All Rivers Run to the Sea: Memoirs (50 page)

That’s how I failed to become a millionaire.

But I did come away from the adventure with some memories. And with a novel that began this way:

“The accident happened one evening in July in the heart of New York, as Kathleen and I were crossing the street on our way to see
The Brothers Karamazov.”

My novel
The Accident
was only partly inspired by reality. To begin with, the fictional Kathleen is not the Kathleen with whom I had broken up or, more accurately, who had broken up with me the year before. Second, although the story correctly describes my condition and feelings in the weeks after the accident (I recall that when I came to, I laughed at the irony of having survived the death camps only to be run over in the streets of New York), in the novel the “accident” is a suicide attempt.

Another episode, however, was drawn directly from reality: my encounter with Sarah. I met her on a bus between the Hôtel de Ville and the Place de la République in Paris. I felt her watching me as I read a Yiddish book. Blond and petite, her mouth framed by lines of disillusionment, she seemed lost in her own existence. She invited herself home with me. “Tell me a story,” I said, and she replied, “My name is Sarah.” My mother’s name, I thought to myself. To her I said: “That’s not a story.” “Yes it is,” she said. I sat down at my desk, but she remained standing, leaning against the door as if to prevent an intruder from entering or to stop me from leaving. I sank into an uneasy silence. Was she waiting for questions I never asked? Suddenly her eyes filled with tears and she cried, “Don’t you understand? My name is Sarah and I was born in Vilna.” I opened my mouth to say that that wasn’t a story either, but she now seemed beside herself. In a loud voice she began to tell me of her experiences in a concentration camp, of the torture the Germans inflicted on her, of the solidarity among the other inmates. She was twelve years old at the time. I shouldn’t have listened, should have plugged my ears, thought of something else, made love to her—anything to make her stop talking.

For
The Accident
, perhaps in order to transcend the theme of the accident-suicide. I chose as epigraph a quotation from Nikos Kazantzakis’s
Zorba the Greek:
“I was once more struck by the truth of the ancient legend: Man’s heart is a ditch full of blood. The loved ones who have died throw themselves on the banks of this ditch to drink the blood and thereby come to life again; the dearer they are to you, the more of your blood they drink.”

For the camp survivor life is a battle not only for the dead but also
against them. Locked in the grip of the dead, he fears that by freeing himself, he is abandoning them. Hence the near-impossibility of loving, or of believing in humanity.

I was released from the hospital in a wheelchair and returned to my hotel room. There were frequent visits from David and daily ones from Aviva. For several days I worked at home, and then, my patience at an end, I returned to the UN on crutches. Colleagues were helpful, among them Shalom Rosenfeld (gifted
Maariv
columnist, who was passing through New York) and Dick Yaffe. These were difficult times at the United Nations. The heroic uprising in Hungary was crushed by Soviet tanks. My Israeli readers were keenly following those events as well as the diplomatic consequences of the Israelis’ lightning campaign in Sinai, which was the first of General Moshe Dayan’s legendary exploits. Despite my physical discomfort I attended interminable Security Council sessions.

I found these debates absorbing. Most of them concerned Israel, and therefore Jewish history and my people’s destiny were at stake. Well-informed sources had no doubt that there was collusion at the highest level between Israel, Britain, and France. Ben-Gurion was reported to have traveled to Paris incognito to meet with top French officials in a well-guarded villa. Other sources denied these rumors. Either way, Abba Eban’s speeches were as eloquent as ever, those of the French and British representatives striking in that it was unusual to hear Israel defended so vigorously. The other nations, however, remained faithful to their traditions of hostile neutrality or masked hostility. Indignant, the Soviets and Americans thundered against Israel’s alliance with colonialists. President Eisenhower summoned an Israeli diplomat and warned him: “Tell your Jews not to drag the Middle East events into the election campaign.” The emissary passed this less-than-diplomatic warning on, and the great majority of Jewish leaders accepted the directive. Few voices were raised in Israel’s defense. David Ben-Gurion made no secret of his scorn. Disappointed by the silent acquiescence of American Jewry, he proposed that Baron Guy de Rothschild launch a world association of friends of Israel to replace the Zionist movement.

