“We have both seen the worst this life has to offer. Nothing can frighten us, and nothing that happens today will surprise us.” He looked up from his shoes and gazed at Gabriel for a moment. “The things they wrote about you in the newspapers after London—it was all true? You were the one who killed the members of Black September?”

Ibrahim interpreted Gabriel’s silence as affirmation the newspapers accounts were all true.

“I remember Munich so clearly,” Ibrahim said. “We spent that day standing around our televisions and radios. It electrified the Arab world. We cheered the capture of your athletes, and when they were massacred at the airport we danced in the streets. In retrospect, our reaction was appalling, but completely understandable. We were weak and humiliated. You were strong and rich. You had beaten us many times. We had finally beaten you, in Germany of all places, land of your greatest catastrophe.”

“I thought you Islamists didn’t believe in the Holocaust. I thought you regarded it as a great lie, foisted upon the world by clever Jews so we could rob the Arabs of their land.”

“I’ve never been one to dabble in self-delusion and conspiracy theory,” Ibrahim said. “You Jews deserve a national home. God knows you need one. But the sooner you give the Palestinians a state in the West Bank and Gaza, the better for all of us.”

“And if that means giving it to your spiritual brethren in Hamas?”

“At the rate we’re going, Hamas will look like moderates soon,” Ibrahim said. “And when the Palestinian issue is finally removed from the table, the Arabs will have no one else to blame for their miserable condition. We will be forced to take a hard look in the mirror and solve our problems for ourselves.”

“That’s just one of the reasons why there will never be peace. We’re the scapegoat for Arab failings—the pressure valve for Arab unrest. The Arabs loathe us, but they cannot live without us.”

Ibrahim nodded in agreement and resumed the study of his shoes. “Is it also true that you are a famous art restorer?”

This time Gabriel nodded slowly. Ibrahim pulled his lips into an incredulous frown.

“Why, if you have the ability to heal beautiful paintings, do you engage in work such as this?”

“Duty,” said Gabriel. “I feel an obligation to protect my people.”

“The terrorists would say the same thing.”

“Perhaps, but I don’t murder the innocent.”

“You just threaten to send them to Egypt to be tortured.” Ibrahim looked at Gabriel. “Would you have done it?”

Gabriel shook his head. “No, Ibrahim, I wouldn’t have sent you back.”

Ibrahim looked out his window. “The snow is beautiful,” he said. “Is it a good omen or bad?”

“A friend of mine calls weather like this operational weather.”

“That’s good?”

Gabriel nodded. “It’s good.”

“You’ve done this kind of thing before?”

“Only once.”