Without Borders (Israel, Jerusalem)

On a painted wooden plaque hanging from a souvenir stall in Jerusalem, a thousand-year-old quote is inscribed in Hebrew and English: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself" — Leviticus 19:18 .

But here, the verse becomes an image. Two hands—one dark, the other light—reach out toward each other. A gesture that is both biblical and political, twisting Michelangelo's Creation of Adam into a manifesto of equality. It is no longer God who gives life to man, but two humans who recognize each other as sacred .

The photograph was taken in 2016 in Israel, a country crisscrossed by visible and invisible borders: walls, ideologies, fears. Six words, however, are enough to crack these walls.

In Hebrew as in Arabic, in Jew as in Muslim, the word “neighbor” is binding. It is not an abstract concept, but a face, a neighbor, another self . In Jerusalem, a city holy to three religions, this message takes on a sharp resonance. It has lost none of its radicalism. It disturbs as much as it consoles.

This sign is a reminder. That peace will never come alone. That it is made, gesture by gesture. Outstretched hand against clenched fist.