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  Messenger’s Dawn

  Lior Akerman

  Copyright © 2019 Lior Akerman

  All rights reserved; No parts of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information retrieval system, without the permission, in writing, of the author.

  Translation from the Hebrew: Ram Chopra

  Contact: [email protected]

  Contents

  Prologue

  1.

  2.

  3.

  4.

  5.

  6

  7.

  8.

  9.

  10

  11

  12

  13.

  14.

  15.

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  18.

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  52.

  This book is dedicated to all those who believe in their ability to create reality and bring change. To those who want a better world and can act to promote it. To those who understand that we come from dust and return to dust. To those who believe we are all alike. To those who will not let religions and beliefs divide man nor put up walls between them. To those who see their lives as being of value and feel they are on a mission.

  “The real courage is in living and suffering for what you believe,”

  —Christopher Paolini, Eragon

  Prologue

  New York, October 16th

  The dark October night was especially cold. The leaves had begun falling off the trees on the streets and the city was covered with a relentless drizzle. None of the thousands of concerned pedestrians, swarming the sidewalks like busy ants below, noticed the figure in white up in the tower, 102 floors above the city. He was looking out towards the horizon, lost in thought. Traffic at the intersection of 5th and 33rd was lighter than usual. He did not hear the noise rising from the street below. His mind was somewhere else. This time of year, this hour of the day, were perfect for reflection.

  The entire world seemed to be at war. Entire economies were collapsing or facing collapse. The stock markets were struggling. Tourism around the globe had stopped. Thousands of flights had been canceled, with people preferring to remain at home. Businessmen had begun preparing their end-of-year reports with great concern. The Christian world began preparations for the upcoming Christmas season, not knowing whether they would get to celebrate it. The Jewish people gathered in synagogues in the days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur for self-examination.

  Rabbis were issuing Halachic rulings and discussing the future with their congregations. All the nations of the world, all races, religions and nationalities, looked up to the sky in wonder, asking themselves: Who is He? Where did He come from? How did He succeed in doing what He has done? What is the meaning of the phenomenon that has amazed the world in recent months? Is the end of the world near, as the pessimists believed? Or were we about to emerge into a new world, as the false prophets promised? No one knew what to believe. Things were still unclear. This is exactly the way it is supposed to be, he was told.

  Churches all over the world filled with worshipers, listening carefully to the Bishop’s attempts to explain the phenomenon and its meanings and how it proves the foundations of their faith This sentence needs clarification as it is unclear as to what the “phenomenon” is. Synagogues filled with religious and secular Jews, in search of answers and perhaps asking God for forgiveness and mercy as they believed the end of time was coming. Thousands of temples throughout Asia were packed with millions of followers, asking their scholars and monks for answers, without even knowing what the question was. In the Muslim world, mosques overflowed with millions cramming the halls and courtyards. The Imams stood before the masses of worshipers, not knowing what to say. The Vatican square filled with tens of thousands of followers, raising their eyes to St. Peter’s Basilica, hoping to see their holy Pope and receive answers about what was happening and what might happen in the future. Perhaps he was the one who could give them hope.

  However, no one had any understanding or explanation of what had happened in the past three months. They were not meant to understand. There was no way for them to understand; not yet. That is what was decided and how things were conducted. Even he did not know what was going on and what it was all leading towards. He saw part of the picture, but he was unable to share this knowledge or his thoughts with anyone. She was the only one who felt there was something special about him, something much bigger than meets the eye. Jacobs also suspected this, but they too were still not supposed to know who he was and what he was doing.

  The truth was that he, too, did not really know what things would be like on the day after. He had a clear and defined role that he carried out carefully and with a real sense of purpose. He knew what his role was and how serious his responsibility. Whenever he said to his friends, “the weight of the entire world rests on my shoulders”, he meant it in the most literal sense.

  He had managed to win the battles he fought up until this point but it was still to be decided who was going to win the war.

  On that cold night, sitting bent over and lost in thought, with the Manhattan skyline behind him, his face was contemplative but full of satisfaction. A hint of a smile hovered around his lips. He could not afford to show more than that. The best was still to come.

  1.

  New York, October 12th

  It was Columbus Day and the city was ready for its annual festivities.

  People had the day off and the colorful Fall leaves created a peaceful atmosphere. Everyone was out on the streets. The sights and sounds of the terrible war had died down and were slightly forgotten. The figures in black had not been seen in public for a while. And although it was clear to everyone that there was no guarantee that things would remain quiet, it was time to ignore the fear and celebrate.

