Année : 2024

2024 was the year where AI finally started returning on investment  ITPro
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Two sailors die during Sydney to Hobart yacht race  Deccan Herald
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Periods of rain. Areas of dense fog. High 48F. Winds ESE at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch..
Cloudy with occasional rain…mainly in the evening. Low 42F. Winds SW at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%.
Updated: December 27, 2024 @ 12:02 am
Iowa Law Enforcement Academy Director Brady Carney presents a diploma to Clinton Police Officer Jordan Lawrence during a Dec. 13 ceremony.

Iowa Law Enforcement Academy Director Brady Carney presents a diploma to Clinton Police Officer Jordan Lawrence during a Dec. 13 ceremony.
Clinton Police Officer Jordan Lawrence was part of the Iowa Law Enforcement Academy’s 318th graduation class that celebrated with a ceremony on Dec. 13. He completed the academy’s 16-week training program that consisted of coursework in policing communications, criminal law, physical fitness, and emergency response. They also received training in patrol procedures, investigations, and tactical and administrative skills.

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Over 1,200 slots. Major gaming studios. Lots of Megaways slots. 1x Bonus. T&Cs apply, 18+
You are going to love the current Wow Vegas promo code because it lets you play over 1,200 slots for free. Plus you can even use it to redeem some cash prizes too.
Beyond the welcome offer, you will find that Wow Vegas has a massive range of promos for existing customers. So that whether you are using those daily coin rewards or picking up perks from the VIP Star System, you’ll always have a way to play without spending any of your own cash. Truly what sweepstakes gaming should be all about.
Wow Vegas is one of the biggest sweepstakes casinos in the US and such is its popularity that even Paris Hilton has teamed up with the brand. But that’s not enough to help Wow Vegas maintain its popularity and the sweeps casino will need to do more to attract even more new customers. As such, there is now a no deposit bonus at Wow Vegas that gives all newcomers a massive amount of free credit to play with.
More so, WOW Vegas has continued to push the boundaries of fun and rewards with the launch of the WOW Jackpot. Now, every time you get to play on WOW Vegas, you have the opportunity to win one of four incredible jackpots across every game – Mini, Minor, Major, or the Grand jackpot.
The WOW Jackpot is available for both WOW Coins and Sweeps Coins (SC) mode, with just a slight difference for opt-in procedures:
When you hit the jackpot, the fun begins with a colorful wheel that will appear on your screen. You’d have to spin the wheel to discover which jackpot you’ve been able to win. Whether it is the Mini, Minor, Major, or the Grand jackpot, every moment here is really something to look out for.
With the launch of the WOW Jackpot, every time you play an SC game, there are now more ways and extra chances to win big. Here’s how it works:
This feature isn’t just about big wins as one may ordinarily think. It’s also linked to other important game elements, like:
With the WOW Jackpot, WOW Vegas has just given players another amazing way to win with every spin.
Pretty much all sweepstakes casinos will have a welcome offer that gives you free credit to play with. However, Wow Vegas has outshone most of its rivals with the sheer size of its sign up bonus. After all, it is deal that gives you 35 Sweepstakes Coins and 1,750,000 Wow Coins and you can get it just be taking the following steps:
Once you have done this, you should find that your Wow Vegas account has been set up and you can log in just by entering your email address and your password. Now you can check that you have all of your Wow Coins and Sweepstakes Coins in your account balance in the sidebar.
From here, you can load up the main gaming lobby and click on any game to load it up from your web browser. Then it’s just a matter of selecting whether you want to play with Wow Coins or Sweepstakes Coins, entering in your virtual stakes and enjoy playing.
What’s best is that there aren’t any wagering conditions to worry about because Wow Vegas is a sweepstakes casino which means that you cannot actually wager your own money. Just note that you have to play through your Sweepstakes Coins at least once before you can redeem any prizes.
So once you’ve got your welcome offer, you’ll be pretty keen to put it into action. We’ve assembled this list of simple tips you can use to get maximum enjoyment out of all of that free credit:
You will get a healthy amount of Wow Coins and Sweepstakes Coins for signing up to Wow Vegas, and it’s probably best that you start off by using the Wow Coins first. This is because the Wow Coins can only be used to play for fun and this means that they are perfectly suited for getting some practice in before using your Sweepstakes Coins in a bid to try and redeem those cash prizes.
Every casino game will have something called a return to player percentage (RTP). This refers to how much you could expect to win on average should you play that one game over time. So with a slot game that had a 96% RTP,  you would expect to win back 96 Wow Coins for every 100 Wow Coins that you’d played.
It’s pretty easy to find the RTP of any slot game online, and this should help you see which of the 1,200 slots featured at Wow Vegas gives you the best chance of winning back even more Wow Coins and Sweepstakes Coins. Any slot with an RTP of over 96% will be better than average, and while jackpot slots can have huge multipliers, it often comes at the expense of a less generous RTP.

