Rabbi Yosef Greenberg will lead the Hanukkah Menorah Lighting today at 4pm at the Midtown Mall. Everyone is welcome to gather at the Giving Machine for the lighting.
In 1991, Rabbi Greenberg founded the Lubavitch Jewish Center of Alaska, which now serves over 6,000 Jews living in Alaska.
The Menorah represents Jewish faith and resilience. The candles are lit over the eight days of Hannukah, a joyful festival commemorating the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem after it was reclaimed by the Maccabees from the Seleucid Greeks in 2nd Century B.C. According to tradition, the Maccabees only had one day’s worth of oil, but it miraculously burned for eight days.
Throughout history, Jews have faced hatred, violence, and attempts at annihilation. Every time, the Jewish people have resisted and stood together against evil. Today, Jews and friends of Jews mourn the tragic deaths that resulted from a targeted antisemitic attack on Sunday at Bondi Beach in Syndey, Australia.
Yesterday, December 14, two or three gunmen open-fired on a group of Jews lighting the Menorah on Bondi Beach to kick off the Hannukah festival. At least 11 innocents were killed as well as one of the gunmen. 29 people were hospitalized with injuries.
According to a top Australian intelligence official, authorities had one of the gunmen on their radar but had not deemed him an immediate threat. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and The Australian National Imams Council condemned the violence as “evil beyond comprehension,” “cold-blooded murder,” and “crimes [that] have no place in our society.”
What is usually a jubilant start to one of the most well-known Jewish holidays has become for many a time of grief, shock, and prayers for peace, strength, and solace.
Anytime the Jewish community decides to have a public gathering they better have very tight security.
will you be bringing weapons?
Always
Any articles coming out for the tens of thousands of Gazan women, children, and elderly murdered by Zionists?
Any articles on the tens of thousands of Catholics and Christians murders by Islamists.
All lives are equal – please report accordingly.
P.s. no Scofield bible for me….
The ones responsible for the plight of Gazan women, is gazan men, the ones that put them and their children in harms way. Gazan men use women and children as fodder, gazan men do not love their childrenor women or they would protect them. Jews are not responsible for their deaths, HAMAS IS RESPONSIBLE. Islam is a religion of pure and utter hatred and violence. We Jews are blamed so that the world will hate us and not fight with us against terrorism. We are the primary target, you are next, according to their “bible” known as the koran. Despicable response to this article.
Molly, your rigid religious stance is at the core of thousands of years of war. You won’t yield because your god teaches that all other religions are false and evil, and according to you, “Islam is a religion of pure and utter hatred and violence”.
Yet, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, as of mid-December 2025, over 70,000 Palestinians in Gaza have been killed by Israel since the war began on October 7, 2023. That’s some genuine hatred and violence.
I wont change my opinion on HAMAS TERRORISTS as they all want me dead. my G-d is loving, not full of rage and hatred as the Islamists are. We are not taught to hate as Islamists are.
Believing anything out of gaza is fake news as HAMAS CONTROLS GAZA. Hamas and the people of Gaza perpetrated an atrocious attack on Israel on 10/7/2023. Israel has every right to defend itself against ISLAMIC TERRORISM.
Like I said, rigid.
Check your mirror for a rigid person
Evan,
You realize that using terrorists as the source of your opinion dooms your opinion to failure, right? You are willfully and knowingly spreading terrorists propaganda. I should be surprised, sadly I am not.
As a critical thinker, I checked a few sites regarding the reliability of the Gaza Health Ministry. Wiki offered this: “19 November 2025, over 72,500 people (70,525 Palestinians and 2,109 Israelis) have been reported killed in the Gaza war according to the Gaza Health Ministry (GHM) and Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, including 248 journalists and media workers,120 academics, and over 224 humanitarian aid workers, a number that includes 179 employees of UNRWA. Scholars have estimated 80% of Palestinians killed are civilians ”
Seems somewhat reliable given the many inputs, but I will concede that both the Palestinians and the Israelis are motivated to provide favorable data, and neither may be accurate.
You cite Wikipedia and claim to be a critical thinker. Read what your copy and paste says, apply some actual critical thinking. Maybe do a little bit more than cite a source that is known for being corrupted by antisemitism.
How many of the journalists and media workers, academics, humanitarian aid workers and employees of UNRWA were members of Hamas? Any self proclaimed critical thinker would have already asked these questions and had the answers before posting more Hamas propaganda. You do you Evan.
You claim to be a critical thinker, but rely on Wikipedia?
Tell us all you do not actually think about anything critically, without actually saying it.
“…according to the Gaza Health Ministry…”
According to the Israel Health Ministry, not a single Gazan non-combatant has been harmed in any way. (Yes, I just made that up. Thanks for noticing.)
.
Your source is not reliable. The numbers presented are not supportable, and statically improbably to the point of impossibility. I would trust Zelensky to provide a full audit of where all the aid money went before I trusted the Gaza Health Ministry. In fact, I would trust gas station sushi before I trusted them. Hell.. I would trust Hillary Clinton first.
Zionism is not in America’s interest – night be in Israel’s, but not ours.
USS Liberty?
Natalie please do a story on that – truly tragic.
Trillions spent in the middle east the last 30 years while homeless blanket our streets, US vets, by the scores, are commiting suicide every day.
Health care expenses are through the roof. Our infrastructure is crumbling.
AMERICA FIRST.
Blood, Soul, Culture.
People, Money, Land.
Not another penny to Israel, Europe, anybody until we take care of our own.
And the Trump administration is going to eliminate 35,000 jobs at the VA.
Please, stop conflating Zionist Israel with Judaism! The rise in antisemitism can arguably be laid at the feet of the Netanyahoo regime and his very brutal repression of Palestinians. Many people throughout the world do not realize that all Jews are not Zionists and not all Zionists are Jews. In fact, some of the most vocal critics of Israel are Jews, among them Prof. Norman Finkelstein, John Mearsheimer and Noam Chomski, authors Glen Greenwald, Max Blumenthal, Katie Halper and Aaron Mate, etc. and many other Jewish organized anti- Zionist protest groups.
There is not time (or allowable space in MRAK’s ‘Comments’) to thoughtfully respond to this column. Therefore, conclusions only.
1. The ‘time of Jacob’s troubles’ seems to be upon us. Jerusalem (Israel and the dispersed descendants of Judah) is becoming a heavy stone, a stumbling block to the nations.
2. Islam is not and has never been a ‘religion of peace,” no matter what GWB once imagined and uttered.
3. Islam has been Jacob’s enemy since Muhammad devised his malign cult, and Islam has now become the enemy of Israel’s friends in the Western nations. All denials of this reality are self-destructive delusions.
4. We have admitted the barbarians into our gates. Be prepared for more and frequent slaughter in western nations.
Yes.
Yes very tragic.
No, I don’t want more money sent to Isreal to fight terrorism.
How about we actually prosecute and jail the individuals that committed the atrocity instead?
It seems every opportunity the protected classes have to consolidate power for themselves always ends up costing those who had nothing to do with the crime.
No more.
More gun (bolt action) restrictions and speech censorship for Australians now…. The fatigue is real.
The Greeks did nothing wrong, they brought prosperity and civilization.
Jews are always playing the victim, when they’re the ones to blame for the bogus debt and credit system Ponzi scheme we have today… side note, muslims are just as big of a problem… go fight over your sandbox somewhere else, we don’t care.
Why is it always so easy to pull the antisemites out of the shadows into the daylight?
Because much of their reason for their stance is a need to attention. They need that spotlight!! It has to be about THEM!!
If it is semitic to covet my money for your victimhood status, then yes, I am anti all of that.