A short video that appeared to show Chabad Hassidim on what was claimed to have been Syrian soil caused an uproar on social media in the Arab world and beyond.
The clip showed a handful of Hassidim, including children, singing and dancing light-heartedly, drinking “l’chaim,” and adding humorously that they were preparing to set up a Chabad House in Syria.
The video also showed an electrical generator and a van parked behind the Hasidim, with an unfurled banner reading “Historic Printing Ceremony of the Holy Tanya, Syria, Hader,” referring to the central religious book written in the late 18th century by the founder of Chabad, Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Ladi.
However, as the video left the Israeli sphere and went viral in the Arabic-speaking sphere, many in the Arab world did not conceive these scenes as a light-hearted comic intermission, expressing outrage and disdain at the scenes.
The video was published on Al-Jazeera’s Arabic outlets, which added, “Israeli platforms circulated video footage of settlers performing Talmudic rituals for the first time on Syrian territory. The settlers performed their prayers near the base of Mount Hermon, which was recently occupied by the Israeli army after the fall of the Syrian regime."
One commenter noted, “Let them rejoice a bit, and inshallah they will cry a lot,” while many others sarcastically congratulated the Syrian people for alleged “freedom”.
Cairo and London-based channel Al-Ghad also shared the video, which was given the title “settlers perform Talmudic rituals in Syria”. Razi Tatour, a reporter from Al-Ghad, explained that the Hassidim were awaiting the inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump, hoping that he would allow a “geographical expansion” of Israel, accusing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of “embodying the dream of Greater Israel” and “establishing himself as a new Sykes-Picot of the region.”
Hezbollah loyalist outlet Al-Mayadeen held a panel discussion with guests from Ramallah, Beirut, and Damascus in an attempt to analyze “what goal Israel seeks to achieve through provocative actions of Israeli rabbis perform Talmudic rituals near the base of Mount Hermon in Syria.” Abdel Qader Badawi, dubbed by the channel an “Israel expert,” implied that these “Talmudic rituals” are promoted by Israeli authorities, arguing that they express “the Israeli biblical settlement orientation that seeks expansion, settlement, and swallowing up more Arab lands and settling them.”
The video also made it outside the Arab world, as prominent anti-Israel and antisemitic bloggers shared it, adding their own thoughts. One of these was Anastasia Maria Loupis, who accused the Hassidim of performing “demonic Talmudic rituals in Syria for the first time,” while the pro-Islamic Republic outlet The Cradle claimed that “This act recalls the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon when the Rebbe instructed Chabad to print the Tanya in Beirut and send him a copy.” It was also shared by the Qatari-affiliated website Middle East Eye as “Israeli ultra-Orthodox Jews reading religious texts and announcing the establishment of a ‘Chabad house’ in the Syrian village of Hader.”
Chabad: ‘all babble and nonsense’
A source in Chabad denied to The Jerusalem Post that the video was taken in Syria. “If you mean the video that went viral, it was an enthusiastic youngster who didn't even make it to Syria and only came as close as he could to Syria from the Israeli side of the Golan Heights.”
The source said that the men in the video hold no formal positions in Chabad nor are they official emissaries, adding that they jokingly started handing out faux titles such as ‘Chabad house in Syria,’ ‘emissaries’ and ‘printing the Tanya in Syria.’
“It's all in babble and nonsense,” the source concluded.