Every slot at Wow Vegas will feature something different. For example, Megaways slots like Muertos Multiplier Megaways feature a random reel multiplier to give you thousands of ways to win, while hold and spin slots such as Floating Dragon Hold and Spin give you much greater control over how the reels spin. Plus there are even bonus buy slots that let you raise your virtual stake to access special features like bonus rounds, respins and so on.
As such, it’s probably smart to focus your attention on just a few slots so as to get to know these special features a little better. After all, you’ll need to know how anything from those scatter symbols to the cascading wilds could help you maximize your potential wins.

While this welcome offer doesn’t come with any specific time limits, it’s important to remember that you will get 60 days to use your Sweepstakes Coins. This shouldn’t be too much of a problem for most people, but it could still be a good idea to make a note of when you signed up to Wow Vegas to make sure that your Sweepstakes Coins don’t go to waste. Plus make sure that you only register your account at this sweeps casino when you have enough spare time to research the games and get the most out of this deal.
Finally, it’s worth remembering that, while you are only playing with virtual credit, it can still be all too easy to spend a little too much time on your sweepstakes gaming. As such, it’s smart to set limits on how much you play and aim to keep your casino gaming in check.
This is easily done by setting yourself a budget and sticking to it. Not only does this help you in terms of playing responsibly, but it will also have the bonus effect of making your Wow Coins and Sweepstakes Coins last much longer.

It’s fair to say that many sweepstakes promo codes can be a little complicated, so we thought we’d straighten out this deal from Wow Vegas in the following points:
If we have learned one thing about Wow Vegas, it is that this brand loves to put on lots of special offers for existing customers. All that you have to do is to load up the Promotions page and you’ll find a vast range of deals including the following:
While we have got an entire guide devoted to the Wow Vegas daily login bonus, we thought that we should summarize the key features of this deal here. Simply put it’s a deal that will give you 1,500 WOW Coins and 0.3 Sweepstakes Coins just for checking into your account every day. What’s best is that it reloads every 24 hours to give you a daily amount of free credit to play with.
These are where you have to play some of the branded games and take on other players. If you are triumphant, you could take the lion’s share of a 10,000 Sweepstakes Coins prize pool.
This is where you spin a prize wheel that assigns random amounts of free credit and you could get up to 1,000 Sweepstake Coins with one fortunate spin. The best thing is that you get chance to spin the Wheel of Wins every day.
Here you just have to play more than anyone else on the Wow Vegas site on a single day to get a slice of a prize pool that goes all the way up to 8,000 Sweepstakes Coins.
You can’t help noticing that Wow Vegas has teamed up with Paris Hilton and the celebrity is on hand to promote some exceptional offers. Take the Paris’ Lucky 6 promo that lets you play top slots like Wow Rush and win a share of up to 10,000 Sweepstakes Coins in return. Similar deals include the Paris Prize Draws promo that invite you to check out one of the new games and win up to 500 Sweepstakes Coins.
This deal is a lot of fun as you just have to check into Wow Vegas between the hours of 6pm and 8pm ET every day from Saturday through to Thursday and you’ll get free coins as a result.
Wow Vegas loves to host regular slot tournaments and the Thursday Thriller promo is one of the best. After all, you just have to outclass your opponents to take a slice of the 1,500 Sweepstakes Coins prize pool.
This is where you can get 20 Sweepstakes Coins and 5,000 Wow Coins for each friend you bring to Wow Vegas. Plus there are even Refer a Friend Awards that give you up to 5,000 Sweepstakes Coins for being even more social with your gaming.
All you have to do here is to email Wow Vegas for a chance to win some Sweepstakes Coins and these rewards could get better for consecutive days after this.
This is a reward program where you will entered in at the Rising status and have to keep playing to rise through the different levels of Blue, Bronze, Silver, Gold and Hosted. By doing this, you could be picking up perks like access to the community chat, chat promotions, birthday bonuses, daily prize drops, priority customer support via WhatsApp, 24-hour prize redemption processing, extra Wow Coins on purchases and a whole lot more.

