Jackie Mason thanks the Gentile-in-Chief for a very special Chanukah.

LET'S BE HONEST. Chanukah is called a celebration, but Jews very seldom actually celebrate it. It's not like Christmas, which is a real holiday for Gentiles. Jews know Chanukah has something to do with candles, but they're not sure exactly. The only time they really know Chanukah is coming is when the lobby has a few bright bulbs screwed into an electric menorah, which sits in the shadow of a gigantic Christmas tree.

But this Chanukah is different. It's more a celebration than any other Chanukah I can remember, and for a reason that has nothing to do with the holiday itself. It has to do with Pope John Paul II's stunning pronouncement last week that the Jews should be exonerated of all crimes they have been historically accused of.

The Pope shocked the Jewish community even more when he proclaimed that Christianity owes a special debt to Jews because the Christian savior himself was a Jew.

This is big news, and it may have big consequences for Jewish-Gentile relations.

The fact of the matter is, Gentiles now accept Jews in most situations and relationships as never before. Jews have equal opportunity in every type of employment. Gentiles seem subconsciously to have given Jews preferences in certain professions. Jews are lucky that Gentiles never filed lawsuits to achieve equal rights to become accountants, doctors and lawyers.

But there is still one unique area of discrimination against Jews that still persists, and that is the country club. Most states have laws preventing country clubs from discriminating against people on the basis of race or religion, but Jews know the laws are nothing compared to attitudes.

When a Jews walks into a country club, he does not have to look at faces to know he's not welcome. He could figure it out when he asked for directions to the dinning room and found himself in the garbage.

However, being Jewish and being brought up to think themselves the Chosen People, Jews have taken "choseness" to mean something Moses may not have recognized. They've convinced themselves they didn't want to be members of those country clubs in the first place. So every Jew decided he would build a club on the highway across the street that would be ten times better and bigger so that when the Gentiles drove by, they would be nauseous from looking at it.

If the Gentile country club had a swimming pool, the Jews would have a lake. If the Gentiles had a 10-foot high diving board, the Jews would have one 50 feet high. If the Gentiles had a piano bar, the Jews would have a 32-piece orchestra. If the Gentiles had tuna fish, the Jews had caviar. If the Gentiles had a picnic in the park, the Jews had a cruise to the Caribbean.

The country-club story is typical of how Jews handle the problem of discrimination. They don't confront it, they build around it. But is this the right way? When women were denied the right to vote, they marched in the streets. When blacks were denied civil rights, they not only marched in the streets -- they rioted in the streets. The Jewish answer to discrimination has always been to scream and plead. If they were suffering, the answer was to forgive and forget.

Not only did Jews avoid fighting for their rights -- they decided to avoid even the problem itself by losing their identity. That's why Jewish accountants from Brooklyn try to talk like West Point cadets from North Carolina and Jewish fashion designers named Goldberg from The Bronx become Yves St. La Drek from Paris. Now very short, fat, rich Jews from Long Island marry young, tall Gentiles from Texas.

Jews never fought for equal rights for themselves -- only for acceptance. They've been persecuted in so many countries they felt lucky to be able to live in a country where you could be Jewish without fearing for your life.

But Jews were discriminated against, let's be honest about it. Not so long ago, in the major corporations of America, a Jewish name would not only bar you from the doors of the company, but would also bar you from renting an apartment. The only way a Jew could check into a hotel was if he owned it. Finding a hotel to stay in, if you had a Jewish name, was as easy as finding a ham sandwich at a Bar Mitzvah.

That's different now. And yet, after having attained so many of the equal rights America offers all minorities, Jews still pray to be exonerated from the frequently contrived crimes of which they have been accused by the Gentiles. Now the pope -- who has to be in the running for the title of Head Gentile -- has forgiven the Jews, and even apologized for the history of anti-Semitic accusations.

Wouldn't it be ironic if the Jews take this as the occasion to develop enough pride to face the world with their old Jewish names? Jews now are going to feel so delighted and excited about the pope's pronouncements you will see them testing their popularity by knocking on the doors of the most exclusive country clubs all over America.

And not just country clubs, either. Now, because of the Pope, they can hold their heads high with their own noses, their own accent and walk arm and arm into a Jewish temple -- even with a Jewish wife!