In retrospect this chapter of Israel’s history, once considered glorious, seems problematic. Was it not a tactical and above all a moral error for Israel to fight on the side of the colonialists in a cause that did not concern it directly? On the other hand, this was a perfect opportunity to thwart an enemy who had become dangerously powerful
and arrogant. The fact remains that politically the operation ended in a debacle. After receiving a message from the Kremlin threatening the Jewish state with unnamed reprisals, Ben-Gurion ordered Dayan to evacuate the Sinai. In return, Eisenhower offered guarantees which succeeding administrations refused to honor.

Around this time my American visa expired. Equipped with my crutches and wheelchair, I headed for the Immigration office, where an amiable official took a long look at my stateless persons French travel permit and handed it back to me. “Since you have press accreditation at the United Nations, in principle there’s no problem. But your travel permit has expired. Where do you want me to put the visa?” He advised me to ask the French consulate to revalidate my permit. At the consulate a less-than-amiable secretary informed me that this was impossible, explaining that according to regulations, this type of document could be validated only in France. Back at Immigration, I spoke to the same official, who gave me a note for the French authorities stating that a U.S. visa would be issued as soon as I presented a suitable document. But French bureaucracy has its own inscrutable ways. When the U.S. Immigration official saw me hobbling in on my crutches for the third time, he asked how long this game would continue. I didn’t have enough money to go back to France. Taxis had already cost me a small fortune, and in any case my doctors would have forbidden an Atlantic crossing. As I stood there at a loss, anxiously wondering whether I would be deported or placed on some sort of blacklist, the official leaned toward me, smiled, and said, “For God’s sake, why don’t you become a U.S. resident? Then later you can apply for citizenship.” I stared at him. Could I actually become an American citizen? His smile gave me my answer. I asked if I would receive a real passport eventually, and my new mentor proceeded to lay out the steps that led to my becoming an American citizen.

It is hard to put into words how much I owe that kindly Immigration official, especially when I recall my annual visits to the Préfecture de Police in Paris, with its long lines and humiliating interrogations. When my turn came, the stateless person I was had to try to win over an ill-humored female employee who never even condescended to look straight at me. It was pathetic, even ridiculous, but it was endemic to my condition as a refugee. The refugee’s time is measured in visas, his biography in stamps on his documents. Though he has done nothing illegal, he is sure he is being followed. He begs
everyone’s pardon: Sorry for disturbing you, for bothering you, for breathing. How well I understood Socrates, who preferred death to exile. In the twentieth century there is nothing romantic about the life of the exile, be he a stateless person or a political refugee. I know whereof I speak. I was stateless, and therefore defenseless.

When, five years later, I applied for American citizenship, there were no problems, just simple, rapid formalities. A few days before the ceremony the concierge at my hotel had a message for me: I was to call the FBI; there was a telephone number. The refugee in me was scared. What could I have done to attract the attention of J. Edgar Hoover’s omnipotent, omniscient FBI? I called the number. A man answered and told me the agent in charge had just left the office and would not be back until the next day. I prepared for a sleepless night.

That evening the agent called me. “I didn’t want you to worry, so I’m calling from home. I must ask you a question. You’re going to be an American citizen. Have you thought about registering with your draft board?” I broke into a cold sweat. “No,” I stammered. The agent asked why not. “I’m too old,” I said. “Besides which, there are medical reasons. I’ve had a serious accident.” The agent was silent. In my mind I saw myself rejected, punished, repudiated—end of naturalization, the American passport forever out of reach. “Well,” he said at last, “you’ll have to register, as a matter of form. But that should be the end of it.”

And it was. A few days later I was handed a brand-new, beautiful American passport.

In 1981, after François Mitterrand was elected president of France, a high official asked whether I would like to acquire French nationality. Though I thanked him—and not without some emotion—I declined the offer. When I had needed a passport, it was America that had given me one.

As promised, Dov and Leah disembarked in New York in 1957. We went to concerts, restaurants. By now I was walking with a cane, which I thought made me look distinguished. But I tired easily. They rented a car and invited me to join them on a six-week cross-country trip, from New York to Los Angeles. Since Dov was my boss I didn’t have to worry about work, so I went.

