With the ongoing IDF operation on Tehran, memes have begun circulating on the possibility of a “Chabad of Tehran,” with one person even purchasing the domain name. It is just a joke or is it a real possibility? And does Chabad already have a presence in Iran?
By Anash.org reporter
With Israel’s strikes on Iran beginning last Thursday, and with many of the regime’s top military commanders killed, including in a covert Mossad operation, and with President Trump openly threatening to “take out” Iran’s Supreme Leader if he does not “surrender unconditionally,” speculation is mounting that a regime change may be underway.
This sense of change was reinforced by Prime Minister Netanyahu’s statements, both months ago and again this week, promising that change is coming to Iran. In a bold and unprecedented move, Mossad posted today on X, calling on the Iranian people to reach out for help in overthrowing the regime and providing instructions on how to do so securely.
Additionally, a pro-Israel hacking group took down Iran’s Central Bank and disrupted Bank Sepah systems, and briefly hijacked the national television broadcast to show footage from past anti-government protests.
Under these conditions, memes have begun circulating social media on the possibility of a “Chabad of Tehran,” with one person even purchasing the domain name ChabadofTehran.com. Although there is currently no official Chabad presence in Iran, that was not always the case.
Originally, Iran was known as Persia and was home to one of the oldest Jewish communities in the world. Jews lived there for over 2,500 years, often with autonomy and relative freedom.
However, after the State of Israel was established in 1948, and even more so after the miraculous Six Day War in 1967, when Israel’s Arab enemies were decisively defeated and humiliated, many Arab and Muslim countries turned violently against their Jewish populations. In Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Libya, and elsewhere, governments and mobs targeted Jews with expulsion, violence, and persecution. Hundreds of thousands of Jews fled these lands. Most moved to Eretz Yisrael, while many others settled in the United States and France. By the 1970s, very few Jews remained in these countries.
Prior to the Iranian Revolution in 1979, Chabad was active in Iran, as it is today in many other Muslim countries.
In 1978, the Rebbe sent Rabbi Sholem Ber Hecht and Rabbi Hertzel Illulian to Iran on Merkos Shlichus. They gave shiurim in shuls, delivered the Tanya in Hebrew, and strengthened Yiddishkeit wherever they could. But unrest was growing quickly. The Islamic Revolution was gaining momentum, and anti-Jewish threats were increasing. The Rebbe directed the shluchim to stay calm, but prepare to act.
That winter, the mission transitioned. Under the Rebbe’s instructions, and coordinated by Rabbi J. J. Hecht, Chabad began working around the clock to get Jewish children out of Iran. Through what became known as Operation Exodus, they secured student visas, arranged flights, and found host families. In total, close to 1,800 Iranian Jewish children were rescued and brought to Crown Heights and other Chabad communities.
The Rebbe personally oversaw their care. On Purim 5739, he had them seated near him at the farbrengen and gave them mishloach manos with his own hands. For Pesach, he made sure the sedorim were run in Farsi and permitted Persian customs like eating rice. At one point, he asked to taste the maror from their seder, saying he wanted to share in what they were going through.
In February 1979, the Iranian Revolution overthrew the Shah and brought the current radical Islamic regime to power under Ayatollah Khomeini. The Jewish community was thrown into uncertainty. While many fled, others chose to stay, and that community, though small, still exists today.
Today, about 8,000 to 10,000 Jews remain in Iran, most in Tehran. There are over a dozen active shuls, kosher food options, mikvaos, and Jewish schools — all under close government supervision. The community is led by Rabbi Yehuda Gerami, a native of Tehran who studied overseas before returning home. He travels regularly to inspect shechita, teach Torah, and support Jewish life throughout the country. Rabbi Gerami has also visited 770 and maintains contact with Chabad chassidim abroad.
