Netanyahu, Obama and their very different Hanukkahs

The leaders of Israel and the US both highlighted the start of the Jewish “festival of lights,” Hanukkah, which began Sunday night with the traditional lighting of the hanukkiyah candelabra.

Yet they did so in different ways.

In special holiday greetings, US President Barack Obama said the lesson of Hanukkah centered “on the miracles that can happen even in our darkest hours.”

“It renews our commitment as Americans — as people who live by faith and conscience — to lead the way and act as unyielding advocates for the fundamental dignity of every human being,” Obama said in a statement released Sunday by the White House on the eve of the holiday.

“During these eight days, let us be inspired by the light that can overcome darkness. As we recall the Maccabees’ struggle to free a people from oppression, let us rededicate ourselves to being the engine of the miracles we seek.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meanwhile, took part in an official Hanukkah candlelighting ceremony at the Western Wall in Jerusalem Sunday, together with Western Wall rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch and Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, even partaking in the singing of the traditional “These Candles” holiday ballad, which explains that the candles are lit to commemorate the “miracles and wonders done to our forefathers.”

His own message drew from a decidedly more Israeli experience.

“I would like to wish the entire People of Israel a Happy Hanukkah,” he said in a statement. “Tonight we light the first candle of Hanukkah. While Hanukkah is also a holiday for family gatherings, it is, first and foremost, a holiday of Jewish heroism, the heroism of a small, determined people that restored its independence and its sovereignty, which spread light and banished darkness; to a large extent it is the story of the State of Israel today.”