyone else on the ops team. In his mind, he thought, ‘If there is one guy who can get me out of this, it’s Nir.’ And now he’s dead, and so is Adira.”
Yaron was quiet for a moment. Then he swore under his breath. “That’s rough. No doubt. Brother, I am never going to knock you for feeling like crap over this. But you do know that there was absolutely nothing you could do to help him, right? You had no way to reach him, no way to extract him, no way to get him to safety.”
“But he was counting on me.”
“Of course he was. You were his hero. You’re Nir Tavor, the guy who can get anything done. But guess what? You’re just a mortal man. It’s like me being trapped on the moon and saying, ‘Help, Nir. Get me off of here!’ You know what? Try as you might, there’s nothing you can do to help me. You’ve got no rockets to send. You can’t transport me off there like Scotty or Spock. As much as you want to help, you can’t, and I’m just plain screwed.”
“Scotty and Spock? Exactly how old are you?” Nir asked, looking to divert the conversation.
“Listen, achi, just because you got the call doesn’t mean you’re the only one hurting. We all loved Yossi, and we all lost him. And not just him. You know that I lost two cousins at Kibbutz Be’eri, and one of my best friends growing up was killed with his wife, daughter, son-in-law, and two grandbabies at Kibbutz Kfar Aza. You think I’m not pissed? Their faces come to mind every time I pick up a gun, and I see them every night when I close my eyes.”
“Then how do you do it? I mean, how do you tamp down the anger? Or, more so, how do you get past the guilt for not doing something about it?”
“I keep reminding myself that I didn’t fire the guns that killed the ones I love. However, I do have the honor, privilege, and responsibility of firing the gun that will kill the ones who pulled those triggers. The past is the past. As much as I wish I could, I can’t do anything to change what’s happened. So my focus now is on making it right. And it will only be right when every one of those Hamas dirties are dead and rotting on the ground.”
Nir breathed in the cool March air and thought about what Yaron had said. Undoubtedly, he was carrying guilt over Yossi’s death. It had led to some strange decisions. When he had been asked to read a eulogy at Yossi’s funeral, Nir had kept his words generic, saying he was a good worker and a friend. Then, later that night, he had gone home with only a bottle of arak as a companion. It took several hours and nearly the whole bottle for him to drink himself to sleep. The next morning, when he had called Liora to tell her that he would not be in that day, he felt he could hear an accusatory tone in her voice. She had said, “Don’t worry about it, Nir. You get some rest.” But what he heard was, “Are you going to let me down one day like you let Yossi down? Am I going to get killed waiting for you to rescue me?”
That kind of thinking was stupid, and Nir knew it. But it didn’t matter. He had switched from liquor to beer and polished off a 12-pack of Gold Star before passing out until the next morning. The only positive to come from that 36-hour period was a commitment to never drink like that again after he finally woke up around 9:00 the next morning. He forced himself to do a 15-kilometer run as both penance and to help sweat any remaining alcohol out of his system.
Yaron was right. He had to let the past go. If he kept hanging on to it, he would end up making a major mistake and the consequences would be huge. One of his teammates could get killed or an innocent civilian might get seriously hurt. In either case, he would come up for disciplinary review and likely be removed from his position. Then he would be no good to anyone.
“What do you do when they come into your mind?” he asked Yaron.
Yaron let out a long sigh. “When I see their faces, I thank God for them. For the life He gave to them and the time they had on this earth. Then I pray the Hagomel. ‘Barukh ata Adonai, Eloheinu melekh ha’olam, ha’gomel l’chayavim tovot, she-g’malani kol tov.’ ”
As he prayed, Nir joined him in his mind: Blessed are You, Lord our God, ruler of the world, who rewards the undeserving with goodness, and who has rewarded me with goodness.
When Yaron finished, Nir offered the traditional response: “Mi sheg’malcha kol tov, hu yi-g’malcha kol tov selah. May He who rewarded you with all goodness reward you with all goodness forever.”
Yaron gave a weary smile. “Yeah, I don’t know if it’s appropriate or not. My synagogue attendance has been spotty at best over the past three or four decades. But it makes me feel good, and it seems to fit.”
Nir put his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “It’s good, achi. It’s good.”
They met the rest of the team back at the entrance to the house. Another Kidon group was completing the exercise, so they waited for them to finish and for the course to be reset. Nir knew that the targets would all be different this time, but he was also pretty sure that the trainers who ran the course would make certain that he had at least one civilian within his purview area.
When their turn came, they entered the house with their IWI X95 assault rifles at the ready. Immediately, targets popped up, and each man cleared their assigned sector. Nir quickly dropped his magazine and slammed in a new one. Because the X95 is a bullpup, designed to be more compact, this took place behind the rifle’s trigger instead of in front. Formerly known as a Micro-Tavor, this had long been Nir’s gun of choice for well over a decade and a half.
After clearing the entryway, Imri led the way to the next door off to their right. As soon as he opened the door, Gil and Yaron tossed in flash-bang grenades. After they blew, Nir led the way in. They cleared this room, and, after a mandatory switch to their Jericho sidearms, they did the same in the next.
Now came the time for them to split up. Nir called out their assignments, receiving an acknowledgment from each man. This time, however, as Nir moved toward the door, he saw Yossi’s face in his mind. And rather than letting the rage rise in him, he thanked God for the time he’d had with his friend.
As before, the door was unlocked. Nir prepared for entry. When he pushed in, there was movement to his right again. His finger tightened on the trigger, but he held back. The little girl cutout with the two holes in it was staring right at him. There was movement to his left. Dropping to his knees, he spun to where the girl had been before. Again, he prepared to shoot, but this time he saw a mother holding her baby. Nir let up the tension from his trigger. Clearing the rest of the room, he saw that there were no threats.
Nice try, trainer guys.
Into his coms, he said, “Lead, all clear.”