Perhaps it is just my social media feeds and Signal text threads, but I suspect not—I hope not. In only three nights of this year’s Khanike, with still so much fire to go, rad Jews have shared thousands of photos and artistic renditions of their chanukkiahs ablaze with solidarity for Gaza.
We rebel Jews have faithfully followed the sensibility underlying this Festival of Lights, in a time of genocide that feels anything but festive, or for that matter, light, by visibly bringing forth the light of resistance. We’ve extended the practice of bravely and defiantly lighting our Hanuka menorahs in windows at moments when antisemitism has threatened our lives and indeed the whole of Jewish existence, to now bravely and defiantly lighting these same menorahs in all sorts of public places, often communally, as Zionism (including Christian Zionism) and Islamophobia threaten Palestinian lives and indeed the whole of Palestinian existence.
For us anarchist Jews in particular, we see this as inseparable from our antifascist practice, our antifascist duty, including to all the ancestors—Jewish and others—who were exterminated by fascists in other times … and now. As the Fayer Collective notes in the zine illuminated by my candles tonight, “For us, the fight against fascism … is a personal and direct fight for our lives,” for others’ lives, … “for the earth, the good life, and total liberation” for all. “And that knowledge has put a fire in our hearts, as anarchists and Jews.”
I’ve been proud of my fellow anarchic Jews—more so than ever—for bravely and defiantly resisting fascism, including in our Zionist kin, every single day since October 7, unceasingly, with public actions ranging from banner drops to Mourners Kaddish, mutual aid to blockades, disruptions, and other direct actions, collective care to rebellious rituals. And we’ve no intention of letting that fire go out, #UntilAllAreFree.
May Xanuka bring the miracle of the light of our solidarity never extinguishing.
(For a PDF of this Palestinian solidarity zine and many others, DM me your email; photos: my candles tonight; a Jewish friend painting a #JewsAgainstGenocide banner in October for a public grief ritual held a couple days later by a bunch of us anarchistic Jews in so-called Asheville, NC.)