Anonymous ID: 584a44 Jan. 11, 2024, 8:48 a.m. No.20225753   🗄️.is đź”—kun   >>5768 >>5785 >>5816 >>5824 >>5831 >>5857 >>5874 >>6156 >>6299

Chabad used 'Mexicans' to dig the secret synagogue tunnels

Secretly began digging the 3-foot-high, 20-foot-wide, 50-foot-long tunnel themselves, using crude instruments and their hands.

 

Later, the men, most of them in their teens and early 20s, took up a collection and hired a group of migrant laborers to finish the job, Kalmowitz said, describing the workers as “Mexicans.”

 

The workers lived at an abandoned building that contained a men’s ritual bath near Chabad world headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway — known in the community simply as 770 — for the duration of the clandestine work, Kalmowitz said.

 

“The Mexicans lived in the building for three weeks during the work,” said Kalmowitz, adding that the migrants did the work “correctly” and installed support beams. “They slept and ate there because it was a secret operation.”

 

Some of the students are on visas from Safed, a holy city in Israel that is considered the birthplace of Kabbalah, or Jewish mysticism, said a Chabad rabbi who asked not to be named.

 

https://nypost.com/2024/01/11/news/orthodox-jewish-students-used-migrant-labor-for-secret-tunnel/

Anonymous ID: 584a44 Jan. 11, 2024, 9:23 a.m. No.20225927   🗄️.is đź”—kun   >>5987 >>6007 >>6051 >>6156 >>6299

Illegal tunnel under a synagogue in NYC is 60 feet long and destabilized nearby buildings, city says

Story by By JAKE OFFENHARTZ, Associated Press • 58m

 

NEW YORK (AP) — The illegal tunnel discovered under a historic Brooklyn synagogue compromised the stability of several structures surrounding the religious complex, prompting an order to vacate as well as citations against its owners, city officials said.

 

Inspectors with New York City’s building safety agency uncovered a tunnel that was 60 feet (18.3 meters) long and 8 feet (2.4 meters) wide beneath the Chabad-Lubavitch global headquarters in Crown Heights. It extended under several buildings in the vicinity, connecting between openings cut into basement walls.

 

The excavation work was done without approval by the Department of Buildings, Andrew Rudansky, a spokesperson for the agency, said in an email to the Associated Press on Wednesday.

 

The findings came after a two-day investigation into the structural stability of the complex, an internationally revered Hasidic Jewish site that draws thousands of visitors each year.

 

Rabbi Motti Seligson, a spokesperson for Chabad, said the underground passage was built by a group of “young agitators” seeking unauthorized access to the synagogue. When Chabad officials attempted to seal the openings on Monday, a faction of worshippers staged a protest, refusing to leave the tunnel and eventually brawling with police. Nine people were arrested, including some who used crowbars to rip off the synagogue’s wood paneling, according to a police report.

 

It was not immediately clear when the tunnel was constructed or what it was intended to accomplish. Some members of the community said they were hoping to fulfill the “expansion” plan of the former head of the Chabad movement, Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson. A faction of Chabad believes that Schneerson is the messiah and is still alive.

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/illegal-tunnel-under-a-synagogue-in-nyc-is-60-feet-long-and-destabilized-nearby-buildings-city-says/ar-AA1mOFd9

Anonymous ID: 584a44 Jan. 11, 2024, 9:27 a.m. No.20225948   🗄️.is đź”—kun   >>5964 >>5967 >>5987 >>6156 >>6299

Vacate orders issued to stabilize New York synagogue after tunnel discovery

 

New York building officials have issued emergency work orders to stabilize a historic synagogue and its neighboring structures after an illicit underground tunnel was discovered at the sanctuary earlier this week.

 

An investigation by the city’s department of buildings uncovered a tunnel that was 60ft long (18.3 meters), 8ft wide (2.4 meters) and 5ft high (1.5 meters) located underneath the global headquarters of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, an important Jewish site. It extends under several buildings in the vicinity.

 

“As a result of this extensive investigation, we have issued emergency work orders to stabilize the buildings above the tunnel, vacate orders in parts of the buildings to ensure occupant safety, and enforcement actions against the property owners for the illegal work,” Andrew Rudansky, a spokesperson for the buildings department, said in an email to the Associated Press.

Rundansky, of the buildings department, said the excavation work to create the tunnel caused structural issues at two nearby single-story buildings, resulting in orders to partially vacate them for safety reasons.

 

The agency also issued a full vacate order at a two-story brick building behind the synagogue. Seligson said the building, which houses offices and a lecture hall, had been vacated prior to the city’s order.

There was inadequate and rudimentary shoring used in the tunnel, the investigation found, as well as in basement-level wall openings created in adjacent buildings.

 

The owners of the buildings have already engaged an architect, engineer and contractor to do the needed work, Rudansky said.

The department has also cited the synagogue for the illegal excavation work that created the tunnel, he said.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/11/brooklynn-synagogue-tunnel-vacate-orders-stabilize

Anonymous ID: 584a44 Jan. 11, 2024, 10:12 a.m. No.20226174   🗄️.is đź”—kun   >>6186 >>6299

Names of men arrested at Brooklyn synagogue tunnel released

The NYPD has released the names of those arrested after they attempted to stop an illegally dug tunnel connected to a Brooklyn synagogue from being filled in.

 

Those arrested are:

Noam Dahan, 20, Criminal mischief and reckless endangerment

David Hayon, 22, Criminal mischief and reckless endangerment

enachem Mulakando, 19, Criminal mischief and reckless endangerment

Shmuel Malka, 19, Criminal mischief, reckless endangerment and obstruction of governmental administration.

Dov Bear Shenhav, 20, attempted hate crime/criminal mischief and attempted reckless endangerment.

Blumenfeld Yerachmiel, 20, attempted hate crime/criminal mischief and attempted reckless endangerment.

Menachem Klieman, 19, attempted criminal mischief and attempted reckless endangerment.

Menachem Koopsnik, 21, attempted criminal mischief and attempted reckless endangerment.

Levi Ytzhak Lahav, 20, attempted criminal mischief and attempted reckless endangerment.

 

The arrests came on Monday after police were called to stop a group of students at the Chabad-Lubavitch World Headquarters in Brooklyn who were attempting to stop construction crews from filling in an illegally dug tunnel connected to the building.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/names-of-men-arrested-at-brooklyn-synagogue-tunnel-released/ar-AA1mLm1s