Y'all prolly heard bout this incident. It's proper for gentiles to remain ignorant, but a friend asked for an explanation so, having already decided to write it up, I'll let you in on the tea.

The Beginning

Orthodox Jews fall into three camps.

1. Modern Orthodox: follow halacha (jewish law) but have jobs, wear modest secular clothing, shake foids' hands (eg. Ben Shapiro)

2. Yeshivish: most have jobs, wear 1950s clothing, usually won't shake with women unless pressured to

3. Chassidish: many don't work, wear 1850s clothing, don't shake

Obviously other differences exist.

Hasidism started as a pietist movement in the 1700s. Chosids all follow a spiritual leader named a Rebbe who holds court and is basically a king or dynast. Bobov hassids follow the Bobover Rebbe, Amshinov chasidim follow the Amshinover, etc. It's an inherited position. Sometimes the old rebbe appoints one son as the heir, sometimes he splits his following between sons (one in New Jersey, one in Israel, etc), sometimes he doesn't say much and there's a leadership dispute.

Sometimes a rebbe dies without a successor and a new one never arises. These are called "dead hasidim"

Chabad-Lubavitch

One of the oldest khasidic dynasties. They get their name from the town of Lyubovichy, in white Ruthenia, where many of the early Rebbes held court.

The 6th - or Frierdiker - Rebbe died without a son.

His son-in-law inherited. Guy you might have seen before.

Menachem Mendel Schneersohn: the Rebbe.

An extremely beloved, interesting, and powerful leader. At 17 he'd already memorized the entire Talmud - thousands of pages of dense and obscure Aramaic - with commentary. The author of hundreds of books, innumerable letters and speeches. He founded thousands of institutions.

During his life the Rebbe had fled from the Soviet Union, the Nazis, France. In New York, he made his court at a building in the neighborhood of Brooklynn - today bougie and expensive, then working-class.

The address? 770 Eastern Parkway. A building so iconic in Judaism it's known simply as 770.

Chabad's Mission

The Rebbe saw that many Jews by the 60s and 70s had only a minimal connection to their religion due to American integration and other negative spiritual factors. Most were far from the fold not on account of a deep seated atheistic conviction but because their parents had integrated, were overcome by their desires, feared antisemitism and wanted to spare their kids, or whatever. They were like infants captured by idolaters in battle - a halachic status which made them unaccountable for their transgressions done in ignorance

Many Orthodox Jews were sad but dismissive of the plight of their misguided brethren, seeing it as a lost cause. Most Orthodox shuls did not do outreach, have special programming, or do anything else for secular Jews.

Not the Rebbe. He sent dozens of his devoted followers to every city in the US and many outside of it, especially places with no Orthodox community.

They wouldn't charge for access to the house of worship (common in most other synagogues) or wait for Jews to come by - instead, the Rebbe's emissaries (shluchim) would go to Jews where they were and bring mitzvos to them. This is called mivtzoyim.

In the process Chabad shliachs had to deal with many novel things like learning English, interacting with scandalously clad women, etc. They did so admirably, remaining true to halacha while tactfully navigating the secular world.

The Rebbe's campaigns led to tens of thousands of Jews and Jewish families returning to Judaism and are seen as an unmitigated success across the Jewish world, inspiring most other denominations and branches to start their own outreach programs, and even forcing secular Jewish movements like reform and conservative to put on fun events lest their congregants desert en masse. Many of the returnees joined Chabad-Lubavitch and became disciples of its chassidus. Even secular and non-observant businessmen donate to it as part of the mitzvah of helping a fellow Jew.

Trouble in Paradise

During the 90s, the Rebbe, already an old man, got sick.

His followers were in great torment. Nobody had inspired this much fervor - nobody could ever fill his shoes. Especially as the Rebbe had no sons or daughters - all klal Israel (the Jewish nation) were his children.

Many chabadniks even believed he was moshiach. Note that this isn't a deity or the "son of" a deity, whatever that means, in Jewish thought:

A king will arise from the House of David, who is learned in Torah and occupied in the observance of commandments as David his ancestor. He will compel all of Israel to walk in the way of the Torah and reinforce the breaches (in its observance). And he will fight the wars of G-d.

One who accomplishes these things is a potential moshiach and deserves to be followed. The actualized moshiach:

Is victorious over the nations around him. And he builds the Temple in his place. And he gathers the dispersed of Israel.

On an infamous day in 1994 - Gimmel (3rd) Tammuz by our calendar - the Rebbe died.

The Chabad community were thrown into disarray. Emotions ran high and within each community, every group, each family of Chabad, people reacted very differently.

