Light in the Tunnels, Light in the World

There are moments that cut through the noise of life and speak directly to the Jewish soul. The newly released footage of six Israeli hostages, deep in a tunnel beneath Gaza, gently lighting a Chanukah menorah only days before they were murdered, is one of those moments.

It is almost too painful to absorb. Six Jews, stripped of freedom and held underground, still choosing to perform a mitzvah that has carried our people through every exile and every darkness. Six people insisting on hope at the very edge of life. Knowing what followed makes the light they kindled feel almost impossible to watch, and yet too sacred to turn away from.

Among them was Ori Danino. I have met his father, Elchonon, many times. He visited our community in the UK and carried himself throughout this terrible ordeal with a strength, a dignity and a steadiness that moved all who encountered him. His family became, for many of us, a living example of what it means to hold on to light even when surrounded by shadow.

This moment arrives as we read the story of Yosef. Yosef is thrown into a pit. He is held underground. He is forgotten by those above. He is, in every sense, a hostage. And then, in a single moment, he is brought out and raised from the depths into a place of light, purpose and leadership.

For months, this story has echoed our own hopes. When will our brothers and sisters emerge from the depths. When will those hidden underground be restored to the world above.

And this year, we experienced our own version of that Yosef moment. We went from having so many hostages held beneath the ground in Gaza, to watching them, one by one, step into daylight again. It felt like a miracle of God’s salvation arriving in the wink of an eye. Yet our hearts cannot rest, because one hostage remains in captivity: Ran Gvili. We must not forget him. We must continue to pray for him and to call for his body to be returned for a Jewish burial. The story of our people is not complete while even one soul is left behind.

Yosef’s journey teaches us that redemption can come quickly, like a sunrise that breaks through without warning. But it teaches us something more. Even as we wait for redemption, we must become bearers of light. We must not allow the darkness around us to shape the darkness within us.

That is the message of the towering menorah now standing at the Western Wall, where freed hostages and their families will light candles each night. People who were once underground are now lifting flames high into the heart of Jerusalem, bearing witness that the human spirit can be wounded but not broken.

But the message does not belong to them alone. It belongs to all of us. In the coming nights, millions of Jews will light menorahs in their homes. And we light them not as passive observers of history, but as links in a chain of resilience and faith that stretches back over many centuries.

We light because our people have survived the impossible.
We light because our ancestors chose courage when fear would have been easier.
We light because every one of us is here only because someone in our family line refused to let their flame go out.

And we light because we are survivors, yet we do not build our identity around victimhood. Jewish history contains suffering, but Jewish identity is not defined by it. Yosef refuses to become a victim. He rises to become viceroy of Egypt and feeds a world in famine. That is our calling too. We take the darkest nights of winter and use them to bring more light. Not for ourselves alone, but to illuminate the world. Our response to pain is not retreat. Our response is to bring warmth, hope and moral clarity to a world starved of all three.

The hostages in the tunnels lit their candles as a final act of faith.
We, who are alive and free, must light ours as a promise. A promise that regardless of the darkness that may descend upon the world, we choose light. We choose life.

And as we light, we remember that Chanukah is the festival of miracles. It teaches us that even in the bleakest moments, unexpected light can break through. Our hope and our prayer is that this year we will witness the miracles that generations before us longed for. Miracles of safety. Miracles of unity. Miracles of peace. Miracles that will bring every captive home and begin to heal a world still aching for redemption.

Happy Chanukah.