Minor Fictional Characters in Alpha and Omega

This article lists the various minor fictional characters who appear in Alpha and Omega. Most were simply mentioned or had a very brief, unimportant speaking role that did not impact the plot, and never appeared again.

Alexander Desk Clerk
When Gabriela Sandoval woke at 4:28 in the morning and found that room service didn't start until 6:30, she showered and dressed and went to the Alexander Hotel front desk clerk to ask her where she could get some breakfast. The clerk thought about it since the clubs were closed and most restaurants didn't open until later. The clerk then suggested the main Tel Aviv bus station which operated around the clock. It was a couple of kilometers so Sandoval could take a taxi or walk which would be less than a half hour. Sandoval asked if would be safe to walk at this time of day to which the clerk replied it was since the thieves would be asleep by now and in any case Tel Aviv was a pretty safe place. Armed with a map and her cellphone, Sandoval decided to walk.

Paddy Bergeron
Paddy Bergeron was a cross-dressing, meth-dealing armed robber out on parole. He and his three girlfriends who hadn't known about each other until the show were guests on the Gabriela and Brandon TV show. Things didn't quite breakdown into a brawl and four burly stagehands helped keep the peace. Bergeron had a good time and made a pass at Gabriela Sandoval when the filming ended which disgusted her. One of his now ex-girlfriends made a come on to Brandon Nesbitt which he declined more gracefully.

Binyamin
Binyamin was the leader of the Likud party. He had spent many years in the United States, where he picked up some distinctly American mannerisms. Following the dirty bomb attack on Tel Aviv, Israel's government collapsed, and the Likud won a parliamentary landslide, installing Binyamin as Prime Minister. His cabinet included Natan as Minister of Defense and Shlomo Kupferman as Minister of Religious Affairs.

Following the miraculous failure of a barrage of Iranian missiles to do any damage to Israel, Binyamin telephoned Minister Kupferman to inform him that the Iranian government had been decapitated by apparently supernatural means.

Binyamin personally led the diplomatic escort which welcomed Muhammad al-Muntazar, the Islamic Mahdi, to Jerusalem.

Literary comment
At the time of publication, the Israeli PM office was held by Benjamin Netanyahu (בִּנְיָמִין נְתַנְיָהוּ), whose first name can also be rendered as Binyamin. Netanyahu is a Likudnik who spent much of his youth in the United States. However, the novel's refusal to give any further details about "Binyamin" suggests that he is an analog, rather than Netanyahu himself.

César
César was Gabriela Sandoval's ex-husband. He worked at IT for a pharmaceutical company in New Jersey and filed for divorce when Gabriela was on her second reporting stint in Iraq. He may have gotten tired of the long distance relationship or perhaps had already hooked-up with his current girlfriend. (Gabriela's lawyers couldn't prove the latter.) In any case, Gabriela's work out of the country let César gain sole custody of their daughter Heather.

Forrest Charleston
Forrest Charleston was a news commentator for Fox News. After the dirty bomb explosion in Tel Aviv, Charleston flew to Israel to cover the aftermath. He had Gabriela Sandoval, who was an eyewitness to the blast, on his show. She privately thought he was slightly to the right of Attila the Hun but, as a fellow professional, she didn't vehemently disagree with him on his show.

Charleston believed ISIS was responsible. Sandoval agreed with the possibility but also suggested al-Qaeda or Hezbollah as possibilities. She did dismiss Hamas and Fatah as not having the expertise to set off a dirty bomb. Charleston demanded to know where the other two would get the radioactive materials but Sandoval countered that ISIS would have the same difficulties. She had four possibilities: renegade Russians, Iran, Pakistan or North Korea. Charleston pushed his bug-a-boo France but Sandoval dismissed them since even with plausible deniability they risked Israeli retaliation.

After they went off the air, Charleston expressed satisfaction on how the broadcast had went. He was interrupted by an aide who passed him a note indicating the suicide of the Israeli Minister of Security which he called the first bit of collateral damage.

Bill Henderson
Bill Henderson was farmer in Arkansas who raised cattle. Most were Holsteins but one was a brick red heifer. Henderson was a Christian fundamentalist and so recognized it as a possible red heifer denoting the End of Days. The Reconstruction Alliance of Israel was interested and, after an investigation into him and his farm, sent Yitzhak Avigad to examine the cow. Henderson was pleased to meet Yitzhak and his nephew Chaim since he felt they were doing Godly work. After a close examination Yitzhak agreed to buy Rosie at far over market price which also pleased Henderson.

