THE OLIVE OIL FESTIVAL

This Chanukah why not light your Menora (Chanukiah) using olive oil to celebrate the existence of this elixir, and while you are at it, give your host a special bottle of Israeli olive oil as a gift? Wine is well covered by Jewish festivals and lifestyle events. There is no lack of opportunities in the Jewish year to say the blessing over wine and enjoy a few glasses and feel righteous at the same time. Chanukah though is a festival that I am at a loss to decide which wine to write about, which is great, because it gives me an excuse to write about olive oil, and it really is the festival of olive oil!
I personally feel the olive and the vine are Siamese twins. They are ever present all over the Mediterranean, certainly  no less in the Eastern Mediterranean, but also may be found everywhere in Israel. The beauty of every Israeli landscape contains vines standing up like soldiers or the shimmering green, silvery leaves of the olive tree. The look is Biblical and yet it also is contemporary.