"We can only laud and thank Hashem for this"

"Reb Mendel Futerfass spent decades in the Siberian gulag. He was eventually released, and was a beloved mashpia in Lubavitch. The year he arrived, he joined the procession to Tashlich, a huge crowd following the Lubavitcher Rebbe to the Brooklyn Botanical Garden. It was a royal parade, the Rebbe at the head of a legion of chassidim, police cars escorting them at the head.

‘In Russia,’ Reb Mendel commented, ‘we also had police joining us when we went to do mitzvos, but they were behind us, trying to intimidate and catch us. Here, the police are in front of us, clearing the way.’

“Rabboisai, just half a year ago, we had police circulating in this neighborhood, outside our shuls, harassing people if they came to daven, and now those same police closed off the road for us to dance. We can only laud and thank Hashem for this.”

RAV YAAKOV ELIYAHU UNSDORFER, rav of Mesivta Reishis Chochma in Montreal, addressing a Hachnassas Sefer Torah last week

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 877)