35

IN THE COMMAND BUNKER three stories underground in the Kirya, the chief of staff of the IDF is way ahead of him.

On an interactive map that takes up one wall, real-time intelligence from Israel’s five satellites paints a digitized image of the country, with green—signifying Muslim control—spreading over Israel’s borders like an uncontrolled amoebic plague. From the south, Egyptian mechanized infantry has swallowed most of the Negev Desert and is moving in a two-pronged advance on the southern cities of Beersheba to the east and the Mediterranean port of Ashdod to the west. Jordanian ground forces are closing on Jerusalem, having already barreled through the Judean suburb of Ma’ale Adumim. From the northeast, Iraqi infantry has moved through the Jordan Valley heading to Tiberius on the Sea of Galilee.

In the north, another front has opened, with hundreds of tanks, presumably under Syrian control but now identified as Iranian, crossing the Lebanese border. In each case, thin blue lines representing Israeli defenders have either cracked or fallen back. Only in a handful of places are they moving forward to engage.

“Get me the prime minister.”

“Pinky,” his adjutant tells him in a voice so low it is barely more than a hoarse whisper, “all communication with the PM is down.”

“With the ranking members of the cabinet, then.”

“Nothing.” The adjutant pauses, looking at the spreading green blight on the digitized map. “Intelligence reports kill squads of paratroops within Jerusalem, nationality still unspecified. Pinky.”

“Say it.”

“They’re all gone.”

“Shit.” He sits for a while, wishing he had not given up smoking. There is no smoking in government buildings, of course, but this is not any day. This, Pinky thinks, is a day that will be remembered in Jewish history forever, if there is going to be Jewish history after today. He sits, heavily, as though irredeemably weakened. It’s an easy decision, really, he thinks. And down to me, number twenty-seven on the list. Who would ever have thought that numbers one through twenty-six would be unavailable? It’s more a political than a military decision. Not my area at all. But there it is. Of course we could wait. But what would that accomplish? Another hour and the opportunity will be lost. “Itzik!”

The chief of staff’s deputy for extraordinary operations is across the room, monitoring his own small screen.

Brigadier Itzik Arian is a small and intense man of fifty who came to the IDF fifteen years earlier by way of academia, an expert in his field who has never been in battle, never fired a shot outside of the shooting range where, like all IDF staff officers, he must qualify every month. That this former professor is required to be proficient in small arms has long been a kind of sick joke in those rarified quarters where Arian’s name and responsibility are known: it is like demanding a Tyrannosaurus Rex be handy with a flyswatter. Now the little Tyrannosaurus walks stiffly, almost reluctantly, to his commander in chief. In any other case, with any other officer, the chief of staff would simply have barked an order across the room.

“General Arian,” Pinky says with a formality that betrays the gravity of what he is about to say. “In line with Government Protocol 221, and in consideration that all others authorized to make this decision are not reachable, I formally command you to initialize Operation Samson.”

“General Pinchas, as you are aware, it is necessary to affix to such an order certain code numbers.”

The chief of staff recites the list of ten digits he committed to memory on his first day at the top of the IDF command pyramid, and which every Sabbath morning as he strolls to synagogue he recites again like an article of faith. Were it not for the fact that such an act would be blasphemous among a people who had been tattooed for other purposes, he would have had these numbers inked permanently on his forearm.

Brigadier Arian moves his lips as though he has just tasted something unpleasant. “General Pinchas,” he recites with the rigid solemnity of a high priest, “your command has been received and will be executed immediately. Pending further orders, Operation Samson will in one hundred twenty seconds be armed and prepared for execution.”

When these two minutes pass, Israel will be the first nation in the world since the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to be one terse command away from unleashing a nuclear holocaust.

Pinky stares at his digitized map and speaks to his adjutant without facing him. “Moshiko, get me air command.” He sighs. “What’s left of it.”