Sign up to Wow Vegas for the first time and you could get a welcome offer that gives you 35 Sweepstakes Coins and 1,750,000 Wow Coins. The Wow Coins are basically used to play the casino games in a standard mode which means that you cannot redeem them for any prizes.
However, the Sweepstakes Coins let you play in a sweepstakes mode where you can potentially redeem prizes like cash and branded merchandise. It’s also one of the biggest welcome bonuses currently available at any sweepstakes casinos and definitely worthy of a closer look.

We decided to take this welcome offer for a test drive and were impressed with what we found. It’s a deal that’s nicely easy to get as we just had to register an account at Wow Vegas for the first time. There was no need to enter in any promo codes and we definitely didn’t have to spend any of our own cash either as the free Sweepstakes Coins and Wow Coins were automatically added to your account.
From here we started using those Wow Coins to play some of those exclusive slot games such as Wild Wow Vegas and Coins of Wow Vegas – Hold and Win. Once we’d done this, we switched over to using the Sweepstakes Coins to play some of the slots we were more familiar with such as Buffalo King Megaways, The Dog House Multihold and Big Bass Splash. A solid introduction to what Wow Vegas is all about.

One of our favorite things about Wow Vegas is just how easy the brand makes it for you to redeem those real-world prizes. These prizes range from cash prizes to some fancy branded merchandise, and you can only get them by playing with the Sweepstakes Coins form of virtual currency.
You can only get Sweepstakes Coins for free such as through this welcome offer, and you will have to play through your Sweepstakes Coins just once before you can make a prize redemption request. Just note that you will have to have at least 100 Sweepstakes Coins in your account and that these can be redeemed at a rate of one Sweepstakes Coin for one US dollar.

On the surface, it’s hard to find any kind of fault with this welcome offer. After all, you are getting a huge amount of virtual credit that can be used to play for fun, and you’ll also get a helping hand towards being able to redeem those cash prizes.
While all of this is good, we might have liked to have a little more originality in this deal. Some sweeps casinos have put on promos that give you rakeback and it might have been nice to have had something similar. Plus you should remember that the Sweepstakes Coins will only last for 60 days which is a contrast with those sweeps casinos who give you Sweeps Coins with no time limits.

We found that this deal gives you a perfect way to play all of the hundreds of games that lit up our Wow Vegas review. It’s a welcome offer that is easy to get, simple to understand and more than capable of giving you plenty of casino gaming entertainment. Plus the fact that you can use this deal to redeem some real money prizes is never a bad thing.
Our only criticism was the fact that the Sweepstakes Coins have some strict time limits, but even so, we reckon that most people will get through this virtual credit in under two months. So make sure that you sign up to Wow Vegas and put this welcome offer into action.

