Hasidic Jewish students sit behind a breach in the wall of a synagogue that led to a tunnel dug by the students, Monday, Jan. 8, 2024, in New York. A group of Hasidic Jewish worshippers were arrested amid a dispute over a secret tunnel built beneath a historic Brooklyn synagogue, setting off a brawl between police and those who tried to defend the makeshift passageway.
Bruce Schaff via AP
Police in Brooklyn are still investigating the discovery Monday night of a tunnel secretly excavated under the Chabad Lubavitch Headquarters, allegedly by “extremist students” seeking to pray off-hours.
Officers from the 71st Precinct responded to the headquarters at 77o Eastern Pkwy. in Crown Heights after a “disorderly group” had been reported illegally breaking down the wall and trespassing.
As shown in videos posted to social media, a number of Hasidic Jewish men had climbed into the tunnel, carved into stone and dirt, to apparently stop it from being filled. Construction crews had been called in to repair the hole in the wall.
But after police arrived, the men in the tunnel refused to leave, leading to a struggle and subsequent arrests. Police did not confirm how many people were arrested at the synagogue, though published reports state that between 9-10 men were cuffed.
The charges were still pending as of Tuesday afternoon, a police spokesperson told Brooklyn Paper, which first reported the story for Schneps Media.
How the tunnel was dug remains under investigation; Chabad Lubavitch spokesperson Motti Seligson said that a group of “extremist students” had previously broken through walls at properties abutting the headquarters in order to access the synagogue without permission.
Crews came to the Chabad HQ on Jan. 8 to repair the wall, but their efforts were ultimately stopped by a rowdy group seeking to keep the secret portal in place.
Another Chabad representative, Yaacov Behrman, shared in an unofficial statement on X (the platform formerly known…
Read the full article here
