sneaked out for a night in Tel Aviv. When I got back the next day, I learned that our unit had been sent out at short notice, and that the Chinaman, our commander at the time, had got a bullet in the head. None of my comrades said anything to me. But the way they all looked at me, I was really not far from shooting myself.
"You are deluding yourself," Joker continued to philosophize. "You know as well as I do, that that is not the real reason. In any case not the only one. The truth is, that we can’t get by without it. When we scent danger, we start panting like a dog after a bitch on heat. Half a day at the front, and we are cursing war and praying for a ceasefire. But while we are here, we long to be back at the front.
"Perhaps," Jamus admits quietly.
"It is like a mental illness. It had already started at school," Joker continues.
"But you weren’t at school here at all," I interject.
"That doesn’t mean anything, does it? I went to school in Romania, Jamus in Egypt, and you here in Palestine. But we were brought up the same way. Every shitty people has its legends of heroes, generals, and marshals, and its history of wars and victories. The kids are taught that war is something beautiful and romantic. And the best thing of all is: to die for the motherland. Every shit who has killed a hundred soldiers gets a memorial and a page in the his-tory books."
"Maybe you should change the world?" suggests Jamus.
"The world can go to hell. If I have children, I will never send them to school. In five years’ time they will be being told that this war was
a great thing and all of them will be praying to take part in such a
»
war.
"You won’t have any kids at all," Jamus consoles him. "Because you will go for a stroll along Allenby Street on the day after the war, when a brick falls on your head and smashes your skull."
"And I will shit on your grave ..." Joker begins.
But silence falls over the tent. Even Shabtai’s chewing stops.
The course commander comes in. He has just come back from brigade HQ.
"Listen, men!" he calls, smiling contentedly. "Last night the brigade forced the route into the Negev! The Egyptians are sur-rounded at Majdal."