Some were sad but accepted it. They would keep the memory and teachings of the Rebbe alive, without central leadership, but fulfilling his mission. Yes, he was worthy of being moshiach, but had died, which according to the majority view, renders one unfit for the status.

Others refused to believe it. The Rebbe was moshiach. Either he had died and would be resurrected or hadn't died at all. Maybe the tomb was empty... They became known as meshichistim (messianics) - the first group, as antis.

An extremely small proportion of the second - mostly women, ignorants, and the insane - went as far as to claim, contrary to all halacha and Jewish thought, that not only was the Rebbe moshiach, he was even, heaven forfend, G-d himself.

History enjoyers will note the parallel to the passing of a certain oily fellow of the 0s

Lubavitch Today

The movement was split. In such an environment christians disaffiliate from each other and muslims wage jihad. We close ranks. All Israel is one nation, one family, and even a big disagreement like this is not enough to cause bloodshed or enmity. (Paul's mistake was bringing in gentiles. Shat the whole thing up)

Chabadniks agreed to maintain their institutions - synagogues, study halls, houses of learning, charities, etc. - by consensus.

Mostly, it worked.

In general, the majority of Chabad adherents are, in public, anti; the most egregious claimants otherwise are technically shunned by the movement. In their own settings, most do affirm that the Rebbe was or is moshiach. There's a push-pull between emphasizing his holiness (+ messi) and not turning off the entire world with crazy claims (+ anti)

The older ones, who actually knew him as a living man, are more likely to be anti. The much larger younger generation - a hasidish movement's demographics are closer to Niger's than anywhere western - lean messianic. Like the wokies of the western world, meshichistim wormed their way into many of Chabad's educational centers to spread their ideology to gullible youth.

The worst mashichistim attend or attended the Chabad yeshiva in Tzfat, in Israel. An institution that was extremely subverted by the aforementioned process. Lubavitchers from the land of Israel tend to be much more messianic than American ones for sociological reasons I don't feel like getting into. Double whammy.

Many of the tzfatis go putting up stickers like these:

Tunnels under 770

770 itself has faced a lot of issues. As the center of the Chabad world, every claimant wanted it, or at least a piece of the pie. This featured acrimonious legal cases and battles, both in the Jewish juridical system and secularly.

After many years, a court gave ownership to a consortium of educators and general representatives of the worldwide movement.

In practice, the synagogue - which every devout chabadnik has been to, prayed at, and loves - is governed or controlled by gabbaim, who are older, respected men. However, many bochurim (unmarried youth) visit and live there or nearby for a year. It's a popular program within the chosidus. Israelis especially get special religious visas just to come and study at 770.

You can see where this is going.

Over time, the number of worshippers, and especially meshichistim, at 770 has built up very high. One factor is the birth rates, which of themselves would mean an increasingly crowded building. More to the point, messianics revere the Rebbe's building more than antis. Also, certain gabboim at 770 encourage meshichism. It brings in donations to the site specifically, instead of the rest of Chabad's institutions. Lastly, tzfaty youngsters who overly revere the Rebbe - many descended from recent returnees to Judaism or from broken family backgrounds - have a huge presence at the site.

Everyone agrees 770 needs expanded, but the planning and permits process to expand a building in New York City, the den of the Democrats, is not fast or easy at the best of times. Imagine with the decentralized state of the Chabad movement today. Many of the meshichistim in particular believe the Rebbe gave them an order to expand the building.

At some point over the past couple of years, some of these bochurim decided enough was enough. They found an abandoned mikveh (Jewish ritual bath) nearby and dug a long butt, big butt tunnel from it to the shul. Furnished with beds, a study hall, etc.

Recently the building commission, fire department or some other fake jobs program found out and got mad. Apparently it's a structural risk to the building

They shut down the lower story and brought in cement mixers. The bochurim responded by rioting and disconnecting the cement mixers

The NYPD came in, evacuating the whole building til further notice and arresting dozens of bochurim.

Now everyone's mad. The elders are realizing the problem with letting meshichism spread so easily and widely among the young. Many think Chabad needs to recentralize or at least establish a committee capable of handling issues. The bochurim are upset their friends got arrested for a righteous cause. Everyone hates that a couple of youngsters are making Chabad and the Jewish people look bad. This is a big deal in Judaism as it leads people to desecrate and disrespect G-d, who is after all G-d of the Jews in particular (and the world in general). The cops, being antisemites. are glad they got to arrest Jews: the only winners in this debacle.

Now you know the whole story. The vids are worth a watch if you wanna see bochurim hit cops with benches