Wow Vegas is clearly a sweepstakes casino who takes great pride in the quality and quantity of its promos. Not only does it give you a huge welcome offer of over a million Wow Coins as well as plenty of Sweepstakes Coins, but there are more promos for existing customers than any other sweeps casino that we’ve seen.
All of this means that you should be able to get lots of free credit you can use on well over 1,200 top slot games from leading developers like Habanero, Pragmatic Play, Betsoft and S Gaming. So be sure to keep Wow Vegas in mind if you ever want to play online casino games for free.
All that you have to do is to log into your Wow Vegas account by visiting the site, clicking on the Login button and then entering in your email address and password. Once you’ve done that you will get your bonus of 1,500 Wow Coins and 0.3 Sweepstakes Coins.
It’s a deal where you could get lots of free Wow Coins and Sweepstakes Coins just for successfully referring your friends to the sweepstakes casino. Just note there is also a monthly leaderboard referral challenge, so it might work a little differently from what you’re used to.
You can get free coins from Wow Vegas in a huge variety of ways. From signing up to the sweepstakes casino for the first time, to logging into your account every day, you will never run out of credit her
Yes, there are multiple offers like this spread all across the Wow Vegas site. After all, it is a sweepstakes casino and therefore it doesn’t have the facility to accept your deposits and it has to let you play for free too.
It’s pretty simple as you just have to visit the Wow Vegas site from your browser, click on the Registration button and then fill in the form with your personal information. Once you have done all of this, you’ll have your Wow Vegas login details. Just remember that you’ll have to verify your account before you can do things like redeem prizes.

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Dec 27, 2024
The former O.K. Stuckey Building, which also housed First United Methodist Church of Hollidaysburg, is set to reopen in a new mixed-use capacity, with a yoga studio on the first floor and food-based tenants slated to occupy the second and third floors. Mirror photo by Matt Churella
HOLLIDAYSBURG — A downtown Hollidaysburg landmark will soon be coming back to life.
The first tenant in the former First United Methodist Church, also known as the O.K. Stuckey & Son building at 400 Allegheny St., is set to open in January.
Arya Yoga Studio will open the weekend of Jan. 17-19, owner Anita Kozeska said.
J.J. Keller Family Partnership, composed of Joseph Keller, his wife Joan, and son Jared Keller, bought the building in September 2021 from Hollidaysburg Downtown Development LLC.
The Altoona Blair County Development Corp. received a $500,000 Keystone Communities Program Grant to help turn the building, which has been out of use since the early 1980s, into a mixed-use commercial facility.
“The redevelopment of the former green church is a big step in maintaining the vibrance of our mountain main streets. This was the first project that was able to benefit from the Borough of Hollidaysburg being included in the newly formed Enterprise Zone,” said Tom Seasoltz, ABCD Corp. vice president of finance/CFO.
“Through ABCD, the ownership group was able to access different tax credit programs, Keystone Communities funding and direct Enterprise Zone loan funds. We hope the site will now serve as a ‘community hub’ for Hollidaysburg, providing another exciting spot to visit in Blair County,” Seasoltz said. “This project took a ton of effort to bring a vacant church building back to life. Many, many thanks to the Keller family for their continued investment in downtown Hollidaysburg.”
Arya Yoga Studio will occupy the entire first floor of the building.
“The middle floor will open second and we hope to have that floor ready for occupancy by the end of February. The top floor will open last and we hope to have that floor ready for occupancy by the end of March,” said Jared Keller.
Other tenants have committed to moving into the building.
“We have a handful of food-based tenants that will occupy the middle and top floors. Shelving/dry storage for shelf stable food products and freezer and refrigeration space will primarily be on the middle floor for a year round farmers market but some will be on the top floor as well,” Keller said.
When all is said and done, Keller said there will be seven or eight full-time tenants across the three floors, along with at least a few dozen year-round farmers market vendors that occupy shelf/freezer/refrigeration space.
“We could potentially have 60+ farmers market vendors, but we’re taking a conservative estimate at this time,” Keller said.
Mirror Staff Writer Walt Frank is at 814-946-7467.
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By Dustin Rowles | Film | September 6, 2024 |
Lee Daniels’ The Deliverance is one of the more preposterous films I’ve ever seen. It’s reminiscent of a season of Ryan Murphy’s American Horror Story compressed into 90 minutes, which is to say: It starts to lose coherence about 20 minutes in and completely derails about halfway through. Unfortunately, that leaves another 45 minutes of increasingly baffling nonsense.
The story revolves around Ebony (Andra Day), a struggling single mother who moves her family into a new home along with her mother, Alberta (Glenn Close). Soon, she and her children start behaving strangely and sometimes violently. Cynthia (Mo’Nique), a woman from Child Protective Services, believes that Ebony is abusing her children, while another woman, Reverend Bernice James (Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor), knows the truth: The house is haunted and has already claimed one family. The Reverend wants to perform a “the deliverance” on one of Ebony’s possessed sons, Andre (Anthony B. Jenkins). This process sounds a lot like an exorcism, only there’s apparently no clerical intermediary between the devil and Jesus himself.
The script, from David Coggeshall and Elijah Bynum, is a haphazard collection of haunted house and exorcism movie tropes, and Lee Daniels amplifies the absurdity to a level of extreme silliness. It’s difficult to categorize this as a “so-bad-it’s-good” movie, but it certainly provokes laughter. If you’re not rolling your eyes, you’re likely guffawing at the sheer implausibility. That doesn’t mean that The Deliverance is intentionally funny; it’s just that it’s too preposterous not to elicit some amusement. It might even be entertaining to watch with a lively audience, but it fails dramatically to function as an effective horror film.
That said, Glenn Close is reason enough to watch, as she inhabits something akin to a dolled-up version of her Hillbilly Elegy character, a woman who is white trash in its purest, uncut form, a woman so white trash that she flaunts her cleavage and hits on a male nurse during chemotherapy treatments. The Glenn Close from Elegy reminded me a lot of my Me Maw. This Glenn Close character is more like my Me Maw after she put in her teeth and got hoochie’d up for a night on the town (and by “a night on the town,” I mean drinking from bottles in paper bags in the common area of a trailer park because that’s how we do it in Bumblefuck, AR). To avoid spoiling too much, at one point, Glenn Close also turns into the White Devil, and if the drugs you took before starting the film have not kicked in yet, demon Glenn Close should do the trick. That’s true even if you didn’t take drugs.
The Deliverance is a bewildering film, and while I wish I could say that the performances of Andra Day, Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, and Mo’Nique elevate it, it’d be a lie. Denzel and Daniel Day couldn’t do anything for this script, but at least Glenn Close is having fun leaning in. While she cannot transcend the material, she does the next best thing: Meets it where it is, rolls around on the floor with it, and maybe even humps its leg.

