A group of Hasidic Jewish worshippers were arrested amid a dispute over a tunnel secretly dug into the side of a historic Brooklyn synagogue, setting off a brawl between police and those who tried to defend the makeshift passageway. The discovery of the tunnel at the Chabad-Lubavitch world headquarters in Crown Heights prompted an emergency structural inspection from the city Tuesday. The building at 770 Eastern Parkway was once home to the movement’s leader, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, and draws thousands of visitors each year. Its Gothic Revival facade is immediately recognizable to adherents of the Chabad movement and replicas of the revered building have been constructed all over the world. #newyork #synagogue #riot Subscribe to The Telegraph with our special offer: just £1 for 3 months. Start your free trial now: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/customer/subscribe/digitalsub/3for1/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_pvid_conversion-subscription_editorial-iniative_03-22_EGW-13_organic_youtube Get the latest headlines: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/ Telegraph.co.uk and YouTube.com/TelegraphTV are websites of The Telegraph, the UK's best-selling quality daily newspaper providing news and analysis on UK and world events, business, sport, lifestyle and culture.
  • @PipocaEnglish
    6•10 months ago

    Basically, the synagogue is the headquarters of Chabad. It used to be the synagogue of the lubbavitcher rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, before his death in the 90s.

    There’s something of a schism in Chabad between people who think that the rebbe could have been the messiah but died, wasn’t the messiah, that he’s going to be revived as the messiah or that he’s the messiah but in hiding until the time is right.

    The rebbe said a few years before his death that he wanted the synagogue there expanded. After his death, the building’s been caught up in ownership disputes between the assorted organizations and factions, preventing any expansion.

    Apparently, a bunch of messianic yeshiva students there got fed up with waiting, and decided to start tunneling over to the synagogue, with the idea that the tunnel would be turned into the expansion they need to prepare for (or trigger, I’m not quite sure) the rebbe’s return.