Graffiti in Tel Aviv

These snapshots show a courageous, subversive and often hilarious political graffiti fight which decorates some walls in Tel Aviv, Israel. Except for the last shot, you obviously need to understand Hebrew in order to grasp what’s going on here, but I’ll do my best to translate.

There is a very well known political slogan in Hebrew, «Am Israel Hai», which means «The People of Israel lives on». Originally a religious song, it’s now chanted mostly by right-wing supporters in political demonstrations. The general idea is to emphasize the supposed strength of the Jewish people, which has faced its purported enemies and lives on in spite of all hardship and misfortune. The practical political meaning of this phrase is, essentially, “everybody else can go to hell”.

This summer, I found this slogan written in blue spray all over the southern neighborhoods of Tel Aviv, accompanied by a huge Star of David. It wouldn�t have been worth mentioning if another person, a whole lot wittier, hadn�t modified each and every instance of that graffiti with red spray, adding words and letters before and after the text, totally transforming the intended message.

The first graffiti shows the phrase «The People of Israel lives on» transformed into «The People of Israel are animals». Next, the message says, «Come on, the People of Israel, let�s make peace». Another graffiti was transformed into «The People of Israel lives in a movie». All of this I found to be absolutely remarkable, both graphically and politically.

The last photograph, a graffiti sprayed in English, speaks for itself.