In the years since, Chabad has not held an official presence in Iran, but the community is in contact with Chabad representatives who assist them to the best of their ability. In 2018, media outlets reported that Russia’s Chief Rabbi and Head Shliach Berel Lazar had visited the country. More recently, Iran’s Chief Rabbi told Mishpacha magazine that many members of his community join a Persian Language Tanya shiur, given online by a shliach in California.
In 5781, when the Jewish community in Tehran renovated the city’s mikvah, they built a beautiful, modern facility with full halachic hiddurim and advanced hygienic systems. Near the entrance room, the community chose to place a picture of the Rebbe, placed alongside a photo of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, the former Sephardic Chief Rabbi who is widely respected by Iran’s Jewish community.
The Rebbe’s picture appearing in Muslim countries in not a new phenomenon either. On June 14, 1994, just two days after Gimmel Tammuz, Senator Pat Moynihan noted in a speech in Congress that “When I met with the Jewish leaders of Morocco and toured several of their synagogues and civic centers I discovered two pictures in every building–His Majesty King Hassan II and the Lubavitcher Rebbe.”
In Bahrain as well, despite there only being 35 Jews left in the country, the rarely-used shul displays a shofar, menorah, graggers…. and a picture of the Rebbe.
Will Chabad be established in Tehran? No doubt it will. It’s only a question of time.
“In 1978, the Rebbe sent Rabbi Sholem Ber Hecht and Rabbi Hertzel Illulian to Iran on Merkos Shlichus. They gave shiurim in shuls, printed the Tanya in Farsi,”
I don’t think the Tanya was printed in Farsi in 1978, it is actually in the process now.
Rabbi Sholem Ber Hecht and Rabbi Hertzel Illulian brought a Hebrew Tanya to Iran.
Rabbi Yedidia Ezrachian, by instruction of the Rebbe, “was in the process of translating the Tanya into Persian.” However, there is no records of him completing it.
** By Sara Karmely – weekly l’chaim – Reprinted from the N’Shei Chabad Newsletter **
It was 1979, two years before the Iranian Revolution. Rabbis Sholom Ber Hecht and Hertz Illulian went to Iran from New York at the request of the Rebbe. As part of their mission, they delivered a Tanya, the basic book of Chabad Chasidic philosophy, to Iran’s Jewish spiritual leader, Rabbi Yedidia Ezrachian. One month later, Rabbi Ezrachian received a telephone call from Rabbi J.J. Hecht, who had been very involved in efforts to bring as many Iranian Jews as possible to safety in the United States. Rabbi Hecht relayed the Rebbe’s instructions to print Tanyas for the Jews in Iran.
By then, most of the Jewish population had fled Iran. It was an extremely dangerous place to live. But Rabbi Ezrachian remained at his post as head of the Jewish community in Iran and the leader of the Rabbinical Court for three more years. The Iranian Moslem Ministers, under the brutal and ruthless Khomeini, issued an edict whose purpose was to purge Iran of anything connected with the Shah of Iran, and to disobey meant a charge of treason and punishment by death.
Rabbi Ezrachian had narrowly escaped death several times already, since there was also a strict edict against anyone and anything that could be perceived to be helping the state of Israel. The death sentence was swiftly and unmercifully carried out upon anyone who dared to disobey that edict. But Rabbi Ezrachian, a scholarly, G-d fearing man, and an ardent chasid of the Rebbe, had been instructed to print Tanyas for the Persian Jews. He did so, but since most of the Persian Jews could not read, write or understand Hebrew, Rabbi Ezrachian was in the process of translating the Tanya into Persian.
One day, Rabbi Ezrachian was in the office of his synagogue in Teheran, Iran, working on his translating of the Tanya. Suddenly there was loud, insistent banging on the door and the unmistakable shouts of the Iranian Taliban. These policemen were known to be violent fanatical Moslem ministers looking for some new Jewish blood to spill, just to prove how loyal they were to their Imam.