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7 Best Western RPGs With Almost No Character Customization (Which Fits The Story)  GameRant
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The Mall at Greece Ridge shut down early by security and police  13WHAM-TV
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NewsVoir
Vadakara (Kerala) [India], December 27: The Sargaalaya International Arts and Crafts Festival (SIACF) 2024-25, set against the stunning backdrop of rolling hills and the Arabian Sea, has emerged as India’s largest celebration of global artistry and gastronomy.
This landmark event, running from December 20 to January 6, brings together over 200 master artisans from 15+ countries, transforming the picturesque Malabar Coast into an international hub of cultural exchange.

The festival’s Tourism Talk Series has become a pivotal platform for shaping the region’s future, with celebrities, political and industry leaders engaging in meaningful discussions about establishing Malabar as a global tourism destination. These dialogues, coupled with the festival’s impressive showcase of international talent, underscore SIACF’s role in cultural diplomacy and regional development.
At the heart of the festival lies an extraordinary culinary experience, with over 20 specialized food stalls creating a vibrant tapestry of Kerala Flavors. Visitors can embark on a gastronomic journey from authentic Kerala meals to Malabar specialties. The festival’s artistic core features award-winning international artisans including Bulgarian textile master Madlena Petrova’s gold-thread creations, Lebanese metalwork artist Fathima Torttoussi’s intricate jewellery, and Iranian designer Fathimeh Alipour Yousefi’s contemporary pieces. The Arabic Calligraphy Theme Village, showcasing AYAT’s century-lasting titanium masterpieces, stands as a testament to the fusion of traditional Islamic art with modern innovation.

