Hanukkah in wartime: Israelis take stock as war continues for more than 2 months

livemint.com:

Israel-Hamas War Day 63: Joe Biden holds talks with PM Netanyahu It was a solemn moment for all of Israel and not only for families of the 138 Israelis still held hostage. For some Israelis, the feeling is of a country shrinking. Some 200,000 Israelis have been uprooted from both the south of Israel where Hamas infiltrated and the north of Israel where Hezbollah attacked from Lebanon.

Absent tourists because of the war, hotels have accommodated many of the evacuees. "Oct. 7 was a day that changed the course of history in Israel," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lior Haiat said, calling it "the worst day for the Jewish people since the Holocaust." Aghast at the Hamas killings, Israelis have bought up guns with the government's blessing.

The nation is largely self-absorbed. Israeli television channels, dominated by war news, rarely broadcast scenes from Gaza except to show soldiers in action. Israel intensifies ground attack in southern Gaza. Is anywhere safe? Israelis must look to channels abroad to view the landscape of buildings destroyed or vacated during an Israeli bombardment and ground offensive in which Gaza health officials say more than 16,000 people have been killed.

Gone are weekly demonstrations that for months drew hundreds of thousands of Israelis into the streets to protest against a government plan to limit the judiciary they assailed as anti-democratic. The country seems less polarised, at least for now, as it readies to celebrate Hanukkah. Israel says ‘killed two Palestinians for every Hamas fighter’ Commemorating an ancient Jewish victory, Hanukkah is a family festival lasting eight nights and featuring candle lighting and frying of foods in oil because, tradition says, of a miracle that oil found to fuel