We discovered an America unknown to us, totally different from New York or Washington, which were the only places I knew. Interminable highways disappeared into a blue horizon ringing tall mountains
embedded in skies of shifting colors. There were cascading rivers and peaceful brooks, green valleys and yellow hills, violent storms and dramatic sunsets. Never before had I been so close to nature. From the hills of San Francisco we gazed upon small towns floating in the fog as in a dream. In the Rocky Mountains the clouds seemed to wear a crown of snow; to touch it you would have to climb to God’s throne. Enchanting mirages, they are so disconcerting you cannot tell which is close and which is far, which is real and which is not. You have a sense of being present at a re-creation of the world.

They say that when Arturo Toscanini visited the Grand Canyon, a companion watched respectfully as the great conductor stood motionless, contemplating the miracle of the Colorado River gorge. Suddenly, after a long and silent meditation, the maestro burst into applause. For him the discovery of deepest America was like attending a concert. For me it was a constantly renewed invitation to learn about my new homeland. In the South I was struck by its citizens’ courtesy, and the unforgivable humiliation of its blacks. Looking at the “Whites Only” signs, I felt ashamed of being white.

There was Las Vegas and its slot machines, available even in the rest rooms. Men and women were standing in dazzlingly bright casinos, betting a year’s salary or more on a little ball that leaps and dances about indifferently, stupidly, before coming to rest on a number, any number. Wherever you turn, you see frozen faces and trembling hands. The casino in Monte Carlo is the playground of the rich, who seem burdened by their wealth. In Las Vegas one sees ordinary people fed up with not being rich.

At the Sands Hotel we dined with Hank Greenspun, a powerful man in the city who was the owner of the daily
Las Vegas Sun
, who told us of his clandestine activities in support of Israel. In 1948 he was involved in an illegal arms shipment, for which he was indicted and sentenced to several years in prison. Of this he was very proud.

One morning we came upon an enormous sign under the Arizona sun: “Indian Reservation 100 Miles.” Instantly we decided to take the detour. None of us had ever met an Indian, our knowledge extending no further than the movie stereotypes of young savages and wise old men. The Indians were always the ones on the attack, shrieking and killing. But why not? In their eyes, the white man was nothing but a rapacious armed invader seeking to drive them from their lands and reduce them to dependency by imposing his language and culture. And all with a revoltingly clear conscience.

The man who greeted us in a tent decorated with feathers and other tribal insignia might have stepped out of a movie. Tall, erect, impassive, and majestic, he had a slow, dignified walk and a weathered, angular face. We hung on his every word as he explained the Indian concept of life and death. He was respectful, and he inspired respect. At one point he asked us to sign his visitors’ book. Dov urged me to go first. I don’t know why, but I signed in Hebrew, and the Indian rewarded me with a hearty pat on the back. “Sholem aleichem,” he said in Yiddish. Dov and Leah nearly collapsed in surprise and laughter.

It turned out our host was Jewish, a camp survivor from Polish Galicia who had first emigrated to Mexico. When things went badly there, he moved to Arizona and made his living as an Indian by day while remaining a Jew by night.

In my diary I wrote: “America is truly a wonderland. Even the Indians speak Yiddish.”

It was around that time, in 1957, that I first met Golda Meir, who had succeeded Moshe Sharett, whom Ben-Gurion considered too moderate, as minister of foreign affairs. She had come to the United Nations to negotiate the Israeli withdrawal from Sinai. Initially known only in Jewish circles, she soon became world famous for her impressive strength of character, the depth of her convictions, and an obstinacy unanimously acknowledged by friend and foe. Though she lacked Eban’s eloquence, she possessed the gifts of sincerity and simplicity, hence her great power of persuasion. Severe, sometimes even cruel toward those she didn’t like, she was boundlessly generous toward those she did. I was lucky enough to be among the latter, not because she thought me more talented than other correspondents, but because she took a kind of maternal interest in me. When she saw me on crutches, she evidently decided to take care of me. At first she may have thought I was a wounded veteran with glorious exploits to his credit, for she asked about my military record. I quickly set her straight. Far from being a war hero, not only had I never been in uniform, I wasn’t even Israeli. I was just a simple Jewish correspondent working for an Israeli newspaper, my wounds courtesy of an ordinary accident. She was incredulous. “But you speak perfect Hebrew!” I explained that I owed that to my father. “And you’re not Israeli?” No. “But why not?” I stammered an awkward reply. Noting my embarrassment, Golda reassured me: “It doesn’t matter. You’re young, you work for one of my
country’s newspapers, and you have no one to take care of you. So listen: I don’t want to see you hobbling around this place anymore.”