Then-Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz participates in a Hanukkah candle lighting at Jerusalem’s Western Wall on Nov. 28, 2021. Photo: Government Press Office

As Hanukkah begins on Thursday, here are eight facts you might not know about the “Festival of Lights”:

1. According to Israel’s Founding Father, David Ben-Gurion, Hanukkah commemorates “the struggle of the Maccabees, which was one of the most dramatic clashes of civilizations in human history, not merely a political-military struggle against foreign oppression. … Unlike many peoples, the meager Jewish people did not assimilate.  The Jewish people prevailed, won, sustained, and enhanced their independence and unique civilization. … It was the spirit of the people, rather than the failed spirit of the establishment, which enabled the Hasmoneans to overcome one of the most magnificent spiritual, political and military challenges in Jewish history….” (Uniqueness and Destiny, pp 20-22, David Ben Gurion, IDF Publishing, 1953).

2. Hanukkah is a Jewish national liberation holiday. Hanukkah is the only Jewish holiday that commemorates an ancient national liberation struggle in the Land of Israel, unlike the national liberation holidays, Passover, Sukkot/Tabernacles, and Shavuot/Pentecost, which commemorate the liberation from slavery in Egypt to independence in the land of Israel, and unlike Purim, which commemorates liberation from a Persian attempt to annihilate the Jewish people.

3. Hanukkah and the Land of Israel. When ordered by Emperor Antiochus IV Epiphanes of the Seleucid region to end the Jewish “occupation” of Jerusalem, Jaffa, Gaza, Gezer, and Akron, Shimon the Maccabee responded: “We have not occupied a foreign land. … We have liberated the land of our forefathers from foreign occupation (Book of Maccabees A: 15:33).”

Hanukkah highlights the centrality of the Land of Israel in the formation of Jewish history, religion, culture, and language. The mountain ridges of Judea and Southern Samaria (the West Bank) were the platform for the Maccabean military battles.

4.  Hanukkah is narrated in the Books of the Maccabees, The Scroll of Antiochus, and The Wars of the Jews. In 323 BCE, following the death of Alexander the Great (Alexander III), who held Judaism in high esteem, the Greek Empire was split into three independent and rival mini-empires: Greece, Seleucid/Syria, and Ptolemaic/Egypt.

In 175 BCE, the Seleucid/Syrian Emperor Antiochus (IV) Epiphanes claimed the Land of Israel. He suspected that the Jews were allies of his Ptolemaic/Egyptian enemy. The Seleucid emperor was known for eccentric behavior, hence his name, Epiphanes, which means “divine manifestation.” He aimed to exterminate Judaism and convert Jews to Hellenism. In 169 BCE, he devastated Jerusalem, attempting to decimate the Jewish population, and outlaw the practice of Judaism.

In 166/7 BCE, a Jewish rebellion was led by the non-establishment Hasmonean (Maccabee) family from the rural town of Modi’in, half-way between Jerusalem and the Mediterranean.  The rebellion was headed by Mattityahu, the priest, and his five sons, Yochanan, Judah, Shimon, Yonatan, and Eleazar, who fought the Seleucid occupier and restored Jewish independence.  The Hasmonean dynasty was replete with external and internal wars and lasted until 37 BCE, when Herod the Great (a proxy of Rome) defeated Antigonus II Mattathias.

5. The reputation of Jews as superb warriors was reaffirmed by the success of the Maccabees on the battlefield. In fact, they were frequently hired as mercenaries by Egypt, Syria, Carthage, Rome, and other global and regional powers.

6. Hanukkah celebrates the Maccabean-led national liberation by conducting in-house family education and lighting candles for eight days in commemoration of the re-inauguration of Jerusalem’s Jewish Temple and its menorah (candelabra).

The Hebrew words Hanukkah (חנוכה), inauguration (חנוכ), and education (חנוך)possess the same root.

7. As was prophesized by the Prophet Hagai in 520 BCE, the re-inauguration of the Temple took place on the 25th day of the Jewish month of Kislev, which is the month of miracles, such as the post-flood appearance of Noah’s rainbow, the completion of the construction of the Holy Ark by Moses, the laying of the foundations of the Second Temple by Nehemiah, etc.

The first day of Hanukkah is celebrated when daylight hours are equal to darkness hours — and when moonlight is hardly noticed — ushering in brighter days.

8. Hanukkah highlights the defeat of darkness, disbelief, forgetfulness, and pessimism by the spirit of light, faith, commemoration, and optimism.

The author is a former Israeli ambassador, and political commentator.