Difference between revisions of "Satmar (Hasidic dynasty)"

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(Recategorise: theological anti-Zionists rather than the Zionist movement)
(Restore Chabad-relations point and add attributed material from Frimet Goldberger, 'Blurring Out Satmar History' (The Forward, 2 Aug 2013; full text supplied by David))
 
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{{short description|'''Hasidic dynasty founded in Satu Mare (Satmar), Romania, in 1928 and rebuilt in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, after 1947; split since 2006 between two rebbes'''}}
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{{short description|'''Largest Hasidic court; Hungarian-origin anti-Zionist dynasty split between [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] (Kiryas Joel) and [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] (Williamsburg)'''}}
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{{Hasidic sidebar}}
 
{{Infobox religious group
 
{{Infobox religious group
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| name = Satmar
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| name         = Satmar
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| native_name = חסידות סאטמר
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| type         = [[Hasidic dynasties|Hasidic dynasty]]
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| type = [[Hasidic]] court (Haredi Judaism)
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| founder       = [[Joel Teitelbaum]] (1887–1979)
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| main_classification = [[Hasidism]] (Hungarian / Sighet–Satmar line)
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| founded_date = {{Start date|1928}}
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| theology = Anti-Zionist; ''Vayoel Moshe''; three oaths
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| founded_place = Szatmárnémeti (Satu Mare), then in Romania
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| structure = Split since 2006 between two rebbes
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| headquarters  = Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York, and Kiryas Joel (Town of Palm Tree), Orange County, New York
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| founder = [[Joel Teitelbaum]] (1887–1979)
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| leader_title = Rebbes
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| founded_date = 1905 (Satu Mare); rebuilt in New York after 1946
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| leader_name   = [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] (Kiryas Joel)<br />[[Zalman Teitelbaum]] (Williamsburg)
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| founded_place = Satu Mare (Satmar), then Kingdom of Hungary
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| languages    = Yiddish
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| leader_title = Rebbe (Kiryas Joel / Ahronim)
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| notes        = Described by YIVO as the world's largest Hasidic group, with about 100,000 followers. Divided since the death of [[Moshe Teitelbaum (Satmar)|Moshe Teitelbaum]] in 2006.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
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| leader_name = [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] (born 1947)
 
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| leader_title2 = Rebbe (Williamsburg / Zalis)
 
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| leader_name2 = [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] (born 1951)
 
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| members = About 26,000 households (c. 2016); largest Hasidic group worldwide
 
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| area = [[United States]], [[United Kingdom]], [[Israel]] / occupied East Jerusalem, [[Belgium]], [[Canada]], [[Argentina]], [[Australia]]
 
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| language = Yiddish (everyday); Hebrew (liturgical)
 
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| headquarters = [[Williamsburg, Brooklyn]] and [[Kiryas Joel, New York]]
 
 
}}
 
}}
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'''Satmar''' is a [[Hasidic dynasties|Hasidic dynasty]] founded in 1928 by [[Joel Teitelbaum]] (1887–1979) in Szatmárnémeti (Satu Mare), then in Romania. Teitelbaum escaped from Bergen-Belsen on the [[Kasztner train]] in 1944, spent two and a half years in Palestine and arrived in the [[United States]] in 1947, where he rebuilt the court in [[Williamsburg]], Brooklyn. YIVO describes it as the world's largest Hasidic sect, with about 100,000 followers and branches in [[Kiryas Joel]], Los Angeles, Montreal, Antwerp, London, Buenos Aires and [[Jerusalem]].<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> Since the death of [[Moshe Teitelbaum]] in 2006 the court has been divided between his sons [[Aaron Teitelbaum]], based in Kiryas Joel, and [[Zalman Teitelbaum]], based in Williamsburg.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /><ref name="Canvey" />
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Satmar is known for its theological rejection of Zionism and of the State of [[Israel]], set out by Joel Teitelbaum in ''Va-Yo'el Mosheh'' (1959–1961).<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /><ref name="Magid" />
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== History ==
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=== Sighet and Satmar ===
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The dynasty descends from [[Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhely]] (1759–1841), a disciple of the [[Seer of Lublin]] and author of ''Yismaḥ Mosheh''. His great-grandson [[Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum]] (1808–1883) became rabbi of Sighet in 1858. Joel Teitelbaum was the youngest son of [[Hananiah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum]] of Sighet (1836–1904). His elder brother [[Chaim Tzvi Teitelbaum]] (1880–1926) and that brother's son [[Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum (1912–1944)|Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum]], who died in Auschwitz, were the last Sigheter rebbes in Europe.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
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[[Joel Teitelbaum]] became rabbi of Orsova in 1911 and of Carei in 1926. He was invited to Satmar in 1928, but opposition meant that he could take up the post only in 1934.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> At the 1922 congress of anti-Zionist rabbis at Csap, organised by [[Hayyim Elazar Shapira]] of Munkács, his signature appeared first on the declaration excommunicating the Zionists and [[Agudat Yisrael]].<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
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The sociologist [[Samuel C. Heilman|Samuel Heilman]] gives a fuller account of the dynasty's early history, with some dates that differ from YIVO's. He dates [[Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhely]] to 1758–1841 (YIVO: 1759–1841) and says he brought Hasidism from Poland to Hungary and opposed any modernising trend.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar153" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar154" /> In 1834 Moshe tried to install his son Elazar Nissan (1786–1856) as rabbi of Sighet, but the town refused to accept him. Moshe's grandson [[Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum]], known as the ''Yetev Lev'', was expelled from posts in Ujhely and Drohobych before establishing himself in Sighet in 1858. There he closed a 50-year-old school and replaced it with his own yeshiva.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar154" /> His son [[Hananiah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum]] faced a breakaway community in Sighet and placed it under a ban. Heilman says there are reports that he used thugs against opponents, and that he grew the yeshiva to about 300 students.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar155" /> Lipa's first marriage was childless. With a decree signed by a hundred rabbis he took a second wife, his cousin Chana; their eldest son, [[Chaim Tzvi Teitelbaum]] (Heilman: 1879–1926; YIVO: 1880–1926), succeeded him in 1904.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar156" />
  
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'''[[Satmar]]''' (Yiddish: סאטמאר) is a [[Hasidic]] court originating in Satu Mare (Satmar) in historic Hungary, rebuilt in New York after the Holocaust by [[Joel Teitelbaum]] (1887–1979). It is the largest Hasidic group in the world. [[Marcin Wodziński]]’s mid-2010s count from internal telephone books put Satmar at about 26,000 households — some 20 per cent of all Hasidim — split after 2006 between two sons of [[Moshe Teitelbaum (Satmar)|Moshe Teitelbaum]] (1914–2006): [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] in [[Kiryas Joel]] and [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] in Williamsburg.<ref name="Magid">Shaul Magid, [https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/belief/articles/satmar-anti-zionist The Satmar Are Anti-Zionist. Should We Care?] ''Tablet'', 21 May 2020.</ref>
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Heilman gives Joel ("Yoelish") Teitelbaum's dates as 1886–1979 (YIVO: 1887–1979). As the younger son he had no place at the Sighet court. At 17 he married his cousin Chavah Horowitz, and he was given a minor post at Muzhijevo.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar153" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar156" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar157" /> On the advice of the [[Belz (Hasidic dynasty)|Belzer Rebbe]] he settled in Satmar in 1905, without an official post. He became rabbi of Orsova (Orshiva) in 1911, returned to Satmar in October 1914 and stayed until 1922.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar158" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar159" /> In 1920 Satmar's religious council rejected his application to be its rabbi, and in 1922 he went back to Orsova, where he enlarged his yeshiva to about 100 students. In 1926 he moved it to Carei (Krole).<ref name="HeilmanSatmar160" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar161" /> In the same year his brother Chaim Tzvi died. The Sighet court passed not to Joel but to Chaim Tzvi's 14-year-old son Zalman Leib (1912–1944), who later married Joel's daughter Rachel.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar161" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar162" /> Heilman describes Joel and [[Hayyim Elazar Shapira]] of [[Munkacs (Hasidic dynasty)|Munkács]] as ideological allies but political competitors, neither willing to let the other lead the camp.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar160" />
  
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Satmar is the principal organised bearer of Hungarian Haredi anti-Zionism in the United States. It rejects [[Agudat Yisrael]] participation in Israeli coalitions, funds institutions that refuse state money through vehicles such as [[Keren Hatzolah]], and heads the [[Central Rabbinical Congress]] in North America while remaining tied to the [[Edah HaChareidis]] in Jerusalem. It simultaneously condemns [[Neturei Karta]] when the latter joins Iranian or Palestinian platforms, and it operates as a New York voting machine that endorses secular Democrats and Republicans. That mix — theological rejection of the state, material support for Haredim who live in it, and American political brokerage — is the court’s public profile.<ref name="JCStern">The Jewish Chronicle, [https://www.thejc.com/comment/comment/time-to-stop-the-shraga-stern-farce-1.494581 Time to stop the Shraga Stern farce] ''The Jewish Chronicle''.</ref><ref name="TOIAaron">Times of Israel, [https://www.timesofisrael.com/head-of-satmar-hasidic-sect-castigates-followers-for-admiring-israel-idf/ Head of Satmar Hasidic sect castigates followers for admiring Israel, IDF] ''Times of Israel''.</ref>
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When Satmar's rabbi died in 1928, Joel won an election by a plurality. Opponents alleged fraud, and a rabbinical court ordered a new vote, which he won more clearly. He received a letter of appointment in October 1928, and a rabbinical court confirmed it in early 1929. His opponents then held a further election in April 1929, which he lost, and his supporters set up a separate congregation.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar163" /> He moved to Satmar only in 1934. There his yeshiva grew to about 350 students, one of the largest in Transylvania, and Satmar gradually eclipsed Sighet.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar163" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar164" /> Heilman says Joel visited the Holy Land in 1932 hoping to be chosen to lead the [[Edah HaChareidis]]. In 1936 King Carol II of Romania greeted him first among the dignitaries at the Satmar railway station.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar165" /> His first wife died in January 1936, and in August 1937 he married Alte Feige Shapiro (1912–2001), daughter of the Częstochowa (Tchenstechover) Rebbe. Neither marriage produced a surviving son. His last surviving daughter, Roysaele, died in 1953.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar165" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar166" />
  
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== History ==
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=== Holocaust and the move to New York ===
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In 1944 [[Joel Teitelbaum]] was among those taken from Bergen-Belsen on the [[Kasztner train]]. He spent two and a half years in Palestine and arrived in the United States in 1947. He settled in [[Williamsburg]], where he gathered Hungarian survivors around a new court.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> Some earlier accounts give 1946 for his arrival in Williamsburg; YIVO gives 1947.
  
