UK News

The academic year has got off to a busy start for Chabad on Campus in the UK.

On campuses in Bloomsbury, Brighton, Bristol, Cambridge, Edinburgh Leeds, Nottingham, Oxford, South Kensington and South London, Chabad centres catered for in excess of one thousand students over the Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Sukkot festivals.

"For many students – especially those coming from the United States to study - this was their only High Holiday experience," says Rabbi Mendy Loewenthal, director of Chabad of South Kensington, where 80 students attended Rosh Hashanah meals.

With Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur falling outside the university term, Chabad was the only Jewish organisation offering meals and services to students on… Read More »

This past June, Rabbi Aryeh Sufrin received notice from Buckingham Palace that he was selected for a prestigious honor, to be bestowed upon him by Queen Elizabeth II. In recognition of his groundbreaking work tackling substance and alcohol abuse, the founder of Drugsline received an MBE, becoming a Member of the Order of the British Empire. Dvora Lakein spoke with him then about his organization’s achievements and his anticipation for his visit to the Palace to receive the MBE medal.

Sufrin met the Queen Sunday, October 25. Lubavitch.com caught up with the Chabad rabbi to find out how the day went.

I understand that you are a proud royalist. Tell us about the proceedings of the day when you received the honor.

Being at the palace… Read More »

Rabbi Aryeh Sufrin, director of Chabad Lubavitch Ilford, received an MBE (Member of British Empire) at Buckingham Palace this week.

Her Majesty the Queen has given him the honor "for servicing the Jewish Community Relations and to Drugsline in North East London."

Rabbi Sufrin and his wife Devorah moved to Ilford, Essex, in 1983, following in the footsteps of his parents who moved to the area in 1976.

The first Chabad centre was opened in 1983. In January 2001, Chabad moved into its new and refurbished 4,000 sq. foot centre which houses a synagogue, library, nursery school, Hebrew classes, and counseling services.

While attending to his religious duties, Sufrin founded Drugsline-Chabad, a non-denominational… Read More »

Eton College doesn't sound like a place where you would expect to find a Chasidic rabbi helping boys wrap tefillin.

In fact, the prestigious boarding school founded in the 15th century by Henry VI as "The King’s College," counts a small population of Jews within its student body, and that precisely is what they were doing this Sunday morning with Rabbi Yossi Simon of Tzivos Hashem UK.

Messrs Benjamin Pearl and Mendy Taijtelbaum, both well known philanthropists in Anglo-Jewry, facilitated the program at which Rabbi Simon was invited to Eton to meet with the students. Rabbi Simon introduced them to the mitzvah of tefillin. The program included a demonstration in the work of the scribe, giving the boys a chance for a… Read More »

Thousands of people danced and celebrated in Chabad Centres throughout the country for Shmini Atzeret and Simchat Torah – the concluding holidays of the Jewish festive season.

As well as hosting the usual array of festive meals, hakafot (dancing with Torah Scrolls), and religious services, Chabad Centres reached out to Jews in other parts of the community by walking to different synagogues to join in and add to the rejoicing – a practice encouraged by the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn of blessed memory.

"Simchat Torah was very big this year," said Rabbi Leivi Sudak director of Lubavitch of Edgware, which welcomed over 1000 people during the festival.

"We went to dance and celebrate with… Read More »

Coming off of one of the busiest times of the year, Jewish community members and yeshiva students in Manchester said that a campaign to bring the holiday season to homebound and hospitalised individuals resulted in hundreds of people getting a chance to celebrate the High Holidays.

According to Rabbi Yisroel Cohen, the Lancshire-based outreach director for the Chabad-Lubavitch yeshiva in Manchester, requests poured in from local families and congregations that knew of Jewish hospital patients, nursing home residents and other homebound people who needed to hear the sounding of the ram’s horn on Rosh Hashanah, make a blessing on the Four Species during Sukkot, or simply needed a reliable supply of kosher food.

Read… Read More »

Over 1000 people climbed on board four mobile sukkahs which made their way around the capital during the Sukkot festival this week.

The sukkahs, which were mounted on the back trucks, visited locations in the City, West End, North and East London, as well as going as far afield as Oxford, to allow people to eat in a sukkah, shake the Lulav and Etrog and learn more about the festival.

The sukkahs were welcomed by workers in the City and West End where there is a shortage of permanent Sukkahs. Using Twitter and a blog, the locations of the sukkahs were regularly updated to allow workers to find their closest sukkah from the comfort of their office or on their Blackberry.

"Despite the rain, over 1000 people came by the… Read More »

Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah, the final holidays in this holiday-intensive season, are the most joyful festivals on the Jewish calendar. This year, the name of Daniel Pearl will be honored in hundreds of Chabad congregations worldwide as they dedicate one of the seven hakafot dances to his memory.

The Jewish American journalist murdered by Al Qaeda terrorists in Karachi, Pakistan, in 2002, would have celebrated his 46th birthday on Simchat Torah.

The idea to dedicate a hakafah to his memory came after Danny’s father, Judea Pearl, asked Rabbis Chaim Block and Efraim Mintz if Chabad can do something on Simchat Torah in tribute to his son.

Rabbis Mintz and Block and a dozen Chabad Shluchim got together on this.

“We… Read More »

Over 2,000 people filled the usually quiet streets of North West London this week for Chabad of Hendon’s annual Simchat Beit HaShoeva Sukkot party.

The event, which has been running annually for past five years, included live music from renowned Jewish entertainers Eli Tamir and Sruly Ginzburg as well as a fireworks display, hot food, jugglers and a video display.

“We coordinated  with the local police, the streets were closed off enabling people to celebrate in public as opposed to in an enclosed area,” says Rabbi Dovid Katz, assistant director of Chabad of Hendon.

“The atmosphere was electric!” says David Abramson, a local Hendon resident.

“Seeing everyone dancing in the… Read More »