The Jewish Press reports: "Tunnel Discovered under 770 Chabad Center in Crown Heights." The article relates:
On Friday, CrownHeigts.info reported the discovery of a tunnel beneath the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters located at 770 Eastern Parkway in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. The tunnel was discovered some three weeks ago. According to CrownHeights.info, a homeowner on Union Street reported hearing suspicious noises in his residence over some time. Growing increasingly concerned, the homeowner eventually shared his suspicions.
Meanwhile, construction activity was in progress to install new plumbing in the vicinity of 770, and as the project approached its conclusion, a trench was excavated to lay a waterline, revealing an underground tunnel. The tunnel extended from the Mikvah under the women’s section of 770 on Kingston Ave.
The article also adds that "CrownHeights.info speculated that a group of Yeshiva men who had been locked out of 770 during the COVID pandemic decided to dig their way in, literally."
CrownHeights.info may have originally included that speculation, but it isn't what it is reporting now. It's December 22, 2023 article instead relates (underline added):
While details on the tunnel remain scarce, and with some rumors spreading, it appears that a group of bochurim began digging around six months ago in an attempt to “expand 770”.
Working at night for an extended period of time, the bochurim began digging from the Mikvah building and hollowed out a tunnel that sounds eerily similar to those used by Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The tunnel, while “amateurish” managed to extend all the way to 770 where it burrowed under the Kingston Ave women’s section, possibly destabilizing it.
The article also adds:
Editor’s Note: A previous version of this article included an assumption that work on the tunnel began during COVID, an assumption that has proven to be wrong. CrownHeights.info has confirmed through a neighbor who had access to the Mikvah that as of six months ago no work on the tunnel had begun. The article has been corrected to show the accurate information.
In fact, there is no clear explanation for the tunnel. The Forward mentions and dismisses the Covid explanation, but goes on to relate other explanations including that it was intended as an expansion of the existing synagogue or, alternatively, "they had dug the passageway from that area to a neighboring vacant property in order to dispose of debris." Yet another explanation given is that the students that dug the tunnel--a "group of messianists, known by the Yiddish term meshichisten, [who] have congregated in the synagogue in the building’s basement for years" of which "many are from Israel"--were “actively participating in hastening the arrival of Moshiach," or Messiah, believed by the students to be a rabbi referred to in the article as Rebbe. Rebbe had intended an expansion to the synagogue prior to this death, and his followers apparently believe that the expansion is needed to usher in his return.
In that regard, a New York Post article shows that the tunnel led from the Chabab Headquarters, underneath a structure used as a women's prayer section, and to a former men's bath. Rabbi Motti Seligson, spokesman for Chabad-Lubavitch, told the Post that "[s]ome time ago, a group of extremist students, broke through a few walls in adjacent properties to the synagogue at 784-788 Eastern Parkway, to provide them unauthorized access." But the Post also reports that "[t]he tunnel apparently was designed to reach the abandoned men’s mikvah — or ritual bath — around the corner to 'expand' the synagogue[.]"
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