As news spread at the end of the Sukkot holiday of the liberation of the final living hostages, whom the Hamas terror group held in Gaza, synagogues across the United States marked the moment with quiet ceremonies that mixed relief and mourning.

At Skokie Valley Agudath Jacob Synagogue, a Modern Orthodox shul in the Chicago area, some 65 congregants gathered on the eve of the Shemini Atzeret holiday to remove yellow ribbons which had been affixed to trees outside the synagogue for almost two years.

“Everyone was excited,” congregant Bryan Gryka, general manager and executive chef of the kosher eatery Milt’s Barbecue for the Perplexed who attended with his 9-year-old son, told JNS. “They had yellow ribbons with hostage names on them, and they were removing them as the hostages were releas

See Full Page