Beirut: Seven Days in a Small War

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collapse, he shot forward again, and you were hit between the eyes. Even now the pop of his words reverberates in the memory.

But only in the memory. The colonel is not here. The desk is not here. Nor the men, nor the roof, nor the walls. Nothing remains on top of this bunker any more, including a portion of the roof itself, heaved high in a corner by an Israeli artillery hit. Where the colonel delivered his harangue, the noon sun drills. There is nothing else but silence and loose straw. No one who did not know what function the straw originally served could possibly guess that this was once a place of importance.

It was during the colonel's harangue last September that little Samer entered the office and was called to stand before his father. He wore matching checkered shirt and pants, and black laced shoes; highly polished and grown up. He stood about 3½ ft. high before the desk. The colonel put him through his paces:

"Who is Sadat?" he asked the boy.

"Sadat sold Palestine to Israel."

"Who is Jimmy Carter?"

"Carter supported Israel."

"Who are you?" The colonel regarded Samer with mock intensity.

"I am from Palestine," fired back his son. "From Hebron!"

Then the visitor asked Samer what he would like to be when he grew up. Samer said that he would like "to marry." The soldiers roared. The boy, not realizing that he had said something funny, froze in bewilderment. In answer to another question, Samer said that he would like to live in a world without soldiers. He said so there, standing where the Swedish modern desk was, where the straw shifts back and forth now. After the boy left the room his father swore. "If I am killed, my son will carry my gun."

With the walls down, one can clearly see the Mediterranean from the roof, not 500 yds. to the west. The mind sails it; first into the past, then north up the coast to where the past is now, to the besieged city with its sonic booms and rubbish fires and damaged children. It was for children this trip was taken in the first place. Two are known to be safely out of Lebanon. One is well in Beirut, though in a perilous position. The fourth is probably all right, in hiding with his mother, who will be protected by her people for being the widow of a warrior and hero. The story is done. Along the way, another story told itself; but that is a very old story. Everybody knows about wars.

The mind continues to sail in the white heat. Silently, in slow motion, the colonel's office comes back to its original shape. But the colonel is away today, and his men are not here either. It is Samer sitting behind the Swedish modern desk, his head barely showing over the top. This time the visitor enters the room to stand at attention. The boy looks him over with deep curiosity. "Who are you?"he asks, as if he were his father. He is puzzled by the absence of an answer. —By Roger Rosenblatt/Beirut