I did exactly what he would have. I wanted to make him proud, wherever he was. Maybe he would see or read about it in the news. I took Bilal’s imagined defiance a step further. I sang, even though I don’t have a good voice. I started with “Yumma Mweil elHawa,” to set the mood. The judge admonished me. I waited a while, then sang every Abdel Halim Hafez song I could think of. “El Hawa Hawaya” followed by my favorite, “Qariatol Fingan.” The judge was baffled, then irate, yelling at me, at the prosecutors, lawyers, bailiffs. She ordered the guards to silence me. I sang “Mawood,” another of my favorites. The judge had allowed reporters into the courtroom. But now she motioned for them to leave, and on their way out, they snapped photos and videos, for which I posed as best I could.

I did what Bilal would have done. I colonized the colonizer’s space of authority. I made myself free in chains and held that courtroom captive to my freedom. I felt Bilal’s presence with me. For those hours, it gave me comfort and strength to imagine he was watching. When I would not stop singing, the judge ordered guards to escort me out and “make sure she’s civilized tomorrow.”

I continued to sing as they hauled me out into the hallway, where reporters clamored and were pushed back by police. I was singing “Gabbar” at that point, stretching out the interminably long note of the last syllable, “Gabbaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar,” until one of the guards cupped my mouth. I licked his palm, faithful to Um Buraq’s lesson not to react predictably. He removed his hand reflexively, then gripped my jaw so tightly my cheeks bruised.

They put me in a metal vault, with bright lights and loud music that blared until the next morning, when they lugged me back to military court. My head drooped from the weight of the dark bags under my eyes. The room was empty on that second day, except for officers of the court. I hummed quietly to myself, but guards stuffed a rag into my mouth and sealed it with tape. The judge opened the proceedings by expelling the press, but not before holding them responsible for giving a platform to a terrorist to hijack the sanctity of her courtroom in particular and Israel’s democracy in general. But, she added, she was pleased to see me behaving now.

I tried to muster energy to hum through the gag, but the freedom of my defiance got stuck in my throat, and I choked on it. My body filled with silence and exhaustion. I was grateful not to be under bright lights and blaring music. My heavy head fell, my eyes closed, and when I opened them again, I was in a van, then inside the Cube.