  Despite the tension, the Mayor decided to approve this year’s parade. It was going to be more modest than usual, but it was organized perfectly, and everything was in place. The police were on high alert and deployed along Fifth Avenue where the parade was heading. In this city of more than 6 million people, with only a million or so remaining, a scant ten thousand participants planned to march. The organizers were expecting many of them to be there to celebrate with dozens of youth bands and dance groups completing their final rehearsals for the vibrant parade.

  At noon, Fifth Avenue was packed with New Yorkers celebrating the holiday, cheering from both sides of the street. The ruins that remained from that terrible day had been cleared, and despite the restraint and apprehension, there was a festive and joyous atmosphere. The music playing, and the balloons and ribbons flying in the wind, gave the participants a pleasant, happ
y sensation.

  By 14:00, the street was full of groups marching and dancing to the loud music. The effort the organizers made to help the civilians forget the horrors of that day was well worth it. They continued to run around relentlessly, making sure everything was in order. They appeared to be troubled, but their concern had to with logistics not safety. The crowd was calm and happy, and the marchers were full of vitality and excitement.

  The man in white, standing on the roof of the Peninsula building on the corner of Fifth Avenue and East 56th Street, looked down in concern. He knew something the others did not, or rather he had a feeling he knew something they didn’t, as always. He waited patiently behind the concrete pillars on the roof.

  At 14:30 the music suddenly stopped.

  The speakers fell silent, cut off from electricity. The dancing stopped abruptly and the sound of music and singing was replaced with confusion.

  Then they appeared: –the figures in black.

  The cameras covering the parade live zoomed in on what was happening. One of the black figures blocked the parade at the East 54th Street junction and the second figure appeared behind the parade beyond 57th Street. They both moved towards the crowd.

  One of the figures suddenly launched a huge ray of fire at the parade. A police vehicle blocking traffic was overturned and went up in flames. A few seconds later it blew up in a deafening explosion. By now the flames were close to the front of the parade and the civilians reacted with fear and hysteria. They turned back and started to run from the fire, but then another huge ray of fire was launched at them from the other figure.

  The large police force was immediately deployed at the two junctions, taking position, forming a wall facing the two figures. They tried to pull out their guns and shoot at them, but they were caught in the fire, leaving them no chance. Then, when everyone was sure they were doomed in this fire trap, something unexpected happened.

  The spray from a huge water tank crashed on the black figure who was launching the ray of fire at the parade at the 54th Street junction. The fire went out immediately and the street turned into a flowing stream of water. The bystanders were swept a few meters off the ground by the flow.

  They were soaking wet and thrown to the ground, but they were saved from the fire. Thousands of eyes looked up at the white figure on the roof of the building.

  A few seconds passed before the spray from second water tank landed on the other black figure, the one launching the ray of fire at the crowd from 57th Street. Water came bursting out, drowning the black figure and extinguishing the fire coming from it.

  Once they realized what had just happened, tens of thousands of wet Americans stood there applauding the white figure that saved them from the tragedy that had been so close. The cameras kept rolling throughout the melee, sending live footage all over the world.

  Now it was perfectly clear who was the enemy and who was the savior. The white figure had won another battle, but the war was far from over.

  2.

  Israel, August 2nd

  August was very hot this year and tensions were high. In addition to the terrible heat, three suicide attacks were carried out in Israel during the first week of the month, killing tens of innocent civilians and bringing back the painful memories from several years before.

  The first explosion came at 08:00 on Sunday morning at the entrance to the Supreme Court in Jerusalem. Hundreds of civilians were on their way into the Court, in line for a security inspection. The second attack took place in Tel Aviv an hour later at the entrance to the Hashalom train station beneath the Azrieli Towers. An endless number of passengers were waiting to enter the station, while others passed on foot or in cars outside the station. Many soldiers got off the train on their way to their bases in Southern Israel and hundreds of civilians were in the building above them. At the exact same time, the third suicide bomber blew up at the Bat Galim train station in Haifa, as tens of soldiers were getting off the train on their way to their bases, while hundreds of civilians were in the station or above it at the time.

  Within less than 24 hours, security forces had counted 280 dead civilians and soldiers, with hundreds injured. The Shin Bet force arrived at the scene immediately and carried out a quick and thorough preliminary investigation. They easily discovered the identity of the attackers by the ID cards they were carrying. What they discovered was very troubling. The three suicide bombers were successful young men from good families, none of them had a suspicion or security-related background.

