Rabbi Menachem Creditor
Tonight, as the first small flame of Chanukah prepares to pierce the gathering dark, our hearts struggle to hold the weight of this terrible day. Only hours ago, the shoreline of Bondi Beach, in Sydney, Australia, where Jewish families gathered to rejoice in the promise of light, became the site of brutal terror. At least eleven precious souls were taken. A community was assaulted. The world was shaken again by ancient, stubborn Antisemitism hatred that seeks to unmake Jewish life.
One of the murdered was Alex Kleytman, a Holocaust survivor who died shielding his beloved wife of fifty years, Larissa. The arc of his life, surviving history’s deepest night only to fall while protecting love itself, is almost too much to bear. May his memory and the memories of all who perished rise with the sanctity of the martyrs of our people. May their names be for an everlasting blessing.
And the wound has reached my own family.
My brother, Arsen Ostrofsky, married to my precious sister Tzeira, who stood at Bondi Beach with his wife and my beautiful nieces, celebrating Jewish joy, celebrating Chanukah’s defiant radiance, was shot in the attack. By God’s grace and the courage of those around him, he will recover. My sister’s words, spoken as she shielded her daughters, “We survived Iran, we will survive this too,” are a Torah of resilience carved from the deepest human place. Antisemitism is blasphemy against life itself, a desecration of the Divine Image. That it wounded my family today is heartbreaking; that it has targeted our people for generations is enraging. But I know my brother. His work with AIJAC on behalf of the Jewish community in Sydney will not slow. If anything, today will pour new fire into his unwavering dedication.
Kol Yisrael Areivim Zeh Lazeh.
All Jews are responsible for one another.
Today that truth did not rest in the realm of metaphor. It lived in blood and tears, in terror and in courage, in the fierce insistence that we are bound to one another across continents and across fate. We feel the pain of every family who is grieving tonight. We pray for every injured soul. We pray for my brother’s healing. We pray for the healing of Larissa, whose beloved husband died saving her. And we pray for the entire family of Israel, who knows too well that grief is a language we have had to learn and relearn.
And we offer gratitude for the bystander, unarmed, untrained, unprepared, who rushed toward danger and subdued one of the terrorists. In a moment when darkness sought to devour everything, he became a spark of holy fire. May he be blessed for the life he saved and the courage he embodied.
Tonight, as we stand trembling and furious and heartbroken, the temptation to retreat inward is real. But that is not the Jewish way. The Chanukah lights were never meant to be hidden. Chanukah is a theology of refusal, the refusal to surrender to despair, the refusal to let the world’s cruelty have the final word, the refusal to dim the light God has entrusted to us. We awaken to light, again and again, knowing that every illumination is an act of spiritual resistance. We choose joy not as denial, but as defiance. We affirm life not because it is easy, but because it is commanded.
So tonight, even with broken hearts, we will light.
We will kindle the first flame knowing that the Maccabees lit their light in days as frightening as our own. We will bring our chanukiyot to our windows, placing our courage on display for all to see. We will celebrate, not in naïveté, but in sacred protest. We will not be quiet. We will not hide. We are Jews. We are proud. We are strong. And there is holy work for us to do in the world.
May the lights of Chanukah console the grieving, heal the wounded, strengthen the protectors, and remind us, again, that even the smallest flame is stronger than the deepest night.
Am Yisrael Chai.
May our light increase.
May our resilience endure.
And may we, through acts of faith and justice, illuminate a world still aching for dawn.
