(2 of 3)
As we returned to Jaffa Gate, I realized that there had been no street noises, that here were people who lived in fear. As we reached the police station at Jaffa Gate, a British inspector met us by the barbed-wire entanglements. Said he: "You missed some excitement, Burke. Just a few minutes ago this place was a seething mass. A Jew who'd become a Christian tried to visit Christ Church [an Anglican church next to the police station]. He was spotted by a mob, who beat him. When he ran, someone fired two shots, hitting him in the leg and head. He made the church all right and was hidden by a priest, but we had to get him out in an armored car."
"Mabrouk." Since partition's announcement, life in Palestine has died down to a period of agonized waiting. Few pilgrims will venture the winding, stone-walled roads to Bethlehem unless they travel in heavily escorted convoys. British troops and policemen will patrol Manger Square for Christmas Eve's midnight solemn high Mass. Just i. few days ago outside Bethlehem Arabs ambushed a Jewish convoy, killed ten, while yesterday in north Palestine Jews invaded an Arab village, threw bombs, killed ten including five small children.
In New Jerusalem, commercial life is dead. Jews don't go to Barclay's Bank, which is in the Arab area, because they wouldn't live to come out, and Arab taxi drivers won't take customers through any Jewish neighborhood. To those of us who do move around, it's like crossing & recrossing between two foreign countries.
For safety many an Arab who had become westernized has suddenly gone back to Arab ways. Most Arabs now wear khafiyas (headcloths) or tarbooshes, which haven't been popular in Palestine since 1936. Tarboosh-Maker Philip Akrouk, who ordinarily turns out three tarbooshes daily, is now working elbow-deep in red felt, is selling as many as 30 a day. Says Akrouk as a customer finds one that fits: "Mabrouk!"—"[Wear it] with blessings."
Fifteen Long Miles. When I came up a few days ago from Lydda to Jerusalem, I carefully picked a private Arab car and went through a totally Arab district (other routes alternate between Jewish and Arab areas). Coming up a long grade we were flagged down by a rifle-toting Arab wearing a desert headdress. Stopping us, he pointed his rifle towards me, saying: "This man's Yahudi [Jew].,"
My driver, a hardboiled, competent Arab taxi driver, said, "He's not Yahudi. He's an English newspaper correspondent [there's also open season in Palestine on Americans]."
Said my would-be assassin: "He looks like Yahudi to me. I'll ride along with you." I offered him a cigarette. When I turned towards the back seat to offer him a light, he had propped an automatic on the back of the seat, pointing it at my head. '