Jews are big on candles. We light two candles every Friday night to welcome the Sabbath and we do the same again on the eve of every Jewish high holy day. Then there is the memorial candle, called a ‘yahrzheit candle’, these are the ones we light when a loved one passes away, and then in memorial every year after. We light them too for those that we didn’t know but mourn nonetheless. Jews around the world light yahrzheit candles annually on Yom H’Shoah (the Jewish Holocaust remembrance day), and since 7 October it feels like we have had to keep on lighting those candles far too frequently.
Hanukkah candles are different, though. Hanukkah candles are smaller, multi-coloured and they burn fast and bright. Hanukkah candles are candles of defiance. They declare: we are still here.
Hanukkah commemorates the Jewish rebellion of 167 BC led by the Maccabees against the Greeks, who had made it impossible for the Jews to practice their faith. The Jewish army was small but mighty and, against the odds, defeated the Greeks. In the Bible story, the Greeks trash the Jewish temple, leaving only enough oil to light the temple menorah (a seven-branch candlestick) for one night, but a miracle occurs and the oil lasts for eight nights. That is why Jews light candles for eight nights of Hanukkah.
I am so sick of seeing yahrzeit candles, of memorials and vigils
It would have been so nice if this year the Jewish community could have had the privilege of lighting only our Hanukkah candles, candles that represent freedom and joy. But no, now we must add Hanukkah to an ever lengthening list of holy days that will be forever marred by murder and barbarism. The 7 October attack happened on the festival of Simchat Torah; then, on Yom Kippur this year in the UK, two British Jews were murdered at a synagogue and now we must mourn the death of 15 Australian Jews, including 10-year-old Matilda Britvan and British-born rabbi and father-of-five, Eli Schlanger, gunned down for the crime of daring to be Jewish in public on Australia’s Bondi Beach.
I am so sick of seeing yahrzeit candles, of memorials and vigils. How many more of them do we have to light before real change happens? Will the Bondi Beach attack finally serve as a wake-up call to leaders in the West? Two gunmen standing on a bridge using Jewish families celebrating Hanukkah as target practice. Is that sickening enough? Does that ring alarm bells for any Western leaders?
Australian prime minister Anthony Albanese is proposing tougher gun laws as his magic solution. Like Keir Starmer after the Heaton Park synagogue attack, who promised increased security of Jewish buildings and communities, he is spinelessly missing the point.
Islamic State (IS) flags were found in the car of the Bondi Beach gunmen suspects Sajid Akram and Naveed Akram. Jihad Al-Shamie, who carried out the Manchester synagogue attack, pledged allegiance to IS before his murderous attack. Meanwhile, the Jewish communities here and in Australia have been pleading for their governments to pay attention to the terrifying rise in anti-Semitism.
Both Albanese and Starmer managed to summon enough courage to actually label the attacks ‘anti-Semitic’. But Heaton Park and Bondi Beach are not random acts of anti-Semitism. They did not occur in a vacuum. These attacks are a combination of a failure to tackle Islamic terrorism across the West and ignoring a toxic climate of anti-Semitism, where relentless anti-Israel propaganda is disingenuously described as political criticism by Palestinian activists. This means anti-Semitic rhetoric and calls to ‘Globalise the Intifada’ flourish on the streets of the UK, Australia and across the West.
It’s a toxic combination and leaders who bury their heads in the sand and refuse to find the necessary courage to deal with it will endanger all of us. Islamists are virulent anti-Semites, of course, but make no mistake, they hate everyone else too. Just this weekend, a plot for a terror attack on a Christmas market in Germany was foiled, alleged to have an ‘Islamist motive’ – what a shock.
There are seven nights left of Hanukkah. Jews and non-Jews alike, all those who believe in the importance of freedom, would do well to search for their own spirit of defiance. Platitudes and lukewarm sentiments of solidarity will not win this battle. Let the coming year be the one when we all find the courage to fight back against the evil in our midst. Only then will light triumph over darkness.
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