WE SEE / WIR SEHEN / ΕΜΕΙΣΒΛΕΠΟΥΜΕ / אנחנו רואות / نحن نرى
On Erev Shabbat, on Iftar, on Good Friday,
we sit, our backs to Lake Ioannina, staring at Mavili Square, where, on 25 March, 1944, all Jews of Ioannina, among them Nelly + Rivka + Annetta + Nissim + others in Adi’s family, were deported, on trucks, by Nazi occupiers, + sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau, thorough Larissa, + then Thessaloniki, by train, to their deaths, we are blindfolded,
we walk, in Berlin, hovering Westhafen Station, to the former Putlitzstraße Station, where, on 3
February, 1943, Jewish families of Mitte, among them Erna and Martin, Eliana’s great grandparents, were forced from their homes, which had been converted into ghetto, + deported, on trains, + sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau, to their deaths, we are blindfolded,
Gaza my love, we see.
In Erfurt, Freiburg, Minden, Bamberg, Strasbourg, Notre Dame, Canterbury, for a thousand years, your cathedrals showed us to you in the body of a woman blindfolded, you named her Synagoga, she stood, in submission, holding broken things, beside you, victorious, in the body of a woman, not blindfolded, named Ecclesia, we saw inside ourselves, Martin Luther, founder of Protestantism, peasant-slayer, told you we see our Talmud (our Diasporas) inside a pig’s ass, we were blindfolded, we saw inside ourselves, Luther told you we lie, Luther told you burn and bury through everything of us, Gaza my love, we see.
In Ioannina, 1611, after the uprising of Dionysios Philosophos, of Orthodox peasants + shepherds, the massacre of Jews + Muslims, against one empire’s exploitations + supported by another’s, near Lake Ioannina, you say you see, among the rocks, the old Jewish woman, blindfolded, who spied him, called Ottoman rulers, for his execution, as with Jesus, 2,024 years ago, you say you see, whose crucifixion nails, you say you see, even after our genocides, were made by Romani, then you were expelled, from within Ioannina’s walls, + replaced by us, for a time, who then, blindfolded, came inside, Gaza my love, we see.
Facing the genocide of Palestinians perpetrated by the State of Israel, we, carrying these stories, refuse the fascism forced on Jews by Nationalists + Philosemites, you tell us we lie, 30.000 murdered, 13.000 children, 1.8 million displaced, 700,000 in most severe starvation, 1.3 million in acute hunger facing it, 70% homes destroyed, 1 million ghettoized in Rafah waiting invasion, you tell us we lie, you tell us burn + bury through infants in incubators, water, universities, hospitals, poets, flour or we blaspheme Nelly + Rivka + Annetta + Nissim + Erna + Martin or we’re not ourselves,
you blindfold us, Gaza my love, we see you inside ourselves.
—Adi Liraz, Eliana Pliskin Jacobs, Robert Yerachmiel Sniderman
Exhibition History:
27-29 June 2025. TRANSDIASPORA, 48 Stunden Neukölln Festival. Berlin, Germany.
Media:
“The only place to reflect critically is on the streets” by Sarah Adler (The Berlin Left, 2024)
Artist Talks:
Robert Yerachmiel Sniderman. “Against Genocide: Gaza, Shoah, Oak Anfal.” 17 April 2024, College of Fine and Performing Arts: Department of Art & Art History and Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies, Western Washington University.