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[[Joel Teitelbaum]], from the Sighet / [[Siget (Hasidic dynasty)|Sighet]] Teitelbaum line, became rabbi of Satu Mare and built a court marked by Hungarian Haredi stringency and hostility to Zionism and to [[Agudat Yisrael]]’s political bargains. He survived Bergen-Belsen on the Kastner train, reached Palestine, then settled in Williamsburg in 1946 and reconstituted the court among Hungarian survivors.<ref name="Magid" />
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Heilman gives a more detailed account. Joel opposed emigration through the Zionists and in 1939 condemned supporters who tried to obtain him a visa for Palestine. In late 1943 he sought certificates himself; by many accounts the Jewish Agency asked him to sign a recognition of the Zionist Organisation's authority, and he refused.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar168" /> In spring 1944 he tried to escape to Romania disguised in a Red Cross ambulance, but was caught at Cluj and placed in the ghetto. He was then added to the [[Rudolf Kasztner|Kasztner]] transport after someone paid what Heilman calls a "huge sum".<ref name="HeilmanSatmar168" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar169" /> The train left Budapest on 30 June 1944 and reached Bergen-Belsen on 9 July. Teitelbaum crossed into Switzerland in early December 1944, arriving at St Gallen on 21 Kislev, a date Satmar still marks as a day of thanksgiving.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar169" /> He sailed from Italy for Haifa on 19 August 1945. In Jerusalem he started a yeshiva with ten students in Mea Shearim, but had little success there.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar170" /> Heilman says he arrived in the United States by the Jewish New Year of 1946, which differs from YIVO's 1947. He first lived in a borrowed house on President Street in Crown Heights before moving to Williamsburg.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar170" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar171" />
  
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He founded ''[[Der Yid]]'', the girls’ schools called Beis Rochel and the boys’ yeshivas Torah VeYirah, the [[United Talmudical Seminary]], [[Bikur Cholim]] (1957, organised by [[Alte Feiga Teitelbaum]]), refugee aid under Rav Tuv, and in 1953 the [[Central Rabbinical Congress of the United States and Canada]]. He served as chief rabbi of the [[Edah HaChareidis]] from 1953 until his death while living in New York. In 1959 he published ''Vayoel Moshe''; after the 1967 war he published ''Al Ha-Geulah ve-Al Ha-Temurah'' against treating the conquest of Jerusalem and the West Bank as messianic miracle.<ref name="Magid" />
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According to YIVO, Teitelbaum became president of the [[Edah HaChareidis]] of Jerusalem in 1953 while living in Williamsburg.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> [[Shaul Magid]], writing in ''Tablet'', dates his appointment as titular head (''av beit din'') of the Edah to a visit to Jerusalem in 1952, and says he remained its honorary president until his death.<ref name="Magid" />
  
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He founded [[Kiryas Joel]] in the Town of Monroe, Orange County, in the mid-1970s as an insular Yiddish enclave. The village later became coterminous with the Town of Palm Tree. Census figures show explosive growth: about 13,000 in 2000, 33,000 in 2020, around 39,000 on ACS 2024 five-year estimates, with other official estimates near 44,000 after 2020–24 growth of about one third.<ref name="JPostKJ">Glenn C. Altschuler, [https://www.jpost.com/judaism/article-694801 Satmar’s micro-society: Kiryas Joel is a mirror of the American people] ''Jerusalem Post'', 27 January 2022.</ref><ref name="CensusReporter">Census Reporter, [http://censusreporter.org/profiles/16000US3639853-kiryas-joel-ny/ Kiryas Joel, NY] ACS 2024 5-year, accessed September 2026.</ref>
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[[Frimet Goldberger]], who grew up in the Satmar community, wrote in a 2013 opinion column in ''[[The Forward]]'' that [[Joel Teitelbaum]] was the leading force in modern American Hasidism. She wrote that he transplanted a pre-modern way of life from Szátmár, in the remote Máramaros region of Hungary, to New York. She quoted the scholar [[Allan Nadler]] as calling this achievement "nothing short of miraculous", and wrote that Teitelbaum set up satellite communities around the world and influenced Orthodox Jewish life in the United States well beyond Hasidism.<ref name="ForwardBlur" />
  
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[[Moshe Teitelbaum]] succeeded in 1979. After his death in 2006 the court split: [[Aaron]] kept Kiryas Joel and a Williamsburg hall at Kent and Hooper; [[Zalman]] kept the historic Rodney Street Yetev Lev and Williamsburg institutions. ''Der Yid'' is identified with Zalman; ''Der Blatt'' (from 2000) with Aaron. The brothers were publicly estranged for about two decades, speaking in 2020, and appeared together at a White House meeting with [[Donald Trump]] in September 2026 over welfare, prison conditions and the Israeli draft.<ref name="YWNTrump">The Yeshiva World, [https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/israel-news/2594035/historic-white-house-visit-inside-rebbes-extraordinary-meetings-with-trump-and-vance.html Historic White House visit] ''The Yeshiva World'', 4 September 2026.</ref>
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In 1973 Teitelbaum asked for the creation of [[Rav Tov International Jewish Rescue Organization]] ([[Rav Tov]]), a refugee organisation.<ref name="UJOExec" />
  
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== Geography ==
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=== Kiryas Joel ===
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[[Kiryas Joel]], in Orange County, New York, was settled by Satmar Hasidim in the mid-1970s. It became an incorporated village in 1977, with powers over housing permits and zoning. Its population grew from about 2,000 in 1980 to 13,000 in 2000 and 25,000 in 2019. In July 2018 Governor [[Andrew Cuomo]] signed the law creating the Town of Palm Tree, an English rendering of "Teitelbaum".<ref name="JPostKJ" /> The [[American Community Survey]] 2023 five-year estimate gives a population of 36,572.<ref name="CensusReporter" />
  
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=== United States ===
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Heilman describes how Joel Teitelbaum built the Williamsburg community. In 1948 he set up a community structure, Yetev Lev, whose regulations were issued in 1952. The first Torah V'Yirah schools opened in 1950–51, followed by Satmar-certified butcher shops in 1955 and summer camps in the Catskills in 1956.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar175" /> He prescribed rules on women's dress, including opaque stockings; in 1978 a Satmar hosiery maker, Lipa Brach, produced the "Palm Stockings" still worn in Satmar. Television was excluded, and the community bought the Yiddish newspaper ''[[Der Yid]]'', which became its semi-official organ.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar175" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar176" /> Heilman cites census figures putting about 65 per cent of Satmar Hasidim below the poverty line.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar172" /> He says Teitelbaum wanted his followers in small towns of their own outside the city. The first families moved to Kiryas Joel near Monroe in late 1974 and 1975, often against local opposition, and the village was incorporated in 1977.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar177" /> Heilman gives Satmar about 95,000 members, with nearly 22,000 people in Kiryas Joel in 2013. In late 2014 the community announced a new settlement, Kiryas Yetev Lev, with 400 apartments in Bloomingburg, Sullivan County.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar152" />
  
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* '''South Williamsburg, Brooklyn''' — historic centre; Satmar-majority among Pupa, Vien, Klausenburg, Vizhnitz, Nitra, Krasna. Zalman’s Yetev Lev on Rodney Street; Aaron’s larger hall at Kent and Hooper. Community estimates put the wider Hasidic population of South Williamsburg in the tens of thousands.<ref name="ShulMap">Shul Map, [https://shulmap.com/neighborhoods/williamsburg/ Williamsburg Shuls] accessed September 2026.</ref>
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=== Succession and split ===
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* '''[[Kiryas Joel]] / Town of Palm Tree, Orange County''' — Aaron’s seat; all-Satmar village; 8,000-family claims in faction literature; 24,000 pupils claimed across the two flagship school systems (12,000 each) in 2023 faction publications.<ref name="ShtetlSchools">Shtetl, [https://www.shtetl.org/article/satmar-community-touts-24-000-students-in-flagship-school-systems-highlighting-rapid-growth-and-its-broader-impact Satmar community touts 24,000 students] ''Shtetl'', 12 December 2023.</ref>
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Joel Teitelbaum was succeeded in 1979 by his nephew [[Moshe Teitelbaum]]. YIVO gives his dates as 1915–2006; some sources give his year of birth as 1914.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> The court then split between Moshe's sons [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] in [[Kiryas Joel]] and [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] in [[Williamsburg]]. YIVO records that the dispute involved some violence and that the succession had not been resolved.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> In 2006 the ''New York Times'' reported that Satmar was the largest Hasidic group in the United States and that its New York schools, if counted as a public school system, would be the fourth-largest in the state after those of New York City, Buffalo and Rochester.<ref name="NYT2006" />
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* '''Borough Park; Monsey; Bloomingburg / Woodbury / Chester satellites; Lakewood; Los Angeles.'''
 
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* '''Montreal.'''
 
