The Last Testament Read Free Page A

common consent, only he could do. No one else had the credibility to make the sacrifices required. In just a matter of days he would, they hoped, end the conflict that had marked the lives of every single one of them.
    He was close to seventy, a hero of four Israeli wars. If he had worn them, his chest would have been weighed down with medals.
    Instead, his sole badge of military service was a pronounced limp 10
    SAM BOURNE
    in his right leg. He had been in politics for nearly twenty years, but he thought like a soldier even now. The press had always described him as a hawk, perennially sceptical of the peaceniks and their schemes. But things were different now, he told himself. There was a chance.
    ‘We’re tired,’ he began, hushing the crowd. ‘We’re tired of fighting every day, tired of wearing the soldier’s uniform, tired of sending our children, boys and girls, to carry guns and drive tanks when they are barely out of school. We fight and we fight and we fight, but we are tired. We’re tired of ruling over another people who never wanted to be ruled by us.’
    As he spoke, the unsmiling man was pushing through the crowd, breathing heavily. ‘ Slicha ,’ he said again and again, each time firmly pushing a shoulder or an arm out of his way. Excuse me .
    His hair was silver grey, his chest barrelled; he was no younger than the Prime Minister. This wade through the throng was exhausting him; his shirt collar was darkening with sweat. He looked as if he was trying to catch a train.
    He was getting nearer to the front now and was still pushing.
    The plain clothes guard in the third row of the crowd was the first to notice him, immediately whispering a message into the microphone in his sleeve. That alerted the security detail cordoning the stage, who began scoping the faces before them. It took them no time to spot him. He was making no attempt to be subtle.
    By now the plain clothes officer was just a couple of yards away. ‘ Adoni, adoni ,’ he called. Sir, sir . Then he recognized him.
    ‘Mr Guttman,’ he called. ‘Mr Guttman, please.’ At that, people in the crowd turned around. They recognized him too. Professor Shimon Guttman, scholar and visionary, or windbag and right-wing rabble-rouser, depending on your point of view; never off the TV and the radio talk shows. He had made his name several summers ago, when Israel pulled out of Gaza: he camped out on the roof of a Jewish settlement, protesting that it was a THE LAST TESTAMENT
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    crime for Israeli soldiers to be giving back land to ‘Arab terrorists, thieves and murderers’.
    He was marching on, squeezing past a mother with a child on her shoulders.
    ‘Sir, stop right there!’ the guard called out.
    Guttman ignored him.
    Now the agent began making his own journey through the crowd, breaking through a small cluster of teenagers. He considered pulling out his weapon, but decided against it: it would start a panic. He called out again, his voice was instantly drowned out by sustained applause.
    ‘We do not love the Palestinians and they do not love us,’ the Prime Minister was saying. ‘We never will and they never will . . .’
    The agent was still three rows away from Guttman, now advancing towards the podium. He was directly behind the older man; one long stretch and he could grab him. But the crowd was more tightly packed here; it was harder to push through.
    The agent stood on tiptoes and leaned over, just lightly brushing his shoulder.
    By now Guttman was within shouting distance of the stage.
    He looked up towards the Prime Minister, who was coming to the climax of the speech.
    ‘Kobi!’ he yelled, calling him by a long-forgotten nickname.
    ‘Kobi!’ His eyes were bulging, his face flushed.
    Security agents from all sides were now closing in, two on each side, as well as the first man advancing from behind. They were ready to pounce, to smother him to the ground as they had been taught, when a sixth agent, standing to the right of the