Let’s stop pretending Chabad is just some friendly “Jewish outreach” group handing out candles and singing songs. They’re a massive, well‑connected religious‑political machine with money, influence, and access to power from Brooklyn to Moscow to Jerusalem. They’ve built a global empire that politicians love because it gives them a pipeline into Jewish communities worldwide. And they use that access to push hardline nationalist ideology that has real consequences for Palestinians.
Chabad’s modern rise starts with the Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, in Crown Heights. Under him, Chabad turned into a worldwide network: schools, synagogues, youth programs, political donors, and a PR operation that makes them look like harmless spiritual guides. Behind that PR, they’ve pushed a worldview where Israel’s borders are “God‑given,” Palestinians are obstacles, and compromise is weakness. There's documented reporting and analysis of his position on “shleimut ha’aretz,” the “wholeness of the land,” where he argued that giving up territory under Israeli control would endanger Jewish lives and insisted Israel act independently of outside pressure.
In practice, that line — “never give up land, never bow to pressure” — feeds straight into the current hardline camp: annexation, permanent control, no real Palestinian sovereignty. You see it echoed in pieces openly arguing that the Rebbe’s view supports annexing the West Bank and Gaza and “ending the idea of Palestine” altogether. That’s the ideology a lot of today’s brutality grows out of.
In Israel, Chabad isn’t running the government, but they’re plugged into the religious‑right ecosystem that keeps the whole violent machine running. They’re part of the ideological backbone behind settlement expansion. They run Chabad houses in settlements, they preach that the land is non‑negotiable, and they help normalize the idea that Palestinians don’t belong there. They’re not the ones physically building the outposts, but they’re the ones blessing the people who do, teaching kids and families that this is holy work, not a political project.
When it comes to Gaza, Chabad rabbis have repeatedly made statements that line up with the most extreme nationalist rhetoric. Some have blessed soldiers heading into Gaza. Some have publicly said the war should be fought without restraint. Some have pushed the idea that mercy toward Palestinians is weakness. This isn’t fringe — these kinds of positions is agreed on by 82% of the Israeli population that treats mass civilian death and starvation as “regrettable but necessary” or just doesn’t talk about it at all.
And then there’s who they choose to stand next to. In 2025, when Itamar Ben‑Gvir — a far‑right monster with a history of openly racist, anti‑Arab positions and ties to Kahanist ideology — toured the U.S., a lot of Jewish groups refused to meet him. Chabad rabbis did. He was welcomed at Chabad centers, including at 770 Eastern Parkway, the headquarters in Crown Heights. Outside, protests broke out. Some Chabad followers responded with violence, chasing a woman while chanting “Death to Arabs,” attacking protesters, burning a keffiyeh.
Politically, Chabad has been a convenient bridge for leaders who want access to Jewish communities without dealing with messy internal politics. Netanyahu has long courted Chabad donors in the U.S. Trump had Chabad‑connected advisers and donors around him. Putin has leaned on Chabad as his preferred “official” Jewish partner in Russia, sidelining other Jewish currents. There’s a whole Politico piece literally calling Chabad the “happy‑go‑lucky Jewish group that connects Trump and Putin.” That’s the level of access we’re talking about: heads of state using this network as a channel, and the network using that proximity to reinforce its own power and worldview.
Inside Israel and the occupied territories, Chabad’s presence in the West Bank is obvious: Chabad houses in settlements, religious courts, youth outreach, and rabbis who preach that the land is non‑negotiable. They help keep the settlement project spiritually justified. They help keep people fired up for a political mission that destroys Palestinian lives. They’re part of the everyday infrastructure that makes occupation feel normal and holy to the people living inside it.
At the same time, Chabad’s global footprint means their messaging doesn’t stay in Israel. It spreads through thousands of emissaries (“shluchim”) stationed in cities around the world. These rabbis and centers shape how diaspora Jews think about Israel, Gaza, and Palestinians. They host events, give talks, frame the war, frame the occupation, frame Palestinian resistance. Even when they don’t say “wipe them out,” they often present a narrative where Israel is eternally under existential threat, Palestinians are mostly a problem, and military force is just self‑defense. That framing is exactly what lets governments get away with mass killing and starvation while still claiming moral high ground.
There’s also the internal tension: Chabad historically had a complicated relationship with Zionism, sometimes keeping distance from secular nationalism. But after October 7 and the ongoing genocide, there’s been a clear shift toward more openly nationalist, exclusionary politics in parts of the movement. You see it in who they host, who they defend, who they attack, and who they ignore. You see it in the way some Chabad communities respond to protests, to criticism, to Palestinians, to left‑wing Jews.
Meanwhile, when people like Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens reports that Chabad is a global puppet‑master conspiracy, Chabad leadership screams “blood libel” and points to violence against their rabbis and centers. The fact is that Chabad as an institution has chosen to align itself with some of the most extreme, anti‑Palestinian forces in Israeli politics and has helped legitimize policies that have killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in Gaza and crushed Palestinian life in the West Bank.
So no, this isn’t some neutral, spiritual outreach group floating above politics. It’s a powerful religious‑political network with deep ties to right‑wing governments, a hardline territorial ideology, and a global messaging machine that helps justify what’s being done to Palestinians — while hiding behind the language of faith, community, and “Jewish safety.”
