It’s a cold Jerusalem night and we are on a quest to discover the most beautiful Hanukkah menorahs of the Old city. As we concluded our Hanukkah tour at the Western Wall, we counted over 200 menorahs which is very fitting for the holiday which is called ‘The holiday of lights’.

At the Roladin factory by Netanya, every Hanukkah season, over three million Sufganiot are baked. A good enough reason to go check out what is the fascination with those Hanukkah Donuts that Israeli’s have.
Ironically, when newspaper Israel Hayom conducted a blind tasting with some of the biggest food critics in Israel the “tastiest Sufgnia” that won was actually made at the Abulafia Bakery, which is run by the renowned local Arab-Christian family in Jaffa.

This is the groundbreaking of the new Korean Embassy building in Herzliya. The Korean government is the first Asian government to purchase land to build their own embassy in Israel. This ambitious project will cost the Koreans an estimated six-and-a-million-dollars. And maybe a Symbol of the strong relationship between Israel and Korea is the fact that there is no house in Israel that doesn’t have at least one product made in Korea.

Ron Jacobsohn, JN1 Correspondent:
We are at the Groundbreaking of the new Korean Embassy building in Herzeliya. The Korean government is the first Asian government to purchase land to build their own embassy in Israel. This ambitious project will cost the Koreans an estimated six-and-a-million-dollars.

Kyou-Hyun Kim, the Deputy Foreign Minister of Korea flew in especially for the ceremony and to prove how crucial the relationship with Israel is for his country

Kyou-Hyun Kim, Deputy Foreign Minister of Korea:
More than anybody else, you know, we understand the security situations that the Israelis are in, so, and when you’re a school children, you’re taught a lot about Israel like Kibbutz and how to work together as a group and so almost all Koreans have a softer spot for Israel, so that’s a good foundation for us to move forward together.

Kim il Soo, the Korean Ambassador to Israel, suggests that the tight relations between his country and Israel comes from the deep understanding Koreans have to the situation in Israel as it is very similar to what they are experiencing back home.

Kim il Soo, Korean Ambassador to Israel:
It is a first time for an Asian country to build its embassy, we are very proud of that, and that also express, I mean Korea’s firm commitment for the relations with Israel. Israel has many good relations with many Asian countries, but Korea is a little bit unique; we have so many things, have things in common, I mean we developed our economy and political democracy in a very tough environment, I mean security environment so just that I mean modern history of ours tells the common ground we have, so that makes our relations with Israel very special.

The chairman of the Korean Friendship Association, MK Meir Shitrit, says that the relationship with Korea is good but still has room to improve.

MK Meir Shitrit, Chairman, Korean Friendship Association:
I’m glad that today, because of the similarities between Israel and Korea, we are in very good relations between Israel and Korea and I’m glad that they’re building this embassy here, I hope that as Mr. Kyou-Hyun Kim said, I hope that one day we’ll have peace in our area and all the embassies will move to Jerusalem but in the meantime they need an embassy and I know that doing usually a very good job in everything they do. Most of the countries in the world do not accept the situation of today, they don’t recognize all Jerusalem as an Israeli territory and therefore they’re waiting for the peace process as we are, I’m waiting as well! I hope that one day we’ll come shortly to peace in which we’ll define our borders, then there will be no obstacle for no country to build embassy in Jerusalem, I know that many countries already, about many years ago, lands in Jerusalem for the building of own embassies, including United States. The fact they are not building, because the situation in Jerusalem is in conflict and therefore they’re waiting to see the peace process so I hope that the peace really will be accomplished, in that case we’ll see all the ambassadors moving to Jerusalem. I hope that this building embassy would also make progress and tighten our relations between Israel and Korea, there is still… it became better, there’s still a long way in order to make it more and more tightened.

Ron Jacobsohn, JN1 Correspondent:
Maybe a Symbol of the strong relationship between Israel and Korea is the fact that there is no house in Israel that doesn’t have at least one product made in Korea.
For JN1 I am Ron Jacobsohn in Herzeliya.

Hanukkah seems to always have a lot of symbolism attached to it. Interestingly it seems every generation of Jews has managed to interpret the Maccabee’s victory on the Greeks in a different way. We went to find out what the holiday to folks today?

Ron Jacobsohn, JN1 Correspondent:
Hanukkah seems to always have a lot of symbolism attached to it. Interestingly it seems every generation of Jews has managed to interpret the Maccabee’s victory on the Greeks in a different way. We went to find out what the holiday means to Israelis in 2013.

Jeffrey Woolf of the Talmud Department at Bar Ilan University explains that Hanukkah is above all a celebration of the Jewish triumph against persecution.

Jeffrey Woolf, Bar Ilan University:
Hanukkah symbolizes the miraculous dimension of Jewish history, that by all the rules of history we shouldn’t be here, everybody else disappeared, everybody else assimilated and left the historical stage and Jews are still here and they’re still back in their country so there’s a sense of God working behind the scenes which is one of the themes of Hanukkah too because Hanukkah, if you look at it is a story of a guerilla, successful guerilla warfare and you could describe it that way and plenty of historians do describe it that way, but the reason why Hanukkah has religious significance is because Jewish tradition saw something deeper and more profound and divine in the story.

It seems many Israeli’s relate to Hanukkah today more as the first independence holiday of the Jews, being the Maccabee’s ruled over this land for over 200-years.

Gonen Ginat, Israel Hayom:
Hanukkah is a more national holiday than a religious holiday, although there are religious rules to the holiday, but it’s common to all Israelis because we celebrate, in fact, the beginning of 200 years of Jewish sovereignty in Israel after fighting against the Greeks and expelling them out of Israel. Therefore, it’s more like the first independent holiday of the Israelis.

Avigail Lansbacher leads a group of orthodox Jews who have taken upon themselves the task to become close and understand better the secular Jews. The organization has build a huge Menorah at the Tel-Aviv Port with thousands of lights inside and every time another orthodox family hosts a secular family for candle lighting, the lights on the Menorah will get bigger and brighter.

Avigail Lansbacher, Karov LaLev:
In the past, the lighting of the Menorah was inside the houses and each family individually and now we want to show that the families will get together and the light will be much bigger if it’s done together. As Jews, will make the light bigger, making the Jews closer to each other and loving each other, understanding each other, knowing each other.

Its seems Hanukkah is also very unique because as it was the first holiday in the Jewish calendar that was created because of an historical event in the life of the Jews.

Jeffrey Woolf, Bar Ilan University:
It’s the first holiday with religious sanction that’s not mentioned in the Bible. The idea that you could do that without a prophet, there were no prophets, in fact, if you read the book of Maccabees, one of the themes there is we’re doing this until there’s a prophet, we’re doing this until there’s a prophet. Because, you know, it’s like Judaism was, it was like I was learning to ride a bike: my father, may he rest in peace, kept his hand on the seat and then let me go and all of the sudden I look around and here I’m on my own, this is something similar that happened over here. Now, all of the sudden, no more prophets and a great miracle happens, there’s no prophets to tell them and the rabbis and the religious leadership led by Matthias have to come to a decision: do we have the responsibility, can we take the initiative and create a holiday on our own, do we have that right? And they decided – Yes!

Ron Jacobsohn, JN1 Correspondent:
Hanukkah is undoubtedly one of fun Jewish holidays; just don’t just forget all the calories while eating all the traditional food soaked in oil.
For JN1 I am Ron Jacobsohn in Tel-Aviv, wishing all our viewers around the world: A Happy Hanukkah.