Chanukah and Christmas were celebrated in a variety of ceremonies in Jerusalem and Bethlehem yesterday as well as throughout the country. The Jewish festival of lights began last night with the lighting of the first candle at the Western Wall by Ashkenazic chief Rabbi Shlomo Goren. The ceremony was dedicated to Soviet Jewry, and most of the crowd consisted of new immigrants, public figures and tourists.
Goren was handed a torch by Yigal Hanoch, the 6-year-old son of Prisoner of Zion Leib Hanoch. Among the speakers was Prof. Benjamin Levich, the Soviet aliya activist who only recently arrived in Israel. Speaking in Russian, he implored the public not to forget the Jews who have not yet been granted exit visas from the USSR. Goren, in his speech, called on Iranian Jews to leave for Israel before it was too late.
After the lighting ceremony, 300 youths from the city’s youth clubs came to the Wall to watch 15 beacons lighted. The beacons were carried by runners to the city’s youth clubs. Other runners will carry a torch from the Maccabean birthplace of Modi’in to the Presidential residence in Jerusalem Tuesday evening. President Yitzhak Navon will then light the third candle in their company. The torch will be flown abroad to light beacons in Jewish communities around the world.
SPECIAL FESTIVE AIR
The Jewish National Fund last night lit the giant torches in the form of menorahs on 18 lookout posts from the Golan Heights in the north to Sharm el-Sheikh in the south. Some 20,000 youths, settlers and soldiers, participated in these ceremonies. In Jerusalem, the coincidence between Chanukah and Christmas, for the first time since 1940, lent a special festive air to the city, as the lights from Chanukah menorahs mingled with those from Christmas trees and other decorations.
Some 150 Lebanese pilgrims attended a special Christmas eve service held at the King David Citadel in East Jerusalem in solidarity with the Christians of Lebanon. The service was held under the slogan: “Nevertheless, Lebanon Wishes You a Merry Christmas.”
Thousands of pilgrims from all over the world attended the midnight mass at Bethlehem’s Manger Square. Others filled the numerous churches in East Jerusalem. All events took place without disturbances.
The Christmas celebration began at noon yesterday when the Latin Patriarch, Giacomo Beltritti, left Jerusalem for Bethlehem escorted by a long motorcade of notables. Halfway between Jerusalem and Bethlehem, at the Mar Elias Monastery, the patriarch was greeted by the Mayor of Bethlehem, Freij. He entered the city accompanied by Freij and mayors of the nearby largely Christian towns of Beit Sahur and Beit Jala.
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