In “Enemies Foreign” Mossad head, Eli David (Michael Nouri) has come to Washington. Not to visit his daughter Ziva (Cote de Pablo). This pair are as estranged as ever the word meant. How would you feel if your father left you in the dessert to die, hmm?
Eli is in town ostensibly to attend an NCIS review conference — something he could have done via video. So why come to America?
A young woman electronically steals a credit card off a guy on the international terrorist watch list. She is arrested by Tony DiNozzo (Michael Weatherly) and Tim McGee (Sean Murray). OK, you can forget about her now.
Using the same device, Ziva finds the man. Malachi Ben-Gidon is a Mossad officer in the country illegally with Ziva’s current replacement Liat Tuvia. The woman has all of Ziva’s skills. Malachi and Liat were sent ahead of Eli to protect him from three Palestinian assassins.
Dr. “Ducky” Mallard has received three bodies, smugglers who fired upon a coast guard ship. An empty crate was discovered in the sea. The crate had air holes cut into it suggesting someone or ones smuggled themselves into America.
Eli meets with Leroy Jethro Gibbs (Mark Harmon). His coming to Washington has something to do with a file to be reviewed at the conference. It deals with a young agent in Amsterdam. The agent was Leon Vance now director of NCIS. This is the key to the episode, and being November sweeps, you had to know you weren’t going to be told what the Amsterdam file was about tonight. Tune in next week.
Cat Fight
Gibbs and his team working with Malachi and Liat are charged with protecting Eli. They look for the best route into the hotel where the conference is being held. Ziva and Liat decide to bring Eli in via the parking garage and through the kitchen. Ziva acting as Eli and Gibbs as bodyguard walk through the garage looking for assassins played by DiNozzo, McGee, Malachi and Liat.
Using a cool laser beam weapon, Gibbs easily dispatches Tony, McGee and Malachi. Liat admits she would have been killed but not before shooting many holes in Eli via a concealed weapon. Ziva can’t believe she walked into the trap.
The dynamics between the two women is interesting. Ziva extols her achievements with Mossad, but Liat has chops of her own. Liat points out she has time to accumulate more accolades being younger. Meow ladies.
Eli is being kept in a “safe house.” He wants to feel the November coolness so Gibbs takes him for a walk. His team and the Mossad officers watch the street. One of the assassins pops up. Liat shoots him. After the man is dead, she tells him to drop his weapon. Before? After? Semantics.
Later Eli talks to Vance in his office. The question of the Amsterdam file comes up again. What can be so bad in Vance’s past that Eli comes to Washington?
Daddy’s Girl
Abby Sciuto talks to Ziva about her father. Last week we learned Abby’s father is dead. She counsels Ziva, telling her fathers do come back into their children’s lives sighting Gibbs’ father and Tony’s as examples. The adult child-parent dynamic is complicated but more so when the parent is no longer living. Ziva should talk to her father.
When it’s time to go to the conference Director Vance gets into a limousine. Eli’s bodyguard Hadar (Arnold Vosloo, “The Mummy”) rides up front. Ziva will drive.
Before getting in she tries to talk to her father who may be killed. He agrees to talk if she wants to but he won’t beg her. He tells her he has his reasons for hiding his heart. It was open once when his home was filled with the laughter of children. He refers to her, her sister and her half-brother Ari.
Ziva drives to the hotel. Gibbs, Tony, McGee, Malachi and Liat are stationed on the street in front watching for the assassins. They spot one of them. He is arrested.
McGee feels a dry cleaner’s delivery truck has been at the scene a long time. He checks it out with Malachi and comes face to face with an auto tracking multi-shot weapon. Malachi pulls the plug on it to the relief of McBoy-Am-I-In-The-Wrong-Place.
McGee tells Ziva to take Eli through the parking garage. They reach the kitchen and another of those weapons starts firing. Ziva yells to Hadar to take Eli and Vance to the safe house. They run to the limo and drive off. As they flee, the assassin fires an RPG (rocket propelled grenade) at it. He misses! Seriously. The guy can’t hit the car with a small missile. He blows up a taxi instead. No fare. Ziva had shot him. He gets up with two guns ready to fire. In the hotel garage Ziva and Tony cancel his reservation. Threat neutralized.
Or is it? And what about Amsterdam?
To be continued …
(Image courtesy of CBS)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
