Naphtali paused to let his words sink in, but right then a military aide rushed into the room, cleared his throat, and handed the prime minister a phone.
“I’m sorry to interrupt, sir. But you’ve got Defense Minister Shimon on line two, and it’s urgent.”
Birjandi felt a lump form in his throat.
How he loved these two young men. He was amazed at how much and how quickly they had changed. Three months earlier, each of them had been a devout Shiite. Each of them came from a deeply religious family. Their parents were Twelvers, religious zealots fiercely committed to the Twelfth Imam and the establishment of the Caliphate.
Yet both men had been watching Iranian Christian evangelists on satellite television. Both had begun reading the New Testament on the sly in hopes of refuting it. And both of them had had dreams and visions of Jesus. Within a few short weeks, each had become absolutely convinced that Jesus — not Muhammad and certainly not the Mahdi — was the Savior of mankind and Lord of the universe. Each of them secretly had, therefore, become a follower of Jesus, and the Lord had directed them to Birjandi.
For the last nine weeks, Birjandi had met secretly with them for four to five hours every Wednesday to teach them the Holy Scriptures, starting with the Gospel according to John. He had taught them how to carefully observe, properly interpret, and faithfully apply every single verse they found in the Bible. He had answered their many questions — hundreds upon hundreds of them — and he had challenged them again and again to spend time in prayer. “We serve a prayer-hearing and a prayer-answering God, a wonder-working God!” he loved to say. “And answered prayer is one of the ways we experience him.”
“So where do you want to begin?” Birjandi now asked them after they had thanked their Father in heaven and committed their time in the Word to him.
Ali didn’t miss a beat. “With the prophets,” he said. “We want to understand the prophecies of the Scriptures. We want to know if the Bible speaks to the future of Iran. Does the Lord give us any clues as to what will happen to us? And if so, does it tell us what is going to happen with this war, how it will play out?”
“You want to know if the Israelis are going to win or if the mullahs will?” Birjandi asked.
“Yes.”
The old man leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands. He seemed to ruminate over their request, but not for long.
“Very well, gentlemen, the time has come for us to search out together some of the mysteries of the ancient prophets,” he said softly. “Understand that they did not speak about future events in all countries at all times, but they certainly spoke to the future of some countries in the last days of history before the return of Jesus Christ, and they most certainly spoke of the future of Iran. Now let’s put on some tea, and we will begin.”
Prime Minister Naphtali grabbed the phone and took the line off hold.
He was now on a secure line with Defense Minister Levi Shimon in the IDF war room deep below Tel Aviv.
“Levi, it’s me. What is it? I’m in a meeting with Monty.”
“Mr. Prime Minister, we have five Shahab-3 inbound from Iran. One is headed for Haifa, but four appear headed for Dimona.”
Naphtali was stunned. “You’re sure?”
“That’s what the computer track says.”
“How long to impact?”
“Three minutes, maybe less.”
“Can you shoot them down?”
“We’re trying — but it’s going to be close.”
Lexi Vandermark kept tossing and turning. She didn’t want to disturb her husband, Chris, but nor did she have any idea how he could actually sleep at a moment like this. She finally lay on her back, nestled her body next to his, and stared up at the unmoving ceiling fan.
The fan wasn’t moving because the hotel had no electricity. They had no electricity because a missile from Lebanon — or several, actually — had taken out the power station nearby. But Lexi refused to think about the war. She refused to look out the windows at the burning buildings in Tiberias and all the zigzagging contrails in the sky above the Sea of Galilee, some from the Israeli fighter jets that screamed by every few minutes, heading north, and some left behind by the rockets and missiles coming in from Lebanon and from Iran, heading south and west.
She closed her eyes tightly and dialed back a few days to when all was quiet and peaceful, and she and Chris were enjoying the honeymoon they had always dreamed of. Ever since they had landed at Ben Gurion International Airport, Chris had been teasing her that she’d packed too much. But she knew he didn’t really mind lugging around her two suitcases in addition to his own. It made him happy to make her happy, and she hoped he planned to spend his life doing it.
They had loved seeing Jaffa and the beaches of Tel Aviv and working their way up the coast to see the ruins at Caesarea and the church on top of Mount Carmel. Chris had been especially intrigued with Megiddo, where Lexi knew the Bible foretold a great battle — the battle of Armageddon — would one day take place. But coming to Galilee — especially by Chris’s side — had by far been her favorite part of the trip.
As they’d checked in to the Leonardo Plaza Hotel, with a great view of the calm and gentle sea behind them, Lexi had sat on a plum-colored sofa in the lobby watching her new husband with shining eyes. Chris was all she had ever dreamed of. He was handsome, especially in his cargo shorts and gray T-shirt, but he was also hilarious, adventurous, and brilliant. Best of all, Chris loved God more than her, and that was exactly the type of man she wanted to spend the rest of her life with. How had she gotten so lucky? It was God’s gift to her, and she hoped she’d never get over the amazement of it all.
And now they were not only in the Holy Land but looking out over the water upon which Jesus had walked, upon which Peter had fished.
She and Chris had spent months planning every detail of this once-in-a-lifetime journey. They’d read dozens of books and commentaries and novels about events that happened on or around the Sea of Galilee. One of Lexi’s friends from church had made them matching personalized journals with biblical maps and many key Scriptures accompanying them, and they’d devoured it all. There were spaces for them to write their thoughts and paste in snapshots and brochures, and both journals were already full.
They had begun on the north shore, in Capernaum, where Jesus had established his base camp for a ministry of teaching, healing, and discipleship. Then they’d gone to the museum that housed the “Jesus Boat”—a fishing boat dating back to the first century that was just like the kind the Messiah and his disciples used. Lexi had loved holding Chris’s hand as together they had watched a movie about the boat and learned about its discovery.
Slowly but surely now her eyelids were beginning to get heavy. The more she savored the sweet memories they were making, the more peaceful she felt; and the more peaceful she became, the more she let herself drift away, just for a little while, a catnap to take the edge off, and then…
At first she thought it was a dream or a nightmare, but suddenly Lexi realized the air-raid sirens were going off again. She was terrified. Rockets and missiles were inbound, and Lexi had no idea how many or where they would strike. Shot through with adrenaline, she jumped out of bed and shook Chris, shouting at him to get up and run with her to the bomb shelter. Though she tried to rush him, it took Chris a moment to get his bearings. Groggy and half-conscious, he wasn’t listening, wasn’t responding.