When Rabbi Ezrachian opened the door, his heart was racing so fast that he could not think. The office was not a place for these men to search! It contained historical documents connected to the Shah. It contained large gold coins with the Magen David on one side and the Shah’s likeness on the other. And worst of all, it was filled with the receipts of the money that people had given to him to donate for charity to Israel. If these receipts were now found, it would be considered aiding the enemy, the Zionist state – and he would surely be shot on the spot.
Numbly, he stood there as the violent, screaming mob of ministers burst into his office. They immediately started to pull open doors to closets, and dump out files. Any minute they would find the receipts and then…. the Rabbi understood what was about to take place, and recited his final prayers. As the strength started to leave his body, Rabbi Ezrachian prayed to G-d. He saw certain death before his eyes, and prepared to meet his Maker.
Suddenly, one of the ministers pounced on a Tanya. He leafed through it but of course could not read the Hebrew. Roughly he asked Rabbi Ezrachian what it was, and what it said. “It is a holy book, and I am translating it into Farsi,” stammered Rabbi Ezrachian, praying silently that the merit of the Tanya would somehow save him. Opening the book at random, the radical ordered the pale, trembling rabbi to translate it exactly as it was written.
Rabbi Ezrachian did as he was told. He stood there and translated it faithfully, and after translating ten pages, he was quietly ordered to stop. The ministers, who had all stopped their raiding in order to listen, now stood in silent awe. Reverently, their leader took the Tanya, gently touched it to his eyes, and then kissed it. (A Persian custom to show respect). “A book like this we all need,” he said. He sternly told everyone that they need search no longer, because it was obvious that they were with a man who honored “Allah.” Moreover, a special edict was written to protect Rabbi Ezrachian from any form of persecution in the future as well as to allow the Rabbi to continue to translate the holy book with no more disturbances!
After they left, Rabbi Ezrachian fell to the ground in a faint. He soon regained consciousness, but found it difficult, at first, to grasp the fact that he was still alive! They had not discovered the receipts, or the letters from Israel saying that they had received the moneys sent to them. Even just one of those documents would have meant certain death, let alone a full filing cabinet of them. They had listened respectfully to ten pages of Tanya in Farsi. And he had an edict of protection issued by the Taliban radicals themselves! On the following Shabbat, Rabbi Ezrachian said the special “Gomel” prayer thanking G-d for saving him from death.
Rabbi Ezrachian visited the U.S. a few years later. At his first private audience with the Rebbe Rabbi Ezrachian was so overwhelmed that tears rolled down his cheeks. The Rebbe told him, “Serve G-d with joy!” Rabbi Ezrachian replied, “These are tears of happiness.” They spoke together for a long time, and then Rabbi Ezrachian said to the Rebbe, “The Jews who are in Iran are in physical danger, and the Jews who have left Iran are in spiritual danger. I am so worried about them.” Tears came to his eyes once again when the Rebbe answered, gently and sincerely, “So let us pray for them together.” They held each other’s hands and prayed for the Iranian Jews.
Rabbi Ezrachian had many other private audiences with the Rebbe. Each time, he tried his utmost to fulfill what the Rebbe wanted from him. Rabbi Ezrachian has translated the Abridged Code of Jewish Law, the prayer book, Psalms, as well as five other books of the Bible. The Rebbe personally checked several of the translations, though not all.
After leaving Iran, Rabbi Ezrachian lived in Israel for a while before moving to Great Neck, New York.
**From https://www25.lchaimweekly.org/lchaim/5763/781.htm**
In 1974 R’ Y Pinson wrote about going on Shlichus to Tehran or Nice, France (perhaps there were other options as well) and the Rebbe answered Nice.
Maybe it will be better to have the revelation of Moshiah that will usher the ultimate Redemption, then making plans for an eventual or maybe not Chabad House in Tehran , did we already forgot the horrible massacre of October 7th? , I thought and maybe I am wrong that the first priority of the Lubavitcher Rebbe was to bring about the Final Redemption