Chanukah is the story of Jewish unity, of strength, of dignity, and of our very identities. We are all trying to grapple with the horror of what occurred yesterday at Bondi Beach, Australia.
By now, the identities of the 15 murdered include a 12-year-old girl, a Chabad rabbi, and a Holocaust survivor. The words of comfort and resilience that I have written have come much too often to me.
We have written so many of these tributes for far too many Jews, from Washington, DC, to the Passover shooting at a Chabad center in Poway, California, The Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to the Jersey City, New Jersey killing of two individuals at a kosher supermarket, to someone marching into a rabbi’s home with a machete in Monsey, New York, and murdering one, to all of the egregious attacks on religiously garbed Jews, and to the hostility, alienation and open discrimination that many of our students have been facing on campuses across the nation.
We wish all the families some way of finding peace of mind, meaning and closure.
May your candles you light this Chanukah allow you to bring comfort and warmth to your home, strength to your spirit, and Tikvah, hope for the days ahead.
As we celebrate the miracles of Chanukah, we also pause to reflect on the people who make our work possible. This holiday reminds us of the enduring strength and resilience of the Jewish people, both past and present, as well as the power of each individual to bring light into the world.
We are deeply grateful for our friends, partners, and supporters who stand with us, encourage us, and help us turn the tide of misinformation and hostility toward Israel and the Jewish people by building credible, cross-community bridges grounded in truth, shared values, and real relationships.
Just as each candle on the menorah brightens the next, each person who joins our community expands the impact we can have together. Now is a time for unity, and to cling to our Jewish identities.
We Jews are a resilient people. We will never allow this light to be extinguished, and our people to be erased from this planet.
From all of us at EMET, Chanukah Sameach!
And please, if ever there was a time to pass the Antisemitism Awareness Act, it is today! Please call your senators at (202) 224-3121, and your Congressmen at (202) 225-3121 and tell them that NOW is the time to finally pass this important Bill, HR 1007 in the House, and S 558 in the Senate. Thank you.
