There are famous stories of how politicians approached the Satmar Rebbe looking for support and being somewhat familiar with his opposition to Israel spoke against the US continuing support for Israel with financial and military aid only to be castigated by the Rebbe who then explained to his hassidim that 1. his fight is internal, between brothers, but when the non-Jews join in and dont want to support Israel that is just antisemitism, and 2. while he is opposed to the State of Israel, when Israel is in a time of trouble and under attack, the people of Israel are still his Jewish brothers and he supports them.
The Neturei Karta never seemed to make such a distinction and always opposed Israel, even when it was under attack and even supporting people who want to destroy Israel and kill Israelis. I never really understood how they could advocate for the enemies of Israel who would kill Jews because of their hatred for Israel. I dont mind people being anti-zionists (I mean, I do, but people are entitled to their own opinions), but helping the enemy who wants to kill Jews????
The Satmar Rebbe has now attacked Neturei Karta for this very thing.
The Satmar Rebbe (or one of them at least), Rav Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum, aka Rav Zalman Leib, has attacked Neturei Karta saying that they think they have a continuing tradition but are really doing things on their own with no support form the tzadikim of any generation.
The Rebbe said that even in the days of the Satmar Rebbe they acted in ways that hurt him and he spoke against them. We see today that they go places and cooperate with the Arabs while strengthening them in their murderous acts all while wearing bekeshe and shtreimel and stand with haters of Jews and murderers.
The Rebbe said this is a chilul hashem of the highest magnitude and their actions are proof that when one acts without daas torah one can get to the craziest of places crossing every red line along the way.
source: Kikar
------------------------------------------------------
Reach thousands of readers with your ad by advertising on Life in Israel
Reach thousands of readers with your ad by advertising on Life in Israel
------------------------------------------------------
The version I heard was that a politician once came to R' Yoel for his support and went on and on about how he supported Israel. The chassidim could barely restrain their smirks, and started laughing at him once he left. The Rebbe stopped them: "When a non-Jew talks about how much he loves Israel, he's talking about how much he loves Jews."
ReplyDeleteIt was Hubert Humphrey
DeleteKeep following this story. After the Mercaz HaRav massacre, one of the Satmars came out with a statement condemning it and supportive of the victims. A few days later it was reported in the Yiddish press that he had subsequently made a statement on the following Shabbos that he didn't mean a word of it and was just doing it for PR purposes.
ReplyDeleteinteresting. here the Rebbe didnt support the victims, at least not explicitly, but criticized NK. I dont think he has to walk that back
DeleteI highly doubt that. The Satmar don't need PR. In fact, the other brother said nothing. I would trust what he actually said than how the "press" "explained" it.
Delete