Chabad Fulfills Its Mission, the UN Does Not

My favorite charities are those that feed people. In recent years I have taken up the custom of delivering holiday packages to indigent Jews in Toronto in behalf of Chabad and did so again last week just before Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year.

At some point during this holiday most Jews gather together with family and friends for a festive meal. The packages that I delivered contained all of the fixings that a single person needed to enjoy such a holiday meal plus some traditional greetings, prayers and blessings. In a few rare instances where the recipient was not living alone, I delivered two and, in a couple of instances, as many as three packages to one address — but these were rare exceptions to the rule. For the most part these impoverished Jews live alone. 

Chabad’s Outreach and Inclusion

Chabad is technically a Hasidic sect. If one looks at a gathering of hardcore members one observes a sea of black hats, black suits, and unkempt beards, all of which to the unknowing eye makes this branch indistinguishable from other Hasidic camps.

At prayer services the rabbi will wear a bekishe, the traditional long black frock coat, and usually there are a few black suited men among the congregants — but as for the rest of the congregation anything goes. The head is covered but beneath that one finds novelty t-shirts, jeans, occasional tattoos (which, by the way, are forbidden in Jewish law) and all sorts of sundry attire up to and including designer sneakers.

Chabad is very much about outreach and inclusion and has been very successful in this respect. It has become legendary among Jews, almost a joke, that Chabad shuls are to be found everywhere, even in the remotest parts of the world, and it is by far the fastest growing denomination among Jews. The delivery of these packages is part of its outreach. It is designed to bring comfort to poor Jews and connect them with the wider community. (READ MORE from Max Dublin: Has Canada’s Taxman Been Weaponized?)

This year when I arrived to pick up my packages the rabbi asked if I could handle twenty-five, a rather larger number than usual, and when I said that I could he added another one for good measure. To the reader this may not sound like a large number but this is not a door-to-door operation in a Jewish slum. There is no such thing in Toronto. The Jewish poor are pinpricks scattered all over town and this year I found myself driving all the way down to the waterfront and then up again through Liberty Village and the Junction in the west end.

Moreover, there’s seldom anywhere to park legally and it’s often difficult to gain access to the designated abodes. As one might expect these are marginal and not super functional people. Some suffer from what would appear to be a mild form of mental illness or come from a foreign land such as Russia and have not managed to acclimate themselves to their adopted country.

Some live in public housing but due to shyness or fear are reluctant to answer their buzzer if, in fact, they have one. I remember one Russian émigré who answered the door dressed in his best shabby suit. When I tried to hand him his package, he refused to take it because he said he could not afford it. It took a while till I was able to bring home to him that it was a gift but then he decided that he was too proud to take it. In the end I prevailed upon him to accept the package and he was ever so grateful, but I wished he hadn’t been.

Another one was an elderly lady who answered the door wearing a threadbare housecoat. She was very welcoming and spoke to me effusively in the Yiddish dialect of a Polish Jew. Her sweetness, warmth, and enthusiasm and the cadence of her language reminded me of my own mom of blessed memory. 

Those who did not live in public housing lived in slummy little buildings, the shabbiest of rooming houses that by their crumbling, musty, smelly nature smacked you in the face as soon as you entered the front door. Following years of gentrification there is not much of such housing stock left in Toronto, and the landlords should long ago have been cited.

On the other hand, the rent must still be very cheap if it can be afforded by those on public assistance, and what is most striking in such circumstances is that the occupants are trying their best to live independently and with dignity. Their look and circumstance are reminiscent of the photographs taken by Roman Vishniac in Poland before the Holocaust.

They are also reminiscent of the photos taken by Bruce Davidson in his magnificent album East 100th Street. What is most striking about these Jews is their lack of grievance coupled with quiet dignity. They are not the angry poor who sometimes, if one examines their situation closely, aren’t really poor at all but just like playing the victim card. They are the invisible poor, hidden because they have basically retreated from a world that has proven too much for them.

Chabad’s influence and work is not lost on rather more secular Jewish and non-Jewish leaders. When its spiritual leader Rabbi Menachem Schneerson was alive top world leaders used to seek audiences with him just as they do with the Pope. On July 2 Chabad of Toronto sponsored a big event in Toronto’s Roy Thomson Symphony Hall, and I attended because David Friedman, Trump’s ambassador to Israel, was the keynote speaker.

In his speech Friedman stated that though he was not a member of Chabad — and nor, incidentally am I — he considered it to be the most important Jewish organization in the world. He recounted his role in the behind-the-scenes activity in the Trump administration leading up to moving the American embassy to Jerusalem. Before making the final decision Trump canvassed his cabinet for advice and every last one of his cabinet members said that they were against the idea because they feared that it would light up the Arab street.

Trump summoned Friedman to Washington for a month to try to persuade them to go along but to no avail. In the end Friedman counselled that he should go ahead anyway. He said that one must not give in to fear of the crybullies in the Arab street. Trump proceeded with the move and, as it turned out, there were very few fireworks in the Arab street.

There is a fringe faction of Hasidim called Neturei Karta (NK) that repudiates the legitimacy of the Jewish state basically by claiming that it was reestablished by Jewish people and not through the coming of the Messiah. I have seen them — or perhaps imposters of them — mingling with pro-Hamas Jew-hating demonstrators. On the other hand, the philosophy of the Chabad movement is quite the opposite of that. Chabad has long maintained that Israel should never exchange land for empty, treacherous, and manipulative promises of peace. Nothing more than the present war in which Israel is painfully clawing back lost territory in both the south and the north has vindicated the Chabad position. (READ MORE: A Very Unhappy Anniversary)

The Fading United Nations

At the Chabad event Friedman told the audience that his advice to Trump was inspired by the famous passage in Isaiah, “They shall beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks.” He maintained that it was the successful moving of the American embassy that laid the groundwork for the ensuing Abraham Accords.

This famous passage is carved on what is known as the Isaiah wall of the United Nations. But like its predecessor the League of Nations, the UN has failed miserably in keeping the peace. On the contrary, members of its agencies, UNRWA in Gaza and UNIFIL in Lebanon, have collaborated with terrorist war mongers Hamas and Hezbollah. Now UNIFIL, which was supposed to keep Hezbollah north of the Litani river, is refusing to get out of the way during the IDF ground operation in south Lebanon.

Moreover, by espousing and promoting the crazy covid lockdown and the green agenda — that, among other things, calls for the curtailing of food production on the planet — the UN has exacerbated the problems of the poor rather than alleviate them. These are just a few of the reasons why the UN, like the League of Nations before it, deserves to be disbanded and replaced by a truly worthy and moral world body.

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