So why were those yeshiva students digging a tunnel at Chabad headquarters?

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I have to admit that I had never heard of this group-movement.

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Children outside 770 Eastern Parkway, Chabad headquarters in Brooklyn, N.Y., on Tuesday. Photo by Mira Fox

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So why were those yeshiva students digging a tunnel at Chabad headquarters?
The fracas reveals deep rifts in the Lubavitcher community between officials and those who see the Rebbe as the messiah

https://forward.com/fast-forward/575646/chabad-lubavitch-headquarters-770-tunnel-rebbe-messiah/

Beth Harpaz Louis Keene January 9, 2024

A near-riot and nine arrests at Chabad Lubavitch headquarters are bringing attention to deep rifts between Chabad officials and those who openly believe their late Rebbe is the messiah.

The fracas Monday at 770 Eastern Parkway in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn began when a cement truck arrived to fill in a tunnel dug by a group of meshichisten. (Meshichisten is the Yiddish term used to describe Chabad’s “messianists,” who fervently believe in the imminent return of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe who died in 1994.) The passageway was apparently used to dump debris from an unauthorized expansion of the synagogue onto an unused property next door.

Once they realized the tunnel was being filled in, the black-hatted young men tore down wooden panels, exposing the tunnel. The Associated Press reported Tuesday that nine people — between the ages of 19 and 22 — were arrested, with another three charged with disorderly conduct. Chabad spokesperson Rabbi Motti Seligson said that the building was closed pending a structural safety review......................................


..........On the face of it, the organization’s influence has expanded worldwide since the Rebbe’s death. There are now 3,500 Chabad houses operating in hundreds of neighborhoods and college towns around the U.S. and in another 100 countries around the world. ........................