That’s why there is no point being afraid. You can run or you can crawl on the ground, but your bullet will find you. They never miss their target."
I have seen them, the little devils in the ordnance factory. No idea where the factory is located. In England or Germany, or even in Czechoslovakia. But I have watched the workers in their monoto-nous tasks. They don’t worry about who the bullet is meant for. Whether for Greeks, Chinese, or Israelis. It doesn’t mean a thing to them. They are thinking of their girls in the night, of their pay, of the presents that they will buy their children. And the little devils are swarming everywhere with printed labels in their hands. These carry names: "Jehuda Carmi, Tel Aviv," in red ink. So this one will get the bullet in the head or belly and die. "Moshe Dror, Kfar Saba," in green ink. He will get the bullet in the thigh and only lose a leg. Perhaps Moshe is enjoying himself at this moment with a girl on the beach at Tel Aviv, jumping around and spraying her with water. He doesn’t know that his name is on the bullet and that the next time the girl sees him, he will be on crutches. And she will look away, as though she doesn’t know him.
Dudu, the scout, knew it all. He knew the work of the little devils in detail. But one thing he did not know: that while he was telling us this, an ammunition case was sitting in Ramallah containing a bullet with his name on it - "David Zioni, Rehovot, twenty-eight years old, left eye." One should avoid annoying the little devils. Especially on a day when a ceasefire could start.
Actually it doesn’t matter to us. One thing clear: whether the ceasefire comes into effect or not, we can’t go on. If there had been no mention of a ceasefire, then maybe we could have held out for another four or five days. Four or five whole days, in action twelve or fifteen times. But since there has been talk of a ceasefire, we have secretly started to hope that we will survive the week. We can’t go back into that hell. The disappointment would tear us apart.
* *
In La Valletta the little whore
she was just 15, and she cried so
when she slept with a sailor ...
* * if