  
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If Satmar New York schools were a public system they would rank among the state’s largest after New York City, Buffalo and Rochester.<ref name="NYT2006">New York Times, [https://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/25/nyregion/25teitelbaum.html report on Teitelbaum succession] ''The New York Times'', 25 April 2006.</ref>
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==== Moshe Teitelbaum's succession (1979) ====
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Joel Teitelbaum had a severe stroke in February 1968. Heilman writes that during his ten-year decline his wife Feige and his ''gabbaim'' (aides), including Yosef Ashkenazi, Azriel Glick and the yeshiva head Nosson Yosef Meisels, acted for him.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar177" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar178" /> Heilman credits Feige with founding the Satmar Ladies Auxiliary and Satmar's [[Bikur Cholim]] service for Jewish patients in New York hospitals.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar178" /> She opposed the succession of the rebbe's nephew [[Moshe Teitelbaum]], who had urged Joel to divorce her. Heilman says she hoped the community would accept an appointed rabbi rather than a new rebbe.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar179" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar180" /> Joel Teitelbaum died at [[Mount Sinai Hospital (Manhattan)|Mount Sinai Hospital]] early on 19 August 1979. Heilman says the ''New York Times'' reported 100,000 people at his funeral.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar181" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar182" />
  
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=== United Kingdom ===
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Heilman gives Moshe Teitelbaum's dates as 1914–2006. Moshe's first wife and three children were murdered at Auschwitz, and he survived Theresienstadt. In 1945 he returned to Sighet and married another cousin, Pessel Leah (1922–2010). He reached Williamsburg in autumn 1946, after a short stay in Brazil, and became rabbi of the Sighet congregation at 152 Hewes Street. In April 1965 he moved to Borough Park.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar182" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar183" /> Before 1979 he ran small businesses and oversaw the ''kashrut'' certification of the Meal Mart food chain.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar182" /> He flew to the funeral by helicopter and said ''Kaddish'' for his uncle. According to Heilman, no will was ever read.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar184" /> A letter purporting to name the young ''gabbai'' Shulem Halpert as successor was declared a forgery by the ''dayan'' Yecheskel Roth.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar185" /> On 14 September 1979 Moshe was named rabbi of Yetev Lev and guardian of Satmar's assets.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar186" /> A minority, the B'nai Yoel led by Yossel Waldman, broke away, and its opponents called its members "the rebbetzin's Hasidim".<ref name="HeilmanSatmar186" /> Moshe was crowned in Kiryas Joel at the end of the year of mourning, before a reported crowd of more than 20,000.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar187" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar189" />
  
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Stamford Hill remains the British centre (Beis Rochel / Beis Ruchel girls’ schools in Hackney and Salford). From 2016 a mixed Haredi colony on [[Canvey Island]], Essex, was planted by young Satmar-affiliated householders around [[Joel Friedman]] of [[Interlink]] / the [[Pinter Trust]], without a resident rebbe; the group is loosely tied to [[Aaron Teitelbaum]]. Satmar is the largest Hasidic presence there but the settlement is not an exclusive Satmar court town.<ref name="Canvey">K. Revue, [https://k-larevue.com/en/postcard-from-canvey-island/ Postcard from Canvey Island] accessed September 2026.</ref> Manchester / Salford holds Beis Rochel / Beis Ruchel schools.
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==== Aaron and Zalman ====
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== Institutions in the United Kingdom ==
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The day after the coronation Moshe made his eldest son, [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] (born 1947), head of the yeshiva in Kiryas Joel. His third son, [[Zalman Teitelbaum|Zalman Leib]] (Yekutiel Yehudah, born 1952), took over the Sighet community in Brooklyn.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar153" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar190" /> Aaron's 1966 marriage to a daughter of the [[Vizhnitz (Hasidic dynasty)|Vizhnitzer]] Rebbe Moshe Hager had been criticised by Feige's supporters as a match into a "Zionist" family.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar183" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar184" /> On 10 November 1984 Aaron was installed as rav of Kiryas Joel, the first appointment of a son in Sighet–Satmar during his father's lifetime.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar191" /> Heilman says Aaron's supporters and Feige's came to blows in the following years.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar192" /> Zalman was later moved to lead the small Satmar community in Jerusalem, reportedly at Aaron's urging.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar197" />
  
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Satmar institutions in Britain cluster in Stamford Hill / Hackney, Salford / Manchester, and the mixed Haredi colony on [[Canvey Island]] (from 2016). Girls’ schools are generally named [[Beis Rochel]] / [[Beis Ruchel]]; boys’ schools [[Talmud Torah Yetev Lev]] or [[Torah VeYirah]]. Congregations use [[Kehal Yetev Lev]].
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Heilman says that in 1996, after kidney surgery, Moshe reportedly told his sons that Aaron would succeed him. Critics accused Aaron of high-handedness, and in 1999 the succession was reopened.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar195" /> At Passover 1999 Aaron's supporters gathered in Williamsburg to celebrate his appointment as ''rav tza'ir'' (deputy rabbi), but Moshe did not attend.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar195" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar196" /> In June 1999, at the suggestion of the ''gabbai'' Moshe Friedman, Moshe installed Zalman as ''av beit din'' and yeshiva head of Yetev Lev in Williamsburg. Moshe's letter said Zalman's hand was "like my hand", and Zalman said he had never asked his father for power.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar196" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar197" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar198" /> The two camps became known as the "Aaronis" and the "Zalis".<ref name="HeilmanSatmar199" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar201" />
  
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==== Schools ====
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Moshe Teitelbaum died on 24 April 2006.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar203" /> Heilman sets out each side's case:<ref name="HeilmanSatmar203" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar204" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar205" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar206" />
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* '''Aaron's supporters''' cited a 1996 verbal will naming Aaron, supported by witnesses but not by any document. They said the later letter was signed after Moshe had developed dementia, when he was over 80, and that the ''gabbai'' Moshe Friedman had obtained it.
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* '''Zalman's supporters''' published a 2002 letter appointing Zalman, with witnesses to its signing. His brother Lipa said in public that their father had asked him in 1999 to support Zalman.
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''Der Yid'', then partly owned by Friedman, announced Zalman as successor on the day of the death.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar204" /> On the first Sabbath both brothers held separate gatherings in Williamsburg: Zalman in the Yetev Lev hall on Rodney Street, and Aaron in a tent in a school playground. Aaron's supporters later built a synagogue on Hooper Street in 14 days.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar206" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar207" /> Heilman notes the observation that the brothers' theological differences are "thin as a page in the Talmud".<ref name="HeilmanSatmar209" />
  
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{| class="wikitable sortable"
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{| class="wikitable"
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|+ Independent schools identified with Satmar
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|+ Rebbes of Sighet and Satmar
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! Name !! Local authority !! Gender / ages !! Charity / proprietor !! Notes
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! Rebbe !! Dates !! Seat !! Notes
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|-
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| [[Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhely]] || 1759–1841 || Ujhely || Disciple of the Seer of Lublin; author of ''Yismaḥ Mosheh''<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
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|-
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| [[Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum]] || 1808–1883 || Sighet (from 1858) || <ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
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|-
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| [[Hananiah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum]] || 1836–1904 || Sighet || Father of Joel Teitelbaum<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
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| [[Beis Rochel d'Satmar Girls' School]] || Hackney || Girls, 2–19 || [[The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust]] (281371), 51–57 Amhurst Park, London N16 5DL || Majority Satmar; also other Hasidic girls. Trustees include [[Solomon Berkowitz]].<ref name="BRTrust">Charity Commission accounts, [[The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust]] 281371, year ended 31 December 2024.</ref>
+
| [[Chaim Tzvi Teitelbaum]] || 1880–1926 || Sighet || Elder brother of Joel<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Rochel D'Satmar School]] || Hackney || Boys, 2–11 || [[Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited]] (1136378) || 180 Bethune Road, London N16 5DS; URN 147296; head [[Emmanuel Patcas]].<ref name="PBBeisBoys">Powerbase / GIAS listing for Beis Rochel D'Satmar School, Bethune Road.</ref>
+
| [[Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum (1912–1944)|Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum]] || 1912–1944 || Sighet || Died in Auschwitz<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Talmud Torah Yetev Lev]] || Hackney || Boys, 7–11 || Satmar community school || 438 pupils; DfE restriction on new admissions lifted March 2025 after standards improved.<ref name="JCYL">The Jewish Chronicle, [https://thejc.com/family-and-education/dfe-lifts-sanctions-against-chasidic-school-in-stamford-hill-k2g7s2bl DfE lifts sanctions against Chasidic school in Stamford Hill], 21 March 2025.</ref>
+
| [[Joel Teitelbaum]] || 1887–1979 || Satmar (from 1934), then Williamsburg (from 1947) || Founder of Satmar<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar]] / [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar London]] || Hackney || Girls, 2–11 || [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited]] (1125988; co. 06660324) || 117 Stamford Hill, N16 5RS; URN 137505; proprietor [[Abraham Klein]]; c. 1,108 pupils; income £3.72m (year to 30 August 2025). Objects include poverty relief “throughout the world.”<ref name="GiGRuchel">Giving is Great / Charity Commission, [https://givingisgreat.org/database/charity-factsheet/?regNo=1125988 Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited] 1125988.</ref>
+
| [[Moshe Teitelbaum]] || 1915–2006 (YIVO); 1914–2006 (Heilman) || Williamsburg || Nephew of Joel<ref name="YIVOSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Rochel Mcr Girls' School]] || Salford || Girls || Satmar-linked || Ofsted monitoring criticised RSE / protected-characteristics teaching; Ofsted later amended LGBT wording.<ref name="JCMCR">The Jewish Chronicle, [https://www.thejc.com/family-and-education/ofsted-admits-error-in-criticising-charedi-school-for-not-teaching-about-same-sex-parents-cqt2yn8v Ofsted admits error], 17 May 2026.</ref>
+
| [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] || born 1947 (Heilman) || Kiryas Joel || Eldest son of Moshe; rav of Kiryas Joel from 1984; one of two rival successors<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar183" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar191" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Ruchel Girls School]] (primary and secondary) || Salford / Manchester || Girls || [[Beis Ruchel School Ltd]] (co. 03561612; charity 1074439) || Trustees include [[Paul Rothschild]], also of [[Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd]].
+
| [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] || born 1952 (Heilman) || Williamsburg || Third son of Moshe (also known as Yekutiel Yehudah); rav in Williamsburg from 1999; one of two rival successors<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar153" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar196" />
 
|}
 
|}
  
−
==== Congregations and halls ====
+
== Communities ==
 +
=== United States ===
 +
* '''[[Williamsburg]], Brooklyn''': the historic centre. ShulMap lists Satmar alongside [[Pupa]], [[Vien]], [[Klausenburg]] and [[Nitra]] synagogues in the area, including halls on Rodney Street and at Kent Avenue.<ref name="ShulMap" />
 +
* '''[[Kiryas Joel]] (Town of Palm Tree), Orange County''': the seat of [[Aaron Teitelbaum]]. In December 2023 the community publication ''Shtetl'' reported claims of 24,000 pupils across the two flagship Satmar school systems (12,000 each) and, citing the publication ''Hayovel'', about 8,000 families in Kiryas Joel.<ref name="ShtetlSchools" />
  
