A year ago, it seemed inconceivable that some 100 captives would still be held by Hamas today, nearly 15 months after the initial attack.

Last year, I left the eighth night’s candle in my menorah unlit. I resolved that it would remain there until all of the captives were rescued. And there it sits, a terrible reminder of the horror that was unleashed on Israel on October 7.

This, despite the injunction in Judaism that rescuing captives is of the highest order. And yet they remain, languishing in captivity, in the dark, starving. We don’t even know how many of them are still alive.

It is easy, too easy, at the safe distance of my home in the US to forget about the captives and their families. And yet I believe it is of the utmost importance, our sacred responsibility, to remember them and to remind the Israeli government that they have not and should not be forgotten.

A war has raged around them these 15 months. Some hostages have been rescued, some died in captivity, some were murdered on the cusp of being rescued.

Every night for this past week, my house has glowed a little brighter as I add another candle to the menorah. But tonight it will be no brighter than last night, because the eighth candle will again remain unlit. I will place this menorah beside the first, marking their second Hanukkah in captivity.

I will end with my own words from this date a year ago:

My joy in the miracles of the holiday is incomplete, because the miracle of redeeming the captives is incomplete.

Every day, I pray for the hostages and for the souls of those who were murdered. We Jews usually light candles in memory of our lost and missing, but at the end of this Holiday of Light, I will refrain from lighting one of the candles. And I will leave it in my menorah as a reminder. 

It will be a reminder that healing the world is my job too. That there is something I can do, however small, to help tip the world towards justice and peace. That just because I feel helpless and hopeless, I am not free to shirk the task. 

I hope and pray that our Jewish people can once again live in peace and safety. I pray that no more Jewish lights will be extinguished. I pray that all the hostages will be freed. 

I pray that somehow, as impossible as it may seem today, Israelis and Palestinians will find a way to live side by side. 

Until that day, my candle will remain unlit.