"Then you have found wisdom I can only dream of."
He chuckled. "It is an unforgettable place. Just like Jordan was right after the Ice Age, covered with tall grasses, stretching forever in every direction, with the sky everywhere, instead of being confined to a small patch above the trees."
"You are a poet," said Petra. "And also a very old man, to remember the Ice Age."
"The Ice Age was my father's time. I only remember the rainy times right after it."
"I had no idea there were tunnels under Damascus."
"In our wars with the west," said Lankowski, "we learned to bury everything that we did not want blown up. Individually-targeted bombs were first tested on Arabs, did you know that? The archives are full of pictures of exploding Arabs."
"I've seen some of the pictures," said Petra. "I also recall that during those wars, some of the individuals targeted themselves by strapping on their own bombs and blowing them up in public places."
"Yes, we did not have guided missiles, but we did have feet."
"And the bitterness remains?"
"No, no bitterness," said Lankowski. "We once ruled the known world, from Spain to India. Muslims ruled in Moscow, and our soldiers reached into France, and to the gates of Vienna. Our dogs were better educated than the scholars of the West. Then one day we woke up and we were poor and ignorant, and somebody else had all the guns. We knew this could not be the will of Allah, so we fought."
"And discovered that the will of Allah was...?"
"The will of Allah was for many of our people to die, and for the West to occupy our countries again and again until we stopped fighting. We learned our lesson. We are very well behaved now. We abide by all the treaty terms. We have freedom of the press, freedom of religion, liberated women, and democratic elections."
"And tunnels under Damascus."
"And memories." He smiled at her. "And cars without drivers."
"Israeli technology, I believe."
"For a long time we thought of Israel as the enemy
's toehold in our holy land. Then one day we remembered that Israel was a member of our family who had gone away into exile, learned everything our enemies knew, and then came home again. We stopped fighting our brother, and our brother gave us all the gifts of the West, but without destroying our souls. How sad it would have been if we had killed all the Jews and driven them out. Who would have taught us then? The Armenians?"
She laughed at his joke, but also listened to his lecture. So this was how they lived with their history--they assigned meanings to everything that allowed them to see God's hand in everything. Purpose. Even power and hope.
But they also still remembered that Muslims had once ruled the world. And they still regarded democracy as something they adopted in order to placate the West.
I really should read the Q'uran, she thought. To see what lies underneath the facade of western-style sophistication.
This man was sent to meet me, she thought, because this is the face they want visitors to Syria to see. He told me these stories, because this is the attitude they want me to believe that they have.
But this is the pretty version. The one that has been tailored to fit Western ears. The bones of the stories, the blood and the sinews of it, were defeat, humiliation, incomprehension of the will of God, loss of greatness as a people, and a sense of ongoing defeat. These are people with something to prove and with lost status to retrieve. A people who want, not vengeance, but vindication.
Very dangerous people.
Perhaps also very useful people, to a point.
She took her observations to the next step, but couched her words in the same kind of euphemistic story that he had told. "From what you tell me," said Petra, "the Muslim world sees this dangerous time in world history as the moment Allah has prepared you for. You were humbled before, so you would be submissive to Allah and ready for him to lead you to victory."
He said nothing at all for a long time.
"I did not say that."
"Of course you did," said Petra. "It was the premise underlying everything else you said. But you don't seem to realize that you have told this, not to an enemy, but to a friend."
"If you are a friend of God," said Lankowski, "why do you not obey his law?"
"But I did not say I was a friend of God," said Petra. "Only that I was a friend of yours. Some of us cannot live your law, but we can still admire those who do, and wish them well, and help them when we can."