 +
=== United Kingdom ===
 +
[[Stamford Hill]] in Hackney, north London, is the main British centre. There are also Satmar institutions in Salford and Prestwich, Greater Manchester.<ref name="JCRSatmar" /><ref name="KHSatmar" /><ref name="BeisRuchelMcr" />
 +
 +
From 2016 a Hasidic community grew on [[Canvey Island]], Essex, around a former school building bought on 24 March 2016.<ref name="JCRCanvey" /> According to ''K.'', the community's founders included [[Joel Friedman]] of [[Interlink Foundation|Interlink]] and the [[Pinter Trust]]. Satmar Hasidim affiliated with [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] are the largest group there, but it is a general Hasidic community rather than an exclusively Satmar one.<ref name="Canvey" />
 +
 +
Between the early 1990s and 2010 Satmar brought an estimated 20 [[Yemenite Jews|Yemenite Jewish]] families to Stamford Hill. The ''[[Jewish Chronicle]]'' reported that problems with integration quickly became apparent.<ref name="JCYemen" />
 +
 +
==== Schools ====
 
{| class="wikitable sortable"
 
{| class="wikitable sortable"
−
|+ Synagogues and batei midrash
+
|+ Independent schools identified with Satmar
−
! Name !! Address !! Notes
+
! School !! Address !! Pupils !! Proprietor / charity !! Notes
−
|-
 
−
| [[Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev]] || 86 Cazenove Road, London N16 6AB || Core Satmar kehilla from c. 1962; [[Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations]].<ref name="JCRSatmar">JCR-UK, [https://www.jewishgen.org/jcr-uk/london/stamford_shteibls/satmar.htm Satmar Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev].</ref>
 
−
|-
 
−
| [[Beis Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev]] || 42 Craven Walk, London N16 6BU || From c. 2003.<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Hamedrash D'Chasidei Satmar]] || 57 Bethune Road, London N16 5EE || From c. 2010.<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
+
| [[Beis Rochel d'Satmar Girls' School]] || 51–57 Amhurst Park, London N16 5DL || Girls, 2–19 || [[The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust]] (charity 281371) || Income £6,976,785 in the year to 31 December 2024<ref name="CCBaisRochel" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Hamedrash Tehillois Yoel]] || 148 Upper Clapton Road, London E5 9BA || From c. 2011.<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
+
| [[Beis Rochel D'Satmar School]] || 180 Bethune Road, London N16 5DS || Boys, 2–11; 611 pupils || [[Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited]] (charity 1136378) || URN 147296; opened 28 January 2020; headteacher Rabbi [[Emmanuel Patcas]]<ref name="GIAS147296" /><ref name="CCTorahVeyirah" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev]] (listed historic) || 26 Clapton Common, London E5 || From c. 1993; JCR-UK notes it may no longer sit in the organised structure.<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
+
| [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar London]] || 117 Stamford Hill, London N16 5RS || Girls, 2–11; 1,108 pupils || Proprietor [[Abraham Klein]]; [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited]] (charity 1125988) || URN 137505; opened 14 September 2011; income £3,718,860 in the year to 30 August 2025<ref name="GIAS137505" /><ref name="CCBeisRuchelLondon" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Hamedrash V'Yoel Moshe]] (listed historic) || 67 Heathland Road, London N16 6PQ || From c. 2006.<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
+
| [[Talmud Torah Yetev Lev]] || Stamford Hill, London || Boys, 7–11; 438 pupils || || The [[Department for Education]] lifted restrictions on admitting new pupils in 2025 after an inspection found the school met the standards checked<ref name="JCYL" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beth Hamedrash Satmar Veyoel Moshe]] || 37 Northumberland Road, Salford || Maintained by [[KH D'Satmar Ltd]] (1160643); office 315–317 Great Clowes Street, Salford M7 2FZ.<ref name="KHSatmar">Charity Commission, [https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/en/charity-search/-/charity-details/5051699/full-print KH D'SATMAR LTD] 1160643.</ref>
+
| [[Beis Rochel Mcr]] || Salford || Girls, primary || || [[Ofsted]] admitted an error in criticising the school for not teaching about LGBT identity and said it would amend its report<ref name="JCMCR" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd]] || Manchester / Salford || Charity 1115899; grants and religious services; income £238,120 (year to 31 August 2024).<ref name="CongMC">Charity Commission, [https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/en/charity-search/-/charity-details/4026026/full-print CONG YETEV LEV D'SATMAR M/C LTD] 1115899.</ref>
+
| [[Beis Ruchel Girls School]] || Rico House, George Street, Prestwich, Manchester M25 9WS (charity address) || Girls || [[Beis Ruchel School Ltd]] (charity 1074439; company 03561612) || Income £1,749,924 in the year to 31 May 2025<ref name="BeisRuchelMcr" />
−
|-
 
−
| Canvey Island Jewish Centre || former Castle View School, Meppel Avenue, Canvey Island SS8 9RZ || Bought 24 March 2016; shul, simchah hall, grocery, boys’ and girls’ schools, yeshiva ketanah; Satmar-majority mixed Hasidic kehillah, loosely [[Aaron Teitelbaum]].<ref name="JCRCanvey">JCR-UK, [https://jewishgen.org/jcr-uk/Community/canvey/index.htm Canvey Island Jewish Community].</ref>
 
 
|}
 
|}
  
−
==== Charities and related companies ====
+
==== Synagogues ====
−
 
 
 
{| class="wikitable sortable"
 
{| class="wikitable sortable"
−
|+ Registered vehicles
+
|+ Satmar synagogues in the [[United Kingdom]]
−
! Name !! Number !! Role
+
! Name !! Address !! Notes
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust]] || 281371 || Owns [[Beis Rochel d'Satmar Girls' School]]; donated to [[Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited]]; related-party payments to [[Satmar Meats & Poultry Ltd]].<ref name="BRTrust" />
+
| [[Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev]] || 86 Cazenove Road, London N16 6AB || Founded about 1962; member of the [[Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations]]<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited]] || 1136378 || Boys’ primary proprietor; trustees [[Solomon Berkowitz]], [[Maurice Freund]], [[Aaron Langberg]].
+
| [[Beis Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev]] || 42 Craven Walk, London N16 6BU || From about 2003<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited]] || 1125988 || Girls’ school; trustees [[Abraham Klein]], [[Jacob Kernkraut]], [[Jacob Herzka]].
+
| [[Beis Hamedrash D'Chasidei Satmar]] || 57 Bethune Road, London N16 5EE || From about 2010<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beis Ruchel School Ltd]] || 1074439 || Manchester / Salford girls’ schools.
+
| [[Beis Hamedrash Tehillois Yoel]] || 148 Upper Clapton Road, London E5 9BA || From about 2011<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[KH D'Satmar Ltd]] || 1160643 || Salford synagogue, out-of-school club, grants.
+
| [[Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev]] (former) || 26 Clapton Common, London E5 || From about 1993; JCR-UK notes that it may no longer exist<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd]] || 1115899 || Manchester congregation.
+
| [[Beis Hamedrash V'Yoel Moshe]] (former) || 67 Heathland Road, London N16 6PQ || From about 2006<ref name="JCRSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Satmar Torah Trust Ltd]] || — || Linked trusteeship with Cong Yetev Lev M/C.
+
| [[Beth Hamedrash Satmar Veyoel Moshe]] || 37 Northumberland Road, Salford || Run by [[KH D'Satmar Ltd]] (charity 1160643), whose office is at 315–317 Great Clowes Street, Salford M7 2FZ<ref name="KHSatmar" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Kollel Yetev Lev Ltd]] || — || Linked trusteeship ([[Benjamin Ollech]]).
+
| [[Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd]] || Salford, Greater Manchester || Charity 1115899; income £238,120 in the year to 31 August 2024<ref name="CongMC" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Congregation Yetev Lev Dsatmar Antwerp Limited]] || UK company || Antwerp kehilla vehicle; trustee overlap with London Torah Veyirah ([[Maurice Freund]]).
+
| Canvey Island Jewish Centre || Former Castle View School, Meppel Avenue, Canvey Island SS8 9RZ || Bought 24 March 2016; synagogue, hall, grocery, boys' and girls' schools and a junior yeshiva<ref name="JCRCanvey" />
−
|-
 
−
| [[Yeitev Lev Eretz Israel Ltd]] || — || Israel-facing vehicle; trustee overlap with Bais Rochel ([[Solomon Berkowitz]]).
 
−
|-
 
−
| [[Just Kidding]] || 1186598 || Childcare; same circle as Bais Rochel / Torah Veyirah.
 
 
|}
 
|}
  
−
Stamford Hill Satmar also ran a Rav Tuv-style programme that brought an estimated twenty [[Yemenite Jews|Yemenite]] families to London (1990s–c. 2010) rather than to Israel.<ref name="JCYemen">Ben Weich, [https://www.thejc.com/news/satmar-chasidim-was-the-project-to-settle-yemenite-families-in-stamford-hill-a-failed-experiment-li0jrkbp Satmar Chasidim and Yemenite families in Stamford Hill] ''The Jewish Chronicle'', 3 October 2019.</ref>
+
==== Charities and trustees ====
−
 
+
{| class="wikitable sortable"
−
=== Israel and occupied territory ===
+
|+ Satmar-linked charities registered in England and Wales
−
 
+
! Charity !! Number !! Trustees listed by the Charity Commission !! Other trusteeships shown
−
== Israel, the Green Line and occupied territory ==
 
−
 
 
−
Satmar maintains communities in [[Jerusalem]] (including [[Shikun Satmar]] between [[Ezrat Torah]] and [[Tel Arza]]) and [[Bnei Brak]], with smaller groups in [[Elad]] and [[Beit Shemesh]]. Factional geography in Israel is often described as Zalman-leaning in Jerusalem and Aaron-leaning in Bnei Brak, each on the order of hundreds of families rather than tens of thousands.
 
