The tradition on Hanukkah is to eat fried foods because oil is very important for this holiday. During the second century before the common era, the Syrian Greeks controlled Jerusalem and banned Judaism. A group of rebels known as the Maccabees defeated the Greeks and rededicated the Jewish temple. They found one container of kosher oil which lasted eight days, and rabbis say that is the miracle of this holiday. Now, many people eat latkes (fried potato pancakes) and sufganiyot (fried doughnuts with jelly or custard filling) here in Israel.