Every year, Chanukah shows up just as winter is about to (or already is) settling in, with days getting shorter and the menorah insisting, yet again, that light is still possible. This year, the sun sets at 4:13 on the first night. Party on…in darkness.

And it’s going to be a dark Chanukah. Antisemitism has entered the mainstream conversation on the daily, sometimes cloaked in anti-Zionism and sometimes just naked and out in the open. You really don’t have to look too hard at all.

If you’ve been paying attention, you’ve probably noticed something strange happening around the current crescendo of antisemitism: the political extremes (the far-right and the far-left) are starting to sound disturbingly similar about Jews.

That’s “The Horseshoe Theory” in a nutshell. The ends of the political spectrum don’t stretch out infinitely from one another: they curve, and eventually, they meet. And on the subject of Jews, unsurprisingly, they’ve been meeting a lot. Nothing unites a broken society and/or extreme political movements like hatred of Jews. It’s one of the oldest tricks in the book.

Chanukah, oddly enough, is the perfect lens to understand that.

The Chanukah story isn’t just about a plucky Jewish guerrilla force toppling a foreign power; it’s about a tiny, stubborn minority refusing to disappear into the ideological demands of the dominant culture. The Seleucids didn’t want to kill Jews, they wanted to erase Jewish distinctiveness. “Be like us,” they said. “Think like us. Worship like us. Stop being…so Jewish.” That’s precisely the dynamic we’re watching now, but instead of one empire, we get two political extremes, each insisting that if we don’t fit their worldview, then we are the problem. And Jews, as always, become a convenient target.

(Although Rabbi Wallen might say, “If we’re the problem, maybe you’re the reason.” Unfortunately, that clever retort won’t get us very far.)

Consider the evidence. Reports show, and we have all seen, a sharp spike in antisemitic incidents rooted in far-left narratives, often wrapped in the language of justice, anti-colonialism, and, increasingly, anti-Zionism. Jewish students have been chased off campuses or restricted from public spaces for being “complicit.” Protest chants about Gaza easily slide into chants about Jews in general, as if an entire people could be collapsed into a single political accusation. In progressive circles, Jewish participation has been sacrificed on the sacred altar of intersectionality. The vocabulary is new, but the logic is ancient: the Jew as oppressor, colonizer, moral threat, baby-killer, “other.”

At the same time, the far-right hasn’t gone anywhere. In Europe and the U.S., classic conspiracies thrive. Jews control the media, finance, and government. Jews corrupt society. Jews are outsiders undermining “real” citizens. The conservative infighting in the aftermath of Nick Fuentes appearing on Tucker Carlson has been morbidly fascinating to behold. Even the most cursory tiptoe into the far- and alt-right will reveal all of the usual suspects saying all of the usual (and terrible) things.

Don’t worry. Actually, do worry. The violence that flows from either direction looks disturbingly similar. The shooting outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, where a far-left gunman killed two people while shouting “Free Palestine,” showed how anti-Israel anger can mutate into direct antisemitic violence on the left. On the flip side, synagogue shootings like in Pittsburgh and San Diego came from the far-right. Two sides, one outcome; when extremists pull from opposite directions, the rope still strangles the same group. Us.

So, what does Chanukah have to say about this moment? Everything. Chanukah is the holiday that refuses to let Jews hide. It’s the one time a year when our tradition literally tells us to put the menorah in the window. Light publicly. Don’t disappear. Not because it’s safe (in our history, it rarely was), but because disappearing is how you lose the battle without ever fighting it.

Chanukah becomes a counter-narrative to the horseshoe. When the far-right says, “You don’t belong here,” the menorah says, “We’ve belonged here longer than your ideology has existed.” When the far-left says, “Your identity is oppressive,” the menorah says, “Our peoplehood and pride are not up for ideological approval.” When both sides treat Jews as symbols, Chanukah insists that Jews are actual people, replete with stories, traditions, and a stubborn 4,000-year-old refusal to vanish. Have at it.

Extremes thrive in darkness, conspiracy theories, slogans, and in reducing people to caricatures. Jews survive by lighting small flames. One flame on night one. Then two. Then three. Eventually nine. Against the darkness, we get stronger.

And in a world that feels like a horseshoe bending inward, Chanukah tells us to bend back, stand up, and be fearless. Not because the world is safe, but because our survival has never depended on safety.

Only on courage.

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