−
 
 
−
[[Joel Teitelbaum]] headed the [[Edah HaChareidis]], the anti-Zionist communal and kashrut body in Jerusalem that also includes [[Dushinsky]], [[Toldos Aharon]], [[Toldos Avraham Yitzchak]], Spinka and some Breslov and Perushim circles. [[Keren Hatzolah]] raises diaspora money for yeshivas and poor families in the land of Israel who refuse Israeli state budgets. Satmar does not recognise the state. It still funds and houses people who live under it.
 
−
 
 
−
=== Inside the Green Line (Israel in the 1949 armistice sense) ===
 
−
 
 
−
Named Satmar housing and schools sit on the Israeli side of the 1949 line:
 
−
 
 
−
* '''[[Shikun Satmar]]''' — north-west Jerusalem housing belt between [[Ezrat Torah]] and [[Tel Arza]], in the same Romema / Yirmiyahu Street Haredi strip as Geula and [[Mea Shearim]]. This is west / municipal Jerusalem as Israel defined it before 1967, not a named East Jerusalem settlement.
 
−
* '''[[Mea Shearim]] / Geula''' — historic Old Yishuv and Edah street grid; Satmar and Edah batei din, kashrut offices and draft protests concentrate here.
 
−
* '''[[Bnei Brak]]''' — Aaron-leaning Satmar families and yeshivas; Israel proper.
 
−
* '''[[Elad]]''' and '''[[Beit Shemesh]]''' (including Ramat Beit Shemesh) — satellite Haredi towns inside the Green Line; small Satmar presence among a mixed Haredi population.
 
−
 
 
−
[[Keren Hatzolah]]’s published purpose is support for yeshivas and poor households that refuse Israeli government stipends. In practice that money follows Edah / Satmar institutions in Jerusalem and Bnei Brak. Charity filings in the US and UK name “Israel”; they do not publish a line-by-line split of grants inside the Green Line versus East Jerusalem or the West Bank.
 
−
 
 
−
=== Over the Green Line: what Satmar does and does not do ===
 
−
 
 
−
Satmar does '''not''' found or brand settler towns comparable to [[Beitar Illit]] or [[Modiin Illit]] ([[Kiryat Sefer]]), the giant Haredi cities built after 1967 on occupied West Bank land and now among the largest settlements. Those cities are Agudah / Lithuanian / mixed-Hasidic housing markets, not Satmar courts. [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] has blamed Jews “living in the territories” for the violence that follows, a line consistent with opposing Religious-Zionist (and, by extension, mass Haredi) settlement while still funding anti-draft Haredi life in the land of Israel.<ref name="YWNTerritories">The Yeshiva World, [https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/headlines-breaking-stories/244926/satmar-rebbe-of-kiryas-yoel-its-their-fault-for-living-in-the-territories.html Satmar Rebbe of Kiryas Yoel: it's their fault for living in the territories] ''The Yeshiva World''.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
Activity that '''does''' cross the Green Line is institutional and ritual, not a Satmar municipal project:
 
−
 
 
−
{| class="wikitable"
 
−
|+ Occupied territory and East Jerusalem
 
−
! Place !! Status !! Satmar / Edah activity
 
 
|-
 
|-
−
| Western Wall / Old City holy sites || Occupied East Jerusalem (taken 1967) || After the 1967 war Teitelbaum forbade prayer at the Wall and other captured sites in ''Al Ha-Geulah ve-Al Ha-Temurah'', arguing that worship there would confer legitimacy on the state. That ban is a Satmar rule '''about''' occupied ground; it is the opposite of Religious-Zionist pilgrimage.
+
| [[The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust]] || 281371 || [[Abraham Schreiber]], [[Jacob Frankel]], [[Victor Langberg]] || Frankel: [[Vyoel Moshe Charitable Trust]], [[Nextgrant Limited]], [[Friends of Yeshiva Luzern]]<ref name="CCBaisRochelTr" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| Municipal East Jerusalem (shops, hotels, shemita produce, arba minim) || Occupied East Jerusalem under Israeli municipal annexation || [[Edah HaChareidis]] [[Badatz]] kashrut supervision runs city-wide. Hotels and food businesses in central and East Jerusalem carry Edah hechsherim. That is commercial-religious jurisdiction across the Green Line, not a Satmar housing estate.
+
| [[Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited]] || 1136378 || [[Solomon Berkowitz]], [[Maurice Freund]], [[Aaron Langberg]] || Berkowitz: [[Yeitev Lev Eretz Israel Ltd]], [[Just Kidding]]; Freund: [[Keren Yetev Lev Ltd]], [[Congregation Yetev Lev Dsatmar Antwerp Limited]], [[Yeitev Lev Eretz Israel Ltd]], [[Nextgrant Limited]]<ref name="CCTorahVeyirahTr" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Ramat Shlomo]], [[Neve Yaakov]], [[Ramot]] (east sections), [[Givat Ze'ev]] || East Jerusalem / West Bank settlement belt || Haredi neighbourhoods over the line. Edah-type households live there; Satmar does not advertise a named kehillah as it does Shikun Satmar.
+
| [[Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited]] || 1125988 || [[Jacob Kernkraut]], [[Jacob Herzka]], [[Abraham Klein]] || Kernkraut: [[Alte Feiga Trust]], [[E and E Kernkraut Charities Limited]], [[The Knightland Foundation]]<ref name="CCBeisRuchelLondonTr" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| [[Beitar Illit]], [[Modiin Illit]] / Kiryat Sefer || West Bank settlements || Largest Haredi settler cities. Edah umbrella literature lists members in Kiryat Sefer and Beitar Illit. Those are other courts’ and Litvish families’ housing. Satmar leadership publicly treats “the territories” as a Religious-Zionist error, not a Satmar mitzvah.
+
| [[Beis Ruchel School Ltd]] || 1074439 || [[Chaim Shimen Lebrecht]], [[Paul Rothschild]], [[Berusch Krausz]] || Rothschild: [[Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd]]; Lebrecht: [[Friends of Toldos Avrohom Yitzchok]]<ref name="CCBeisRuchelMcrTr" />
 
|-
 
|-
−
| Draft resistance / CRC–Edah protests || Students live on both sides of the line || Anti-conscription campaign (including the 2025 “Cry of the Exile” in New York) covers yeshiva boys wherever they are registered in “Eretz Yisrael,” including settlement yeshivas. The demand is exemption from the [[IDF]], not a Satmar flag over Beitar.
+
| [[Just Kidding]] || 1186598 || [[Solomon Berkowitz]] (chair), [[David Schreiber]], [[Feige Krausz]] || Children's services in Hackney and Haringey; registered 26 November 2019; income £131,825<ref name="CCJustKidding" />
 
|}
 
|}
  
−
=== How to read the map ===
+
== Modesty rules and restrictions ==
−
 
+
In her 2013 column in ''[[The Forward]]'', [[Frimet Goldberger]] argued that Satmar had moved steadily towards greater stringency in the decades after [[Joel Teitelbaum]]'s death in 1979. Her starting point was a photograph of two small girls in the ''Williamsburg Bulletin'', a weekly newsletter for the Satmar community in Williamsburg, in which the girls' faces had been blurred out. She linked the trend to a Yiddish saying, ''di doyres falen'' ("the generations are in decline"), which she said was used to justify new restrictions.<ref name="ForwardBlur" />
−
Satmar’s '''named''' geography in the country is west Jerusalem plus Bnei Brak, Elad and Beit Shemesh — Green Line Israel — plus an Edah presidency that historically claimed the Old Yishuv of Jerusalem as a whole. Its '''doctrine''' treats 1967 conquest as illegitimate, forbids using the Kotel as a Zionist shrine, and funds those who will not take state money. Its '''money''' (Keren Hatzolah, Yeitev Lev Eretz Israel Ltd and related UK/US vehicles) is declared for “Israel” without a public Green Line / OPT ledger. Its '''people''' overlap the Edah world, some of whom live in East Jerusalem neighbourhoods and in Beitar / Modiin Illit. That overlap is not the same as Satmar building settlements.
 
−
 
 
−
=== Elsewhere ===
 
−
 
 
−
Antwerp; São Paulo; Melbourne; Argentina.
 
−
 
 
−
== Orientation to Zionism ==
 
−
 
 
−
Satmar anti-Zionism is not quiet non-recognition. ''Vayoel Moshe'' and ''Al Ha-Geulah'' treat the state as heresy that delays redemption: a golden-calf / false-messiah test. [[Shaul Magid]] stresses that [[Joel Teitelbaum]] almost never names Zionist thinkers; he writes in beit-midrash idiom against ''minim'' and ''apikorsim'' for an ultra-Orthodox audience tempted after the Holocaust and 1967. Magid argues that [[Abraham Isaac Kook]] and Teitelbaum both read Zionism messianically: Kook as a necessary secular husk to be transvalued; Teitelbaum as the satanic prelude that must be refused or redemption will come only through catastrophe. Teitelbaum’s lineage runs through [[Hayyim Elazar Shapira of Munkacz]], the Old Yishuv, early [[Neturei Karta]], [[Elhanan Wasserman]] and interwar Lubavitch anti-Zionism — but only he built a full political theology and rejected [[Agudat Yisrael]]’s pragmatic seating in Zionist institutions as service of the calf.<ref name="Magid" />
 
−
 
 
−
[[Menachem Keren-Kratz]] notes that for the first post-Holocaust years Teitelbaum was almost alone among prominent rabbis in holding the pre-war Transylvanian hard line; he preached in ''Der Yid'' before putting the system in book form in 1959 when he judged Haredi opinion to be softening.<ref name="Magid" />
 
−
 
 
−
[[Aaron Teitelbaum]], addressing Nassau Coliseum, later rebuked Hasidim for admiring Israeli military and political “accomplishments”: “We have no part in Zionism. We have no part in their wars. We have no part in the State of Israel.” He rejected any compromise on drafting yeshiva students.<ref name="TOIAaron" /> The [[Jewish Chronicle]] has insisted that Satmar theology also forbids backing PLO, Islamist or far-left campaigns against Jews: [[Joel Teitelbaum]] called such organisations antisemitic murderers.<ref name="JCStern" />
 
−
 
 
−
In October 2025 the [[Central Rabbinical Congress]] called a “Cry of the Exile” rally at the Israeli consulate in New York against IDF draft enforcement; both Satmar rebbes urged attendance, a rare wartime protest against the state rather than silence.<ref name="TOICRC">Times of Israel, [https://www.timesofisrael.com/topic/central-rabbinical-congress/ Central Rabbinical Congress] coverage of October 2025 rally.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
== Satmar and Neturei Karta ==
 
−
 
 
−
Some [[Neturei Karta]] members come from Satmar families. The court repeatedly draws a line: anti-Zionism is not alliance with Holocaust deniers or with those who praise attacks on Israeli civilians.
 
