From Rabbi Oded Mazor's Speech at Jerusalem demonstration

From Oded Mazor's speech at last Saturday Night's Demonstration in Jerusalem December 2024

"This week we will light our Chanukah candles again. And again, as we did a year ago – with the frustration that intensified with each day of this year – we will recite the Shehechiyanu blessing with broken hearts, our voices breaking for all who have not yet returned and all of those who are no longer. We will recite the blessings for the miracles of those days, and cry out against the human actions, the decisions in the hands of our leaders, all that is still not happening in this time. We will recite "Who sanctified us with the mitzvot and commanded us to kindle the light" – and we will light not only the Chanukah candles, but every candle in our menorah will also be a light of hope, of perseverance, of the highest moral demand, a light of salvation, a light that strives to embrace and illuminate the dimmed and downcast souls of our sisters and brothers in suffering and captivity, of every innocent person whose soul-light is threatened by this war – "Ner Adonai nishmat adam – The light of the Eternal, the soul of a person." Every person.

“Hanerot halalu,” These candles we will light on Chanukah, are for true brotherhood and sisterhood, for responsibility, for perseverance, and for insisting on the value of the life of every human being. If we do not do this ourselves, in these days and in this time, we will have no right to be ourselves anymore, there will be no point to any of the miracles and wonders that our fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers, and we ourselves, fulfilled on this land, in this home.

We have come to expel darkness, we have in our hands the light of love, of peace, each of us is a small light and together we are a powerful light. Together we will increase the light in the world and bring everyone home even before the first candle of Hanukkah. Everyone – now!"