Hanukkah in the Global Darkness

Looking back, what happened this weekend in Bondi Beach sounds like a tragedy foretold. Australia, like most Western nations, has become a hotbed of anti-Semitism since the October 7, 2023 pogrom. The new hatred of Jews has been shaped and refined over the past two years, fueled by a delusional hatred of Israel.

The Australian Prime Minister's decision, as well as that of almost all the leaders of the free world, to "recognize" a Palestinian state as a reward for the pogrom and attacks on Israel from the very day of its founding, has demonstrated to leaders and soldiers of the global jihad that the West will deliver anything they ask for in exchange for a limited period of calm. It has also revealed to many of the world's Jews that they are no longer safe in their countries of origin, countries to which, in many cases, their grandparents fled when they were hunted by the Nazi advance guard.

The Australian case is particularly lacerating. Since October 7, 2023, reported anti-Semitic incidents have multiplied to unprecedented levels. Two days after the Hamas invasion, the streets of Sydney were filled with activists chanting, "Gasify the Jews." Between October 2023 and November 2025, there were thousands of anti-Semitic attacks in Australia, averaging more than five a day.

Synagogues have been attacked with firebombs. Judeophobic graffiti has been painted on Jewish schools, such as "Murder your local Zionist." Cars have been set on fire. Houses have been tagged. Children have been harassed.

No one knows when or where the next terrorist attack will emerge, but with every libel, with every false publication, with every piece of lying information, the possibility of a new attack grows. Hamas' goal has always been this: to win the propaganda war rather than the military one. It has systematically lied, inventing unprovable death tolls and claiming that all Gaza victims are "women and children" and that what we have witnessed has not been a war but a "genocide."

When the world's leading media outlets, Hollywood influencers and entertainers and endless social media accounts are putting all their energy into falsely convincing the public that Israelis are victimizers and not the victims, the possibility of an attack at the hands of a frustrated fanatic or imbecile is very high. The West's cowardly policy turned anti-Semitic marches into "resistance" and this murderous madness does not threaten only Jews or Israel.

Within hours, two students were killed at Brown University in a Jewish Studies teaching space. A Jewish home was shot at in California. A Hanukkah concert in Amsterdam was violently disrupted by jihadists. Calls for help from Jews in Australia were ignored. Jew-haters shout "Zionist" as an insult, and people chant "Globalize the intifada!" in the streets of major cities around the world just minutes after each attack. In Colorado, just a few months ago, an elderly Jewish woman was burned to death by a man shouting "Free Palestine!" In Washington, D.C., a young couple was killed in front of the Jewish Museum on Capitol Hill, also by a man shouting "Free Palestine!" In Manchester in October, two Jews were murdered for the same ideological madness. Under the Palestinian flag, the world's oldest racial hatred has gained new and lethal force.

And now, this unspeakable atrocity. A Holocaust survivor is among the dead at Bondi Beach; the pain generated by this criminal absurdity is indescribable. The method chosen by the killers is also deeply shocking. They went out hunting by shooting into the crowd, seeking the efficiency of mass shooting. Although the scale differs, the similarity with October 7 tells us of a key pattern: a party and a crowd. This is the new method of global jihad, thus globalizing the intifada.

The idea of destroying Israel and any Jew is seducing many people looking for a simple answer to their miserable lives. That is why false data, AI-created videos and images, NGO reports that crumble under the slightest scrutiny, accusations, libels, mutilated stories, and all jihadist disinformation efforts are so easily propagated. There are in society very dangerous groups with a desire to believe the lies.

There was the fallacious "genocide" report, produced by a satellite of the UN, which was shown to be totally rigged. There was the despicable "famine" report, which used children with degenerative diseases to create a lie that was as brutal as it was viral. This has been a relentless system of falsification of reality since October 7 itself. Jihadist activism has done much of the work, but by swallowing their disinformation and spreading it, the "useful idiots" of the West are carrying out their own destruction. It is our way of life that jihadism hates, everything else is excuses.

A few days ago, a video was published of something that happened during the last Chanukkah. The footage showed a group of hostages kidnapped on October 7 in the Hamas subway tunnels, with only what strength they had left, lighting a makeshift Hanukkah, the Jewish candelabra used to celebrate Hanukkah. We know that Hamas massacred them afterwards, but even tortured, deprived of light and food, and aware of their dreadful reality, these Jews were united with each other and with the history of their people. None of the horrors they had experienced could break them.

Hannukkah is precisely the story of survival, one more victory against one of the many empires that sought the extermination of the Jews. The survival of the Jewish people is not without losses, obviously. But despite those losses, despite the pain and isolation, those Jews trapped underground and in their bones were showing something much deeper. Through the centuries, these people continue to defy their enemies with the same intelligence and dignity with which the Maccabees overcame them thousands of years ago. A small nation, surrounded by enemies, chooses bravery over fear, life over death. This Chanukah, Jews will light candles to remember every battle in which outnumbered and outpowered, they refused to bend.

Israel achieves what nations like Australia cannot: endure, grow, and triumph, and not give in to terrorism and global hatred. While mobs promote Israel's destruction in the streets of the West and pusillanimous politicians allow themselves to be cowed by poisoned crowds, the Jewish state is showing scientific, economic, and military achievements. And despite all the lies, the truth is that it is the only country in the Middle East where there is rule of law, democracy, coexistence of all religions, plurality, and prosperity.

Today, Jews have once again become the target of hatred. Attacks such as those in Bondi Beach show that danger is just around the corner. The world has descended into madness again, and everything we believe in seems to be falling apart. Yet, during this Festival of Lights, each night Jews will light the next candle, and the miracle of Jewish survival will continue.

Chag Hanukkah Sameach.