  
−
In 2006 Satmar issued a placard against seven Neturei Karta figures who attended Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s Holocaust-denial conference in Tehran, ordering shunning for “walk[ing] hand in hand with the Arabs” and belittling the murdered.<ref name="Ynet2006">Ynet, [https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3340592,00.html Satmar slams Neturei Karta over Iran conference] ''Ynet News'', 2006.</ref>
+
Goldberger wrote that Teitelbaum had condemned married women who let their hair grow beneath turbans and wigs, but that most Hasidic women complied only after his death, many out of fear of the consequences. According to her, it had become accepted practice in Satmar to expel children from school if their mothers did not shave their heads. Teitelbaum had also criticised the thin stockings and uncovered wigs worn in the 1960s and 1970s, and she wrote that most Satmar women now wore thick, seamed stockings.<ref name="ForwardBlur" />
  
−
In November 2023 [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] attacked Neturei Karta demonstrations in New York “in support of Hamas”: walking “together with the Arabs… who shout… and support the murders” in shtreimel and bekishe was a “terrible desecration of the name of heaven.” Reports noted that Satmar still funds Haredi institutions that refuse Israeli budgets, yet unlike Neturei Karta it keeps ties with pro-Zionist Haredi communities for welfare and politics.<ref name="JP2023">Jewish Press, [https://www.jewishpress.com/news/jewish-news/haredim-news/satmar-rebbe-condemns-neturei-karta-for-supporting-hamas-murders/2023/11/13/ Satmar Rebbe condemns Neturei Karta for supporting Hamas murders] ''The Jewish Press'', 13 November 2023.</ref>
+
She listed further restrictions, which she said applied especially to Satmar and the smaller [[Skver (Hasidic dynasty)|Skver]] group. They included a new rule against the long robes traditionally worn on the Sabbath, and bans on the internet, smartphones and concerts. Strawberries, raspberries and grapes were banned in case they contained insects, and in [[Kiryas Joel]] eye make-up applied by make-up artists was also banned.<ref name="ForwardBlur" />
  
−
== Relations with other Orthodox and Hasidic groups ==
+
Goldberger also described Teitelbaum as a pragmatic leader. She wrote that in Hungary he had been a fierce critic of the [[Bais Yaakov]] girls' school movement, but that in America he led the creation of the Satmar girls' school and encouraged teaching girls the basics of both Jewish and secular subjects. In her account he also relaxed his position on wigs. She argued that he had never encouraged the blurring of girls' faces, and that his followers had taken his cause much too far.<ref name="ForwardBlur" />
  
−
* '''[[Agudat Yisrael]] / [[United Torah Judaism]]''' — theological opponents (state funding, Knesset, Council of Torah Sages). Satmar still inhabits the same Haredi street and sometimes coordinates American pressure against the draft with UTJ’s Israeli agenda.
+
== Opposition to Zionism ==
−
* '''Religious Zionism / [[Abraham Isaac Kook]] heirs''' — the foil of ''Al Ha-Geulah''; settlement in “the territories” is blamed for war, not blessed as atchalta de-geulah.
+
[[Joel Teitelbaum]] set out his opposition to Zionism in ''Va-Yo'el Mosheh'' (1959–1961), which relies on the rabbinic "three oaths", and in ''ʻAl ha-ge'ulah ve-ʻal ha-temurah'' (1967), written after the [[Six-Day War]]. He also forbade the use of spoken modern Hebrew.<ref name="YIVOSatmar" /> [[Shaul Magid]] writes that Teitelbaum almost never discusses Zionist thinkers by name, and that he regarded [[Agudat Yisrael]]'s pragmatic acceptance of Zionism as like the righteous who were misled into serving the golden calf. Magid places him in a longer line of Haredi anti-Zionism that includes [[Hayyim Elazar Shapira]] of Munkács, [[Elchonon Wasserman]] and the Lubavitcher rebbes [[Sholom Dovber Schneersohn]] and [[Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn]]. He argues that [[Abraham Isaac Kook]] and Teitelbaum "disagree less than we think".<ref name="Magid" />
−
* '''[[Chabad-Lubavitch]]''' — shunned by Satmar-type Hasidim as modernised and media-savvy; not treated as a peer court.<ref name="ForwardBlur">Forward, [https://forward.com/opinion/181566/blurring-out-satmar-history/ Blurring out Satmar history] ''The Forward''.</ref>
 
−
* '''[[Skver]]''' — fellow Hungarian-style stringency (New Square). The two have aligned as New York voting outliers, e.g. endorsing Kathy Hochul against a wider Orthodox tilt to Lee Zeldin.<ref name="YWNHochul">The Yeshiva World, [https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/general/2134796/outliers-skver-joins-satmar-in-endorsing-hochul-also-backs-maloney.html Outliers: Skver joins Satmar in endorsing Hochul] ''The Yeshiva World''.</ref>
 
−
* '''[[Belz]], [[Vizhnitz]], Pupa, Vien, Klausenburg, Nitra, Krasna''' — Williamsburg coalition partners under [[United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg]] / [[Moshe Dovid Niederman]]; not theological clones.
 
−
* '''[[Edah HaChareidis]] partners''' ([[Toldos Aharon]], Dushinsky, etc.) — Jerusalem anti-Zionist umbrella once headed by Satmar rebbes.
 
−
== Satmar and [[Chabad-Lubavitch]] ==
 
  
−
[[Satmar]] and [[Chabad-Lubavitch]] are the two largest organised Hasidic projects in the postwar United States, and they are ideological opposites. Satmar built an insulated Yiddish enclave in [[Williamsburg]] and later [[Kiryas Joel]]. Chabad, from [[770 Eastern Parkway]] in [[Crown Heights]], built a global network of ''shluchim'' aimed at non-observant Jews. [[Joel Teitelbaum]] treated other Jews who accepted Zionism or modern Hebrew as heretics to be fenced off; [[Menachem Mendel Schneerson]] treated them as a field for outreach.<ref name="JCWilliamsburg">Jewish Currents, [https://jewishcurrents.org/the-making-of-satmar-williamsburg The Making of Satmar Williamsburg], 8 May 2026.</ref>
+
Heilman writes that in ''Va-Yo'el Mosheh'', written in the mid-1950s, Teitelbaum presented Zionism as the sin for which the destruction of European Jewry was the punishment, and accused the Zionists of reserving immigration certificates for their own followers. Heilman also notes that in 1967 Teitelbaum prohibited visiting or praying at the newly captured Western Wall.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar170" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar171" /> Heilman judges that under Moshe Teitelbaum the campaign against Zionism became more muted. In the later succession dispute, Zalman's supporters questioned whether Aaron was anti-Zionist enough, alleging that he spoke modern Hebrew at home with his Israeli wife.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar194" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar200" />
  
−
=== Shared ancestry, opposite conclusions ===
+
The ''[[Jewish Chronicle]]'' has stated that Joel Teitelbaum described the [[Palestine Liberation Organization|PLO]] and similar organisations as antisemitic murderers.<ref name="JCStern" />
  
−
Pre-state Lubavitch rebbes [[Sholom Dovber Schneersohn]] and [[Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn]] opposed secular Zionism on messianic grounds similar to [[Hayyim Elazar Shapira of Munkacz]], the Hungarian source for Teitelbaum.<ref name="MagidChabad">Shaul Magid, [https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/belief/articles/satmar-anti-zionist The Satmar Are Anti-Zionist. Should We Care?] ''Tablet'', 21 May 2020.</ref> After 1948 and especially after 1967 the paths diverged. Satmar froze anti-Zionism as a total system in ''[[Vayoel Moshe]]'' and ''[[Al Ha-Geulah ve-Al Ha-Temurah]]''. Schneerson treated Israeli military victories, including Entebbe and the capture of the Western Wall, as events with religious meaning and encouraged prayer at the Wall. Teitelbaum called that reading a false redemption, condemned Schneerson by name in the 1967–68 tract, and forbade prayer at sites taken in the war because it would confer legitimacy on the state.<ref name="Mayse">Ariel Evan Mayse, “The Calf Awakens: Language, Zionism and Heresy in Twentieth-Century American Hasidism,” in the Brill collection on American Hasidism, 2020.</ref>
+
In July 2014, after the killing of three Israeli teenagers who had been studying at a yeshiva in the occupied West Bank, [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] told a class in [[Kiryas Joel]] that their parents were to blame: "Who permitted them to go there [to live] among these known murderers?" He attributed it to "the lust called 'Shleimus Haaretz and Zionism'".<ref name="YWNTerritories" /> The [[International Court of Justice]] found in 2024 that Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem "have been established and are being maintained in violation of international law".<ref name="ICJ2024" />
  
−
The same split runs through language. Teitelbaum’s essay on ''lashon ha-kodesh'' treats modern Hebrew as a Zionist garment of impurity. Chabad uses modern Hebrew freely in Israel and in outreach.<ref name="Mayse" />
+
On Sunday 3 June 2018 [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] addressed a Satmar gathering at the Nassau Coliseum on Long Island, speaking in Yiddish. Quoting a Hebrew translation broadcast by the Israeli public broadcaster [[Kan (broadcaster)|Kan]], ''[[The Times of Israel]]'' reported that he criticised followers who admired Israel and its army. It also reported that he said Satmar had "no part in Zionism" or "in their wars", and that he rejected any compromise over the Israeli military draft law for yeshiva students. The paper set the speech against an ultimatum by [[United Torah Judaism]] and [[Yaakov Litzman]] over the draft, after Israel's [[Supreme Court of Israel|High Court]] struck down the exemption in September 2017.<ref name="TOI2018" />
  
