Read Online Khirbet Khizeh by S. Yizhar - Free Book Online Page B

itself from anything that might upset it, with eyes too pure to behold evil, who has looked upon unbearable iniquity. And I hated the entirety of my being.
    However, all Moishe saw fit to do in reply to Gaby’s entire discourse was to say with more than laconic brevity:
    â€œThat’s it.”
    We gathered our equipment and went down to the makeshift prison by the sycamore tree. After debating with myself I gathered up the courage to say to Moishe:
    â€œDo we really have to expel them? What more can these people do? Who can they hurt? After the young ones have already … what’s the point…”
    â€œWell,” Moishe said to me affectionately, “that’s what it says in the operational orders.”
    â€œBut it’s not right,” I protested, not knowing which of all the arguments and speeches that were fighting within me I should set before him as a decisive proof. And so I simply repeated: “It really isn’t right.”
    â€œSo what do you want?” said Moishe, shrugging his shoulders. He left me. I would have chosen, for various reasons, not all due to moral strength, to remain silent myself, but since I’d started and since Yehuda was walking by my side, I turned to him and said:
    â€œWhy do we need to expel them?”
    â€œFor sure,” said Yehuda, “what are you gonna do with them? Would you assign a company to guard them?”
    â€œWhat harm could they possibly do?”
    â€œThey can, and how. When they start laying mines on the roads, and stealing from the settlements, and spying everywhere—then you’ll notice them, and how.”
    â€œThese people?”
    â€œWhat do you mean? Are they too small, are they too virtuous? And apart from that there’s always going to be two or three or more of them that you won’t even know about.”
    â€œIt’s just fantasies,” I said.
    â€œSo what do you suggest?” said Yehuda.
    â€œI just don’t know anymore…”
    â€œIf you don’t know—then shut up,” said Yehuda.
    And it seemed that this was the advice that I had preferred from the outset. But I was overburdened with words. And once I had started I didn’t know how to stop. And since I had no one to argue with—I argued with myself. And this is what I said to myself: But this is a war! Well is it a war or isn’t it? And if it’s a war, well, all’s fair in war. Second voice: War? Against who, these people? First voice (continuing as though he’s heard nothing): Perfect saints they’re not (but who is?). And even if our intentions are good and honest—you can’t go into the water and not get wet (wonder of wonders!). To understand and agree that we’ve got to act—that’s one thing, but to set out and harden your heart and do all sorts of things—that’s always something else … What’s more, who is it who has to be tough and harden his heart? Whoever happens to be tough, and indifferent, anyway. Short break. Immediately, with an apologetic fury that turned into a counterattack: And those villages that we took by storm in the war, were they any different? Or those who ran away of their own accord, frightened by their own shadows? Or villages full of bandits, for whom the fate of Sodom is too good, weren’t they entirely different? But not this … not this … something was still unclear. Just a kind of bad feeling. Like being forced into a nightmare and not being allowed to wake up from it. You’re caught up with several voices. You don’t know what. Maybe the answer is to stand up and resist? But maybe, the opposite, to see and be and feel until the blood flows in order to … in order to what? Time is passing. Time is passing. Man. (Emotional pause.) You are so weak. (Another pause.) If you look you’ll burst. (Bleeding heart, bleeding heart, bleeding heart!)
    Beneath the sycamore the