I Am Still Here: Writings from the Wannsee Conference House

On November 4th, 2024, on a cold autumn day in the German capital, I took a short day trip to the historic Wannsee Conference House—a place that has haunted me ever since I first learned about it in high school.

The Wannsee Villa, nestled by a serene Berlin lake, is one of the most beautiful houses I’ve ever seen. And yet, in 1942, within its walls, senior Nazi officials calmly sat around a table and planned the “Final Solution”—the systematic extermination of European Jewry. That contrast—the elegance of the place and the horror it gave birth to—is impossible to forget.

When people asked why I was going, I casually remarked—ironically, of course—“I’m going to look for the Final Solution… to my life.”

It was a dark joke, but it carried a truth. For many years, since childhood, I’ve tried to grapple with the evil that came from Germany—not to look away from it, but to understand it. I learned the language. I spent time in the country. I went to the sites. I needed to feel it in my body, to confront it directly, to see what it means to be there.

My grandfather came from Germany. He was a Jewish orphan and had to flee for his life. So in a way, Germany is part of me. And perhaps I’ve always been looking for some kind of answer there—a different kind of “final solution,” if you will. Not one of destruction, but of integration. Of understanding. Of resolve.

During that visit, I sat behind the villa and wrote these three pieces—part poems, part meditations. I wrote them in Hebrew, and I’ve translated them here.

I’ve held on to them for a while, unsure whether to share them. But today, on Holocaust Remembrance Day, it feels not only appropriate—it feels necessary. Especially now, in a world where antisemitism is once again rising, and history is being twisted or forgotten.

We must remember what was done,

how quietly and politely it was planned,

and how easily it could return.

I hope more people come to know this place.

To visit it.

To confront it.

As I did.

Writing in my notebook behind the Wannsee Villa, where the Final Solution was planned.

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Wannsee

In this house,
they decided to murder my people.
What does that mean for me?

It’s quiet here.
Peaceful.
The lake is calm—
the ducks, too.
The trees are cloaked in autumn.

What did you witness?
These trees bore silent witness
to the greatest planned murder in history—
the most unspeakable crime.

Why did you do nothing?

This is one of the most beautiful houses I’ve seen.
Adorned with noble sculptures,
glorifying Man.

A place of brutal contrast.
Aesthetic beauty,
and moral rot.
There is no necessary link between the two.

Eighty-two years have passed
since that meeting.
And here I am, sitting.

The same trees.
The same lake.

Could it happen again?

But it already has.
Just over a year ago,
in a place far uglier—
a tunnel,
filthy and underground—
they sat again,
planning another crime.

Another conference.
Another Shoah.

And yet—
I am still here.
The leaves are still green,
though winter looms.

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The Road to Wannsee

The road here was varied.
Two Jews boarded the train.
One with a long beard,
the other with sidelocks.
Both wore hats—
but where was the kippah?

As if trying to hide their identity.
If they knew where I was headed—
would they have acted differently?

Have we really won,
if in Berlin,
we still must conceal who we are?

What did we learn from this house?
What is the lesson
of six million?

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We Learned Nothing

National Socialism will return.
We have learned nothing.
The same crimes,
repeated.

These memorial sites—
they are hollow.

What was the philosophy
that led to the Holocaust?
They don’t know.

(Written on the bench behind the Wannsee Villa, November 4, 2024)

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