−
=== Street conflict, 1977 ===
+
In October 2025 the [[Central Rabbinical Congress]] organised a "Cry of the Exile" rally outside the Israeli consulate in New York against the [[Israel Defense Forces|IDF]] draft of Haredi students. The ''[[Times of Israel]]'' reported that organisers claimed 100,000 protesters and that the rally answered a call from leading anti-Zionist rabbis, including the rival Satmar rebbes.<ref name="TOICRC" />
  
−
The theological quarrel became a neighbourhood quarrel in Brooklyn. The ''New York Times'' reported that in spring 1977 Satmar and Lubavitch Hasidim fought in the streets over Israel and “neighbourhood sanctity.” A candy store was burned, a caravan stoned, Israeli flags burned, a rabbi hung in effigy. Lubavitch support for the Entebbe raid was the ideological trigger; a Lubavitch Lag BaOmer march of about 2,000 into Williamsburg on 9 April met a Satmar crowd of similar size on Bedford Avenue. Each side accused the other of assault.<ref name="NYT1977">New York Times, [https://www.nytimes.com/1977/06/01/archives/hasidim-in-brooklyn-feuding-over-israel-and-neighborhood-sanctity.html Hasidim in Brooklyn Feuding Over Israel and Neighborhood Sanctity], 1 June 1977.</ref>
+
=== Neturei Karta ===
 +
In 2006 Satmar issued a public notice against seven [[Neturei Karta]] members who attended [[Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]]'s Holocaust-denial conference in Tehran, calling on the public to dissociate themselves from the seven, whom it accused of walking "hand in hand" with Arabs.<ref name="Ynet2006" />
  
−
Geography still encodes the split: Satmar-majority South Williamsburg versus Chabad-majority Crown Heights. Satmar literature treats Chabad’s media presence and comfort with secular institutions as a form of Modern Orthodoxy in Hasidic dress, not as a peer court.
+
In November 2023 [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] condemned Neturei Karta demonstrations in New York in support of [[Hamas]] as a "terrible desecration" of God's name. The ''[[Jewish Press]]'' noted that Satmar, unlike Neturei Karta, keeps ties with pro-Zionist Haredi communities.<ref name="JP2023" />
  
−
=== Messianism ===
+
== Relations with Chabad ==
 +
''Jewish Currents'' contrasts [[Menachem Mendel Schneerson]] of [[Chabad]], who built an "army" of emissaries to bring non-Hasidic Jews into the fold, with [[Joel Teitelbaum]], who encouraged his followers to separate themselves from other Jews, whom they largely saw as heretics.<ref name="JCWilliamsburg" />
  
−
After Schneerson’s death in 1994 a Chabad meshichist stream proclaimed him the Messiah. Satmar messianism runs the other way: Zionism is the false messiah that must be refused so that the true redemption can arrive. The two courts therefore accuse each other of corrupting the idea of Mashiach — Chabad by attaching it to a dead rebbe and to the Israeli state, Satmar by making anti-Zionism itself a redemptive test.<ref name="MagidChabad" />
+
In 1977 the ''[[New York Times]]'' reported a feud between Satmar and Lubavitch Hasidim in Brooklyn. A candy store was burned, a caravan was stoned, Israeli flags were burned and a rabbi was hung in effigy. The paper said the main ideological dispute was Lubavitch support for the [[Operation Entebbe|Entebbe raid]], and that a fistfight in April had started when Lubavitchers marched into the Satmar neighbourhood for a religious holiday.<ref name="NYT1977" />
  
−
=== What they still share ===
+
Heilman writes that Joel Teitelbaum's approach was the opposite of outreach and that his Hasidim often fought with the Lubavitchers. He also describes a later clash in which Satmar accused [[Menachem Mendel Schneerson|Schneerson]]'s followers of trying to win over its members, and says Moshe Teitelbaum fended off Lubavitch.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar173" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar194" />
  
−
Both reject drafting yeshiva students into the [[IDF]]. Both operate large New York welfare and school systems and both appear in American electoral brokerage. They do not share pulpits, kashrut, schools or marriage markets. Satmar’s denunciations of [[Neturei Karta]] for marching with Israel’s enemies do not create an opening to Chabad; the forbidden act, in Satmar terms, is granting the state religious standing, which Chabad does as a matter of policy.
+
[[Frimet Goldberger]], writing in ''[[The Forward]]'' as someone raised in Satmar, argued that Chabad was not part of the radicalisation she saw in Satmar and other Hasidic groups. In her view, presenting Lubavitchers as the typical face of Hasidism, in America and worldwide, seriously misrepresents Hasidism. She wrote that many other Hasidic groups shun Chabad as a separate, modernised body, comparable to [[Modern Orthodox Judaism|Modern Orthodoxy]], whose religious stringencies are far more lenient than their own. She also said Chabad's skill with the media and its ease with secular society reflect a worldliness that most Hasidim, being insular, lack.<ref name="ForwardBlur" />
  
 +
== Politics ==
 +
Williamsburg Satmar's civic arm is the [[United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg]] ([[UJO]]). Rabbi [[David Niederman]] has been its executive director since 1989. Before that he was executive vice-president of [[Rav Tov International Jewish Rescue Organization|Rav Tov]] from its founding in 1973. UJO reported 93,131 walk-in clients in 2024.<ref name="UJOExec" /><ref name="UJOHome" /> In November 2025 ''[[Mishpacha]]'' described Rabbi [[Moishe Indig]], founder and leader of the [[Williamsburg Jewish Community Council]], as a political "kingmaker" and questioned him about his endorsement of [[Zohran Mamdani]].<ref name="Mishpacha" />
  
−
== Voting bloc, [[Skver]] and the Williamsburg courts ==
+
In 2022 the Kiryas Joel Satmar faction and the [[Skver]] community in [[New Square]] endorsed Governor [[Kathy Hochul]], a Democrat, against the Republican [[Lee Zeldin]]. Skver also backed [[Sean Patrick Maloney]].<ref name="YWNHochul" /><ref name="VINSquare" /> The ''[[The Forward|Forward]]'' reported that the Williamsburg Satmar faction, called the Zalis, did not endorse anyone in the race for governor, and that the Skver community had about 3,000 votes.<ref name="FwdHochul" /> ''Jewish Insider'' also put the New Square bloc at about 3,000 votes in 2024.<ref name="JISkver" />
  
−
Williamsburg Satmar under [[Moshe Dovid Niederman]] and the [[United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg and North Brooklyn]] ([[UJO]]) is routinely described as New York City’s largest Orthodox voting bloc. Endorsements track yeshiva regulation, welfare and street safety more than Israel policy.
+
In 2025 [[Andrew Cuomo]]'s mayoral campaign announced the endorsement of the main Satmar community in Williamsburg, led politically by [[David Niederman]], with a coalition of congregations including [[Pupa]], [[Viznitz]], [[Vien]], [[Tzelim]], [[Nitra]], [[Krasna]], [[Skver]] and [[Klausenburg]]. The campaign said Satmar Ahronim and the [[Bobov]] community had already endorsed Cuomo, and described the group as the largest Orthodox voting bloc in the city.<ref name="Cuomo2025" />
  
−
In June 2025 the main Williamsburg court ([[Zalman Teitelbaum]]) plus [[Pupa]], [[Vizhnitz]], [[Vien]], Tzelim, [[Nitra]], [[Krasna]], [[Skver]] and [[Klausenburg]] endorsed [[Andrew Cuomo]] for mayor, after Satmar Ahronim ([[Aaron Teitelbaum]]) and [[Bobov]] had already done so. Cuomo called Niederman a friend who had “put his life on the line to save Jews in the Middle East” and built UJO from a three-person team.<ref name="Cuomo2025">Andrew Cuomo campaign, [https://www.andrewcuomo.com/press/cuomo-receives-major-endorsement-satmar-williamsburg-led-grand-rebbe-zalmen-teitelbaum-one Cuomo receives major endorsement from Satmar Williamsburg] June 2025.</ref>
+
On 3 September 2026 both Satmar rebbes, the [[Bobov]] rebbe, the [[Vizhnitz]] rebbe of Monsey and a son of the [[Skver]] rebbe [[David Twersky]] met President [[Donald Trump]] and Vice-President [[JD Vance]] at the White House. ''Jewish Insider'' reported that housing, prison reform and family tax credits were discussed; ''The Yeshiva World'' also reported discussion of the Israeli draft.<ref name="JITrump26" /><ref name="YWNTrump" />
  
−
=== [[Skver]] ===
+
Heilman describes Joel Teitelbaum as a power broker whom politicians, including the New York mayor [[John Lindsay]], visited.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar174" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar175" /> By late October 1979 Moshe Teitelbaum was signing directives on how Satmar Hasidim should vote in a state assembly primary.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar191" /> In July 1984 Satmar Hasidim were officially designated a "disadvantaged minority", which made them eligible for public economic and welfare benefits. Heilman says Satmar yeshiva budgets later exceeded $20 million a year.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar193" />
  
−
[[Skver]] (Skverer Hasidim), based in the all-Hasidic village of [[New Square]] in Rockland County, is the nearest American peer to Satmar in Hungarian-style stringency, Yiddish everyday life and a purpose-built upstate enclave. It is smaller: New Square’s bloc is routinely put at about 3,000 votes, against tens of thousands for the two Satmar factions combined.<ref name="JISkver">Matthew Kassel, [https://jewishinsider.com/2024/10/the-high-stakes-battle-for-the-skver-vote/ The high-stakes battle for the Skver vote] ''Jewish Insider'', 29 October 2024.</ref> The rebbe is [[David Twersky]]; his endorsements in Hudson Valley congressional races are treated as swing assets.
+
== Controversies ==
 +
=== Civil cases ===
 +
Heilman writes that the B'nai Yoel dispute after 1979 produced a stream of lawsuits in New York state courts, because neither side would accept the other's rabbinical judges.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar192" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar193" /> The dispute between Aaron and Zalman also went to the New York courts. It covered the Kiryas Joel cemetery where Joel Teitelbaum is buried, as well as study halls, schools, ritual baths, camps and matzah bakeries, assets Heilman values at about $500 million. Both factions held separate elections for the board of Congregation Yetev Lev D'Satmar in Williamsburg.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar201" /> Heilman says the judges treated the core issue as ecclesiastical and left it to the congregation to decide.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar202" /> In Moshe Teitelbaum's last years one faction asked a court to declare him incapacitated and to appoint co-guardians. Heilman says Zalman and the ''gabbaim'' fought this.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar202" />
  
