In numerous watercolors, Raymond Pettibon depicts a field of gravestones uniform in size and reminiscent of military cemeteries with an inscription of text. In the 2005 drawing No Title (Like the Israelis…), Pettibon inscribes along the bottom margin “Like the Israelis, we make the desert bloom.” In Pettibon’s drawing, the “we” is ambiguous. Meanwhile, the act of “making the desert bloom” refers both to a Zionist slogan and to the Israeli afforestation and agricultural projects in the Negev and Judean Desert, a contested endeavor requiring the forced displacement of Palestinians. The phrase was used by former Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol in 1969, who stated in an interview “What are the Palestinians? When I came here there were 250,000 non-Jews, mainly Arabs and Bedouins. It was desert. More than underdeveloped. Nothing. It was only after we made the desert bloom that they became interested in taking it from us.”[1]