Worshippers clash with police after secret synagogue tunnel uncovered in New York

Members of a Hasidic Jewish community clashed with the NYPD after they uncovered an illegal secret tunnel under a synagogue, which reportedly leads to a ritual bath.

The altercation broke out between “extremist students” and police and construction workers, at the Chabad Lubavitch global headquarters in Crown Heights, on Monday, 10 January,

The group can be seen flipping over synagogue benches in protest of the tunnel being covered, while several men are pulled out from the tunnel entrance by NYPD officers.

“Those efforts (to repair the walls) were disrupted by the extremists who broke through the wall to the synagogue, vandalizing the sanctuary, in an effort to preserve their unauthorized access,” Motti Seligson, the director of media at Chabad, wrote on his X account.