−
The two courts are not a single theology. Skver is less identified with ''Vayoel Moshe'' anti-Zionism as a public programme. What they share is resistance to New York Regents and yeshiva secular-curriculum rules, and a preference for incumbents who already deliver housing, welfare and school quiet.
+
=== Allegations ===
−
 
+
Heilman reports a number of allegations of violence connected with the succession disputes:
−
That produced the 2022 outlier. After [[Bobov]] and much of Borough Park moved to Republican [[Lee Zeldin]] over the Board of Regents’ yeshiva vote, [[Aaron Teitelbaum]]’s Kiryas Joel Satmar and New Square Skver stayed with Democrat [[Kathy Hochul]]. Skver also backed Democrat [[Sean Patrick Maloney]] in NY-17. New Square mayor [[Izzy Spitzer]] defended the line as keeping a partner already in Albany; Satmar activists in the upstate enclave were described as aligned with that choice.<ref name="FwdHochul">Jacob Kornbluh, [https://forward.com/news/523456/kathy-hochul-lee-zeldin-yeshiva-education-orthodox/ In close race, Hochul walks a fine line on yeshiva education] ''The Forward'', 2 November 2022.</ref><ref name="VINSquare">VINnews, [https://vinnews.com/2022/11/15/after-stunning-victory-republicans-work-to-build-relationship-with-new-squares-leaders/ After stunning victory, Republicans work to build relationship with New Square’s leaders], 15 November 2022.</ref> Williamsburg Zalis Satmar did not issue a gubernatorial endorsement that cycle. A Skver presence in Borough Park was separately claimed for Zeldin, showing that “Skver” on a Brooklyn street is not always the New Square rebbe’s bloc.
+
* After 1984, he says, supporters of Aaron and of Feige Teitelbaum came to blows, and the B'nai Yoel dispute involved mass protests, violence and attacks on property.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar192" /><ref name="HeilmanSatmar193" />
−
 
+
* At the September 2000 bar mitzvah of Aaron's grandson in Williamsburg, fighting broke out after a ''gabbai'' who supported Zalman did not call the boy to the Torah. Heilman says Aaron's supporters responded with physical and verbal violence.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar199" />
−
In September 2026 both Satmar rebbes and a son of the Skverer Rebbe sat in the same White House meeting with [[Donald Trump]], alongside [[Bobov]] and Monsey [[Vizhnitz]] — cooperation on prisons, housing and the Israeli draft, not a merger of courts.<ref name="JITrump26">Matthew Kassel, [https://jewishinsider.com/2026/09/trump-white-house-meeting-hasidic-rabbis-housing-taxes-prison-reform/ Trump and Hasidic rabbis discuss housing, prison reform and family tax credits] ''Jewish Insider'', 3 September 2026.</ref>
+
* Heilman quotes a press report that, after the Zalis had repelled an earlier attempt, the Aaronis entered the Williamsburg synagogue with nightclub bouncers who struck several men.<ref name="HeilmanSatmar207" />
−
 
+
None of these accounts records a conviction.
−
=== UJO: a civic machine, not one rebbe ===
 
−
 
 
−
South Williamsburg is Satmar-majority but not Satmar-only. Smaller Hungarian and Galician courts keep their own shtieblach and schools while using a shared civic machine. UJO was founded in 1966. Niederman has been executive director since 1989. He previously ran [[Rav Tov]], the Satmar refugee organisation set up at [[Joel Teitelbaum]]’s instruction in 1973. UJO presents itself as a coalition of more than 200 groups serving on the order of 70,000 people; 2024 figures cite 93,131 walk-in clients. Services run in Yiddish and English: housing, Medicaid, food stamps, immigration, seniors, a kosher pantry opened 2026 at 365 Flushing Avenue with [[Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty]]. City capital funds of $5.5 million were secured in 2025 for a headquarters at 498 Bedford Avenue.<ref name="UJOExec">United Jewish Organizations, [https://www.unitedjewish.org/executive-director.html Executive Director].</ref><ref name="UJOHome">United Jewish Organizations, [https://www.unitedjewish.org/ home page], accessed 2026.</ref>
 
−
 
 
−
The courts in that machine, and on the 2025 Cuomo list, are political partners, not theological copies:
 
−
 
 
−
* '''[[Pupa]]''' — Hungarian court; historic Williamsburg neighbour; co-founder circle of the [[Central Rabbinical Congress]] with Satmar.
 
−
* '''[[Vizhnitz]]''' — Galician/Bukovinian; Williamsburg kloiz plus a separate Monsey rebbe who joined the 2026 White House meeting.
 
−
* '''[[Vien]]''' ([[Kehal Adas Yereim Vien]]) — Oberlander / Viennese origin under [[Yonasan Steif]]; another CRC founding circle; most members now Hasidic in dress and custom because of Satmar proximity, not because Vien was founded as a Satmar clone.
 
−
* '''[[Klausenburg]]''' (Sanz-Klausenburg) — Williamsburg hall; separate Israeli and Netanya institutions; non-Satmar Sanz theology.
 
−
* '''[[Nitra]]''' — Hungarian yeshiva court; Williamsburg and Mount Kisco; CRC milieu.
 
−
* '''[[Krasna]]''' — small Hungarian court in the same street grid.
 
−
* '''[[Tzelim]]''' (Tzelem) — Williamsburg partner named on the Cuomo slate.
 
−
* '''[[Belz]]''' — neighbourhood partner in some slates. This is street politics. In 1979 Satmar students wrecked a Belz synagogue in Williamsburg in a fight over religious courts in Israel; the courts have long disagreed about [[Agudat Yisrael]] and Israeli institutions even when they share Bedford Avenue.
 
−
* '''[[Skver]]''' — New Square votes with Satmar when the issue is Albany and yeshivas; it is not a Williamsburg street court.
 
−
 
 
−
Niederman is the translator of that patchwork into City Hall and Albany language. The coalition can deliver a claimed high-turnout Williamsburg Orthodox vote on the order of 10,000. It does not require Pupa, Vien or Klausenburg to accept ''Vayoel Moshe'', nor Skver to accept Satmar succession claims.
 
−
 
 
−
== Institutions ==
 
−
 
 
−
* Schools: Beis Rochel / Beis Ruchel (girls); Torah VeYirah; [[United Talmudical Seminary]]; [[Yeshivas Maharit D'Satmar]].
 
−
* Aid: [[Bikur Cholim]]; Rav Tuv (Soviet, later Iranian and Yemenite Jews); [[Keren Hatzolah]] (yeshivas and poor in Israel who refuse state benefits).
 
−
* Kashrut and courts: [[Central Rabbinical Congress]]; internal batei din.
 
−
* Press: ''[[Der Yid]]'' (Zalman); ''[[Der Blatt]]'' (Aaron).
 
−
* UK schools: [[Beis Rochel d'Satmar Girls' School]] and [[Beis Rochel D'Satmar School]] (Hackney); [[Beis Rochel Mcr Girls' School]], [[Beis Ruchel Girls School]] (Salford); [[Beis Ruchel D`Satmar]] (Hackney).
 
−
* See also [[Satmar non profits in the US]].
 
−
 
 
−
== Notable people ==
 
−
 
 
−
* [[Joel Teitelbaum]] (1887–1979), founder
 
−
* [[Moshe Teitelbaum (Satmar)|Moshe Teitelbaum]] (1914–2006)
 
−
* [[Aaron Teitelbaum]] (born 1947), Kiryas Joel
 
−
* [[Zalman Teitelbaum]] (born 1951), Williamsburg
 
−
* [[Alte Feiga Teitelbaum]], Bikur Cholim
 
−
* [[Moshe Dovid Niederman]], UJO Williamsburg
 
−
* [[Chaim Yehoshua Halberstam]], Satmar rabbi in Monsey
 
−
* [[Louis Kestenbaum]], property
 
−
* [[Yossi Green]], composer
 
−
* [[Meilech Kohn]], [[Shmueli Ungar]], singers
 
  
 
== See also ==
 
== See also ==
−
 
 
* [[Siget (Hasidic dynasty)]]
 
* [[Siget (Hasidic dynasty)]]
−
* [[Munkacs (Hasidic dynasty)]]
 
 
* [[Neturei Karta]]
 
* [[Neturei Karta]]
 
* [[Edah HaChareidis]]
 
* [[Edah HaChareidis]]
 
* [[Central Rabbinical Congress]]
 
* [[Central Rabbinical Congress]]
 +
* [[Kiryas Joel]]
 +
* [[Satmar non profits in the US]]
 +
* [[Satmar institutions in the UK]]
 +
* [[Munkacs (Hasidic dynasty)]]
 
* [[Hasidic dynasties]]
 
* [[Hasidic dynasties]]
−
* [[Kiryas Joel]]
 
−
* [[Agudat Yisrael]]
 
−
*[[Satmar institutions in the UK]]
 
−
 
−
== External links ==
 
−
 
−
* [https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/belief/articles/satmar-anti-zionist Shaul Magid on Satmar anti-Zionism]
 
−
* [https://mishpacha.com/the-kingmaker-from-williamsburg/ Mishpacha: The kingmaker from Williamsburg]
 
−
* [https://yeshivasmaharit.org/ Yeshivas Maharit D'Satmar]
 
−
* [https://k-larevue.com/en/postcard-from-canvey-island/ Canvey Island]
 
−
 
−
== Further reading ==
 
−
 
−
* Deborah Feldman, ''Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of my Hasidic Roots'', New York: Simon & Schuster, 2012.
 
−
* Yechezkel Yossef Weisshaus, ''The Rebbe'', Machon Lev Avos / Israel Book Shop, 2008.
 
  
 
== Notes ==
 
== Notes ==
 +
<references>
 +
<ref name="ForwardBlur">Frimet Goldberger, [https://forward.com/opinion/181566/blurring-out-satmar-history/ Blurring Out Satmar History] The Forward (opinion), 2 August 2013, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
 +
<ref name="YIVOSatmar">Allan Nadler, [https://yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Teitelbaum_Family Satmar Hasