We interrupt the Kamala versus Donald Sweepstakes to bring you the fourth part of a satire I call “The Satan Series.”
October 16, 2024
15 Tishrei 5785
Tenth floor of hell
Satan (nervously walking back and forth and puffing on a cigarette): Where is he?! He should have been here almost 20 days ago!
Sergio (Satan’s dutiful assistant): I know, master. With all due respect, you have asked that question quite often. We’ve even received an official complaint from Tsar Nicholas on the ninth floor demanding, and I quote, “An end to this insufferable countdown that seeks to uselessly track the whereabouts of that Lebanese peasant.”
Satan: I’ll deal with Nick later. Maybe he’d like to count how many boiling-hot coals I can shove into his nostrils, and then file another formal complaint.
Sergio: There, there, master. Nasrallah couldn’t have gone far.
Satan: Then WHERE is he?! I need some more coffee.
Satan puts out his cigarette and approaches the coffee machine.
Satan: That’s just great. And now the Nespresso machine is out of capsules. Sergio! Where’s that Israeli-brand ground coffee — the red can?
Sergio: (running toward Satan with his clipboard): He’s here! Oh, master, I’ve waited weeks to make this announcement. He’s finally here!
Former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah limps off the elevator on the 10th floor of hell. His hair immediately catches fire from the surrounding inferno.
Satan: Where’s the water cooler?! Someone, throw some water on this wretch!
Carl (the 10th floor custodian): There’s been a department-wide ban on plastic bottles, master. We’ve all been drinking from the hose that G-d throws down every month from heaven.
Satan: Who approved that ban on plastic — wait, let me guess: the progressives? Forget it! Just throw some ashes on him and bring him to me.
Sergio and Carl cover Nasrallah in ashes, then hold him by his arms and bring him before Satan.
Satan (addressing Nasrallah): Listen, you miserable toad, I’m having a terrible morning. You kept me waiting for three weeks and the Nespresso machine is out of those little gold capsules I like. I think I reserve the right to ask you to your insolent face: Where the hell have you been?
Nasrallah (half-smiling): I took a detour.
Satan pulls Nasrallah’s glasses off his face and breaks both lenses with his fists.
Satan: There’s no LensCrafters in hell, Hassan. I’m only going to ask you this one more time: What took you so long?
Nasrallah (trembling): I … I … I wasn’t at fault, I swear. I was tumbling down into the nether regions of damnation when, all of the sudden, I came to a stop and almost hovered mid-air.
Sergio (whispering): Like the world’s fattest hummingbird.
Nasrallah: And then, I heard a voice shouting, “Wait! This one needs a more thorough background check. He’s being described by Western media as apparently having been generous, charismatic, and extremely beloved by children and the elderly.”
“Wait! This one needs a more thorough background check. He’s being described by Western media as apparently having been generous, charismatic, and extremely beloved by children and the elderly.”
Satan (listening while attempting to sip water from a plastic hose without spilling it all over his mouth and fangs): Those progressives will be the end of me, and that includes those editors on earth. Frankly, I’m not even sure I can survive another U.S. election next week. So then what happened?
Nasrallah: Then I heard another voice. It was surreal and angelic, almost too perfect to describe. “Ahmad?” I asked innocently. But it wasn’t Ahmad (he commanded our Radwan Force). Funny enough, it was the voice of G-d. And then I heard, “The headlines were false. Banish him!” And that’s how I ended up here. Mind if I have a sip of that hose? I’ve been in limbo for days.
Satan: Silence! Water is only for administration, custodial staff, and me!
Satan scans a wall of various torture devices that also includes a newspaper profile of him from the 1970s.
Satan: Oh, I’ve been looking forward to this. Sergio, bring me “The Poker” and some Iranian uranium. I’ll take care of this entry personally.
Sergio: Pardon me master, but isn’t he entitled to a trial?
Satan: You heard Ahmad! I mean G-d! He’s banished to hell and now I get to squeeze him into a thin dish and make some Nasra-Lasagna for everyone at the staff meeting!
Sergio: Oh, All-Knowing One, I hate to question you but — (Sergio’s iPhone 3 begins beeping wildly).
Satan: What is it?
Sergio (looking down at his phone): No. No. NO! It can’t be. Not now. I can’t deal with this now!
Sergio begins walking compulsively back and forth and speaking nervously to himself.
Satan: What happened?! The last time you reacted to something like this was when the Soviet hockey team accidentally arrived on the fourth floor back in 1980 (Satan stomps his feet on the floor and looks downward.) You hear that, Nicholas? Your lousy athletes couldn’t even beat a bunch of Americans at a place that was actually called Lake Placid!
Sergio: Oh, master. I don’t know how to tell you this, but Sinwar is on his way over.
Satan: No!
Sergio: Yes! Apparently, he was pulled out of a chair and dragged down here before any Western newspapers could declare he was the patron saint of Palestinian grandmothers.
Satan (whispering while looking upward): Thank you, G-d. Sergio, do we have an extra “Poker”?
Nasrallah (squinting his eyes): Yahya, is that you? They broke my glasses and I can’t tell if it’s you or some mangled side of meat with arms and legs.
Sinwar: Hassan? I can’t see that well either, on account of the fact that the Zionists first saved my brain and then took it back.
Satan (watching in amusement): This is incredible. They’ve each been here longer than one minute and neither one of them has yet to ask about virgins.
Sinwar (approaching Sergio): You don’t look like a beautiful virgin.
Satan: Never mind.
Sergio: We often don’t have such evil arrive on the same day, master. How shall we proceed? I went ahead and ordered a second “Poker” on Amazon, but you know how their delivery is so unreliable once their trucks reach the earth’s mantle. Also, I hate to bring this up again, but I really must insist on some kind of trial …
Satan (stroking his beard and watching as Nasrallah and Sinwar attempt to have a meaningful reunion in the fieriest depths of hell): You’ve given me an idea. It’s new, but I think it’ll work. Until that second “Poker” arrives, at least. Shh, just listen to them for a second.
Nasrallah: What are you doing here, dear Yahya? There must have been some mistake!
Sinwar: What are you doing here, dear Hassan? Your presence here (and mine) contradicts everything I’ve ever believed.
Satan: Sergio, bring these two brutes forward.
Sergio prompts both terrorist masterminds to kneel before Satan.
Satan: I am prepared to make a deal with you both: Each of you will be given an opportunity to prove before me why the other is more deserving of an eternity of suffering. If you can successfully prove that the other butcher committed more heinous crimes than you, you will receive a more lenient sentence. Now, who would like to go first?
Nasrallah and Sinwar exchange uncomfortable looks and remain silent for minutes on end. Then Sinwar breaks the silence.
Sinwar (pointing at Nasrallah): He irreparably ruined Lebanon and ordered thousands of deaths!
Nasrallah (shouting toward Sinwar): He caused thousands of Palestinians and Israelis to die needlessly!
Sinwar: He was part of a group that killed almost 300 American Marines in 1983!
Nasrallah: Israel actually removed a tumor from his sick brain and saved his life, and he turned around and planned Oct. 7! The ingratitude!
Sinwar: He and his group fired on Druze children in a soccer field!
Nasrallah: He bought his wife a $32,000 Birkin bag while Palestinians around him were suffering from impoverishment at the hands of Hamas’ inept rule in Gaza!
Sinwar: That’s not fair! We both made fortunes off the suffering of those we claimed to represent! Also (whispering to Sergio), if my wife ends up here as well, can she bring that purse with her?
Sergio: No worldly objects that once belonged to you on Earth are allowed in hell!
Nasrallah (scoffing): Apparently, not even your eyeglasses.
Satan: You’ve both made quite miserable cases. But I believe Mr. Sinwar deserves the harsher of the two judgments. Throw him into Room C and Nasrallah into Room D and label the doors so I can keep track of them until the punishments begin.
Sergio: I’ve already printed out the labels, master.
Sergio affixes Sinwar’s label to the door of Room C.
Satan: No, this has a typo.
Sergio: I don’t see one, master.
Satan: Right there. You see where it says “Sinwar”? Change it to “Sinwas.”
Tabby Refael is an award-winning writer, speaker and weekly columnist for The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles. Follow her on X and Instagram @TabbyRefael.
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