Iranian Minister of Defense
Iran launched three missiles at Israel in retaliation for the removal of the Dome of the Rock from the Temple Mount which simply disappeared. At the same time, the Minister of Defense died in the middle of a telephone call.

Israeli Defense Forces Captain
A Captain with the Israeli Defense Forces was stationed at a Patriot Missile battery when Iran launched three missiles at Israel in retaliation for the removal of the Dome of the Rock from the Temple Mount. He was in charge of the radar section and reported to the colonel that two missiles were launched from eastern Iran while one from the northwest corner.

The colonel ordered the captain to start a verbal countdown when the nearest missile was 30 seconds from the optimum Patriot launch time. Before the captain reached zero, the radar screens flashed causing curses to ring out from his command. He reported that the three missiles were gone from the radar but the Iranians couldn't be jamming it since they were still getting returns from aircraft in the area.

Israeli First-Aid Volunteer
When a van with a dirty bomb exploded outside Tel Aviv's main bus station, an Israeli man applied first-aid. He grabbed Gabriela Sandoval's arm and told her, in Hebrew, that they had to help the injured. She replied in English she didn't understand and he repeated himself in English. The two helped a man thrashing on the ground with a deep wound in his flank and then the Israeli stuffed his wadded handkerchief and an eyeglasses cloth from Sandoval into the wound to slow the bleeding. He stopped an ambulance by standing in front of it yelling until the attendants took the man away.

The Israeli then asked for Sandoval's telephone number which she refused to give. The man only shrugged telling her it was her loss and went to help the next closest injured person.

Israeli Minister of Security
The Minister of Security resigned in the immediate aftermath of the dirty bomb explosion in Tel Aviv. That night, he killed himself, leaving behind a wife and five children.

JFK Security Officer
Israel took airport and airline security seriously so a Security Officer at JFK grilled the stars and crew of Gabriela and Brandon thoroughly. Gabriela Sandoval became frustrated and tried to pull rank by demanding if he knew who she was. He replied with a cold "No" and continued to question her. With the help of Saul Buchbinder and Brandon Nesbitt they convinced him they had a legitimate reason to travel to Israel and let them board. He did think that their intention to make a documentary on the red heifer was a silly reason and viewers interested in it should find something more important.

Natan
Natan was the Israeli Defense Minister in Prime Minister Binyamin's Likud cabinet. Following the miraculous failure of a barrage of Iranian missiles to do any damage to Israel, Natan received a telephone call from Religious Affairs Minister Shlomo Kupferman, desperately asking what had happened. Natan's answer caused Kupferman to spontaneously recite the Sh'mah, sparking the curiosity of his guest Yitzhak Avigad.

Reconstruction Alliance Museum Attendant
When Eric Katz and Orly Binur visited a museum set up by the Reconstruction Alliance, Katz irritated a museum attendant by mocking a gaudy reconstruction of the Second Temple. She angrily asked why they had come if they made fun of the Alliance to which Katx replied they were archaeologists. This did soften her attitude a bit and she showed the two the various artifacts the Alliance had reconstructed.

Sophia
Sophia was an assistant for the stars of the Gabriela and Brandon television show. She flattered Gabriela Sandoval by calling her a role model and considered sleeping with Brandon Nesbitt if it would advance her career.

Rhonda Stark
Rhonda Stark was the high-school sweetheart of the Reverend Lester Stark. The two had married before Lester started his ministry and remained devoted and faithful to each other ever since. Lester felt she helped keep him grounded and was always honest with what she thought of what he was saying and doing.

Vice President of the United States
The Vice President visited the Temple Mount to see the site where the Ark of the Covenant was discovered.

Mordechai Yehoshua
Captain Mordechai Yehoshua of the Israeli security forces took charge of the operations in Tel Aviv when a dirty bomb was exploded at the main bus station. He told the Gabriela and Brandon show that they had quickly learned it was radioactive because they always carried Geiger counters just in case. They immediately cordoned off the area to limit radioactive poisoning. Fortunately, the winds were light so the fallout didn't spread as far as it might have otherwise. He estimated the death toll from the explosion itself to about a thousand but had no idea what the effects of the radiation might be.