  The first bomber was 24-year-old Muhamad Kaadan from East Jerusalem, an outstanding business student at the East Jerusalem College, with no religious affiliation. He got engaged just two weeks earlier. The second attacker was 23-year-old Sharon Kedem, from Tel Aviv, an outstanding Israeli Defense Force officer from the elite unit, Duchifat. The third suicide bomber was 25-year-old George Samaan, from downtown Haifa. The son of a respected Christian family of high financial status in the city.

  The investigation uncovered that the three bombers had left their homes the day before the attacks and did not return. They were not connected in any way to each other and all three were without their phones. None of their family members or friends had seen them in the hours since they left and leading up to the attacks.

  The testimonies of the few survivors were all the same. Before blowing themselves up in the crowds, the terrorists appeared completely apathetic and indifferent. None of them spoke to the people around them, they were walking like robots, their lives already taken from them as they walked through the crowd.

  The information the IDF collected and, even more so, the information missing, made it extremely difficult for the security forces to understand what had happened. What led these three young men to carry out these murderous suicide bombings? The investigation did not have much time to make progress. Just a few hours passed until public and world attention was diverted as a barrage of rockets and missiles were launched into heavily populated areas of Israel from Lebanon, catching the military and government off guard. Israeli security forces had no prior knowledge of the brazen attack and there seemed to be no apparent reason for Hezbollah to suddenly launch a full attack on Israel. The Israeli response came within minutes. IDF Air Force planes dropped thousands of tons of bombs on the launching pits from which the Hezbollah attacks were launched. All of South Lebanon went up in flames and civilians fled in panic. The damage was catastrophic.

  The war continued for three days, with thousands of casualties on the Israeli side. Many cities suffered severe damage to buildings and infrastructure, complete neighborhoods in central Israel were turned to rubble. In the South, there was terrible damage to the cities of Beer Sheva, Ashdod and Ashkelon; they were completely paralyzed. In the North, the cities of Haifa, Karmiel, Acco and Hadera were badly hit.

  The military and police situation rooms continued to receive endless reports. The rescue forces had trouble getting to all the sites that were hit and many civilians were left untreated for hours. On the Lebanese side, things were even worse. Yet still, the firing continued. The Hezbollah headquarters was bombed and completely destroyed, along with the A-Dahya neighborhood in Beirut. Hundreds of targets of the organization that were prepared in advance were demolished. Hezbollah leaders continued to claim that they did not initiate any attack and did not approve firing missiles at Israel. The Israeli government rejected these claims and did not have any explanation for anyone else authorizing and carrying out the attacks, simultaneously activating thousands of rocket launchers continuously for three days.

  The Israeli Cabinet convened in the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem. The security officials presented all the data they had on the current attacks. They attempted to evaluate the situation and estimate what was going to happen next. The officers were extremely uncomfortable. They had no idea what the future had in store. After 48 hours, James Richards, the United States’ Central Intelligence Agenc
y Director, called the Mossad Director and notified him that, according to a thorough inquiry they had conducted, the Hezbollah had not given the order to open fire. This information only increased the confusion and shock on the Israeli side.

  The Prime Minister and Defense Minister were the first to ask the most obvious questions. “Who fired? Who sent the suicide bombers? How is it possible that one of the terrorists is a Jew and another is a Christian?”

  The Cabinet did not have much time to inquire. In the middle of the discussion held on the second day of the war, Major General Gadi Sharon, the Prime Minister’s military secretary, was called out of the meeting for an urgent update. Soon after, he returned, his face pale with horror. A round of long range missiles launched from Iran and Southern Russia was on its way to Israel, followed by another bigger round. The Hetz anti-missile defense system was activated automatically and managed to shoot down half of the missiles. The others hit their targets. The reports started to flow into the Prime Minister’s meeting in an underground shelter beneath the building.

  Three missiles had hit Tel Aviv. The eastern part of the triangle shaped Azrieli Tower collapsed and there was colossal damage in the area. The Dan Panorama Hotel on the shore in South Tel Aviv was hit and destroyed, all the buildings around it were severely damaged. There were hundreds of civilian casualties. A third missile landed on the runway of the Dov Airport in Northern Tel Aviv. The damage was catastrophic. The number of dead was still unclear. Additional reports continued to arrive of missiles falling in Central Israel, Haifa and Beer Sheva. The media reported tens of thousands of civilians running through the streets in panic in search of safety. The government ministers looked at each other with a sense of helplessness. The Chief of Staff was on his way to the ‘Pit’ in the Kiryah base in Tel Aviv. From there he led the counterattack against the enemy, although it was not clear who the enemy was.