As dusk falls, the Floating Barge Stage comes alive with cultural performances against the backdrop of Sargaalaya’s serene lake. The festival’s entertainment lineup includes tomorrow’s Christmas Special by Sooraj Santhosh, followed by Anitha Shaiq’s Sufi night, Thekkinkadu Band’s fusion concert, and a grand New Year’s Eve celebration with 11 – The Band.
Families can explore the 400-foot underwater tunnel aquarium, enjoy boating activities, and participate in craft workshops led by master artisans. Themed villages dedicated to handloom, bamboo, and Theyyam offer immersive experiences into traditional craftsmanship, while the Global Artisans Pavilion presents rare handcrafted treasures from Russia, Kazakhstan, Nepal, Mexico, and beyond.
The festival grounds, nestled in the enchanting landscape of Sargaalaya Arts & Crafts Village, showcase daily demonstrations of terracotta pottery, bamboo crafts, mural painting, and coir product making. This living museum of crafts offers visitors unprecedented access to centuries-old techniques and contemporary innovations.
SIACF 2024-25, managed by ULCCS Ltd. and supported by the Ministry of Tourism, runs daily from 10 AM to 10 PM. Whether seeking artistic inspiration, culinary adventures, or cultural enrichment, the festival promises an unforgettable journey through global traditions and local heritage.
The festival is made possible through the generous support of its key sponsors and partners. NABARD, as the principal sponsor, plays a vital role in empowering the handloom sector, ensuring the livelihood of artisans and weavers. Complementing NABARD’s efforts, Kerala Tourism and Incredible India add a cultural and tourism dimension to the event, showcasing Kerala’s rich heritage on a national platform. The Development Commissioner of Handicrafts, Ministry of Textiles, extends its unwavering support to preserve and promote India’s exquisite handloom crafts. ULCCS, renowned for its commitment to community development and cooperative values, further amplifies the festival’s outreach and success.
(ADVERTORIAL DISCLAIMER: The above press release has been provided by NewsVoir. ANI will not be responsible in any way for the content of the same)
(The story has come from a syndicated feed and has not been edited by the Tribune Staff.)
The Tribune, now published from Chandigarh, started publication on February 2, 1881, in Lahore (now in Pakistan). It was started by Sardar Dyal Singh Majithia, a public-spirited philanthropist, and is run by a trust comprising five eminent persons as trustees.

The Tribune, the largest selling English daily in North India, publishes news and views without any bias or prejudice of any kind. Restraint and moderation, rather than agitational language and partisanship, are the hallmarks of the newspaper. It is an independent newspaper in the real sense of the term.

The Tribune has two sister publications, Punjabi Tribune (in Punjabi) and Dainik Tribune (in Hindi).
Remembering Sardar Dyal Singh Majithia

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Rabbi Benjamin Elton
We tend to think of Hanukkah as the celebration of a great victory — a victory by the Maccabees over the Syrian Greek empire, ruled by the Seleucids. We tell the story that the Jews defeated their enemies and recaptured the Temple, where the miracle of the oil took place. And that, we often assume, is the end of the story. The Seleucids retreated and an independent Jewish kingdom was re-established. Except, that is not what happened.
Here is the real story. The crackdown on Jewish observance began in 168 BCE, the next year the Maccabean Revolt began and, by 164, they had reconquered Jerusalem and purified the Temple. That is the event that Hanukkah celebrates, but the war was far from over.
Although the Syrian Greeks lifted the ban on Jewish practice, they were still in charge of the land of Israel. The Maccabees had to fight on. There was progress but also setbacks. There were complex negotiations with the Seleucids involving partial autonomy; there were alliances with Rome; and, eventually, complete autonomy was established by 139 BCE, some quarter of a century after the events that Hanukkah commemorates. To paraphrase Winston Churchill: Hanukkah was not the end, it was not even the beginning of the end — it was, perhaps, the end of the beginning.
What is the significance of celebrating an event, even a miracle, that took place not at the end but in the middle of a campaign? What is its relevance for our day?
^{Families of the hostages and their supporters participate in a Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony on the first night of Hanukkah, where one candle was lit for each person still being held hostage, outside The Museum of Art on 7 December 2023 in Tel Aviv, Israel. (Photo by Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images)}
Many of us feel we are in the middle of a long and painful process, we hope not as long as the Maccabean Revolt, but certainly much longer than we would wish. It is now 448 days since the events of 7 October 2023, which means 448 days of captivity of the hostages and 448 days into the increase in antisemitism in Australia and around the world. Although we should also place that in context. I heard a Jewish comedian say, “There’s been a recent uptick in antisemitism, the last 3,000 years”.
Occasionally we hear about negotiations that might lead to a hostage release and a ceasefire in Gaza, and then they go quiet again. We have also experienced encouragement and disappointment in the local fight against antisemitism, as state and national leaders offer their solidarity and support — and then another outrage occurs and we feel let down. We are very much in the middle, so is it appropriate to celebrate?
Hanukkah teaches us that, even at this stage, celebration is not only appropriate but essential. In fact, Hanukkah is just the last survivor of a large number of minor festivals established from the Maccabean period until the destruction of the Second Temple, exactly the time when the Jewish state was fighting for its existence, suffering defeats as well as celebrating victories, and when there was a constant struggle without an established and secure peace.
35 such days were established to celebrate the moments of light amid the gloom. The miracles and wonders of the Exodus when the Israelites left Egypt in triumph only needed one festival — Pesach. It is the more complicated realities of the Maccabean Revolt, and indeed of our time, that call for regular celebration.
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This is something that Rabbi Jonathan Sacks talked about. He told a story that happened to him in 1993, just a couple of years after he became Chief Rabbi. A head teacher of a failing school contacted him to ask for advice. She visited his home and told him a tale of woe. Morale at the school, among students, parents and teachers alike was an all-time low. Due to children being withdrawn from the school and transferred elsewhere by parents, the roll had dropped from 1,000 children to 500. Examination results were poor, and the school was heading towards closure.
Rabbi Sacks takes up the story of his advice to the head teacher:
I said: “I want you to live one word: celebrate.” She turned to me with a sigh: “You don’t understand — we have nothing to celebrate. Everything in the school is going wrong.” “In that case”, I replied, “find something to celebrate. If a single student has done better this week than last week, celebrate. If someone has a birthday, celebrate. If it’s Tuesday, celebrate.” She seemed unconvinced, but promised to give the idea a try.
Eight years later that head teacher wrote again to Rabbi Sacks to tell him what had happened. Examination results at high grades had risen from 8 to 65 per cent. The roll of pupils had risen from 500 to 1,000 again. She said that one word — celebrate — had changed the school and her life.
It is our religious celebrations, and the gratitude to God they express, that give us the strength to carry on. Jewish history is a succession of better times and worse times. The Hasmonean monarchy that followed the Maccabean Revolt was not a simple and wholly happy time. There were civil wars, assassinations and massacres. The alliance with Rome turned into a full Roman occupation which led eventually to the destruction of the Temple. The Hasmonean dynasty itself ended tragically. The last Hasmonean princess threw herself from the roof of the palace rather than be forced to marry Herod. Her final words declared that she was the last of her line, and anyone who came after claiming to be a Hasmonean was a liar.
Nevertheless, the festival of Hanukkah was established and it remains, as a reminder that we celebrate and we thank God even when everything is not perfect, and even though the moment of happiness will pass — because the blessings also endure, and we cannot survive without them.
Dr Benjamin Elton is the Chief Minister and Senior Rabbi of The Great Synagogue in Sydney.
The ABC’s Religion and Ethics portal is home to religious reporting & analysis, ethical discussion & philosophical discovery, and inspiring stories of faith and belief.
We acknowledge Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the First Australians and Traditional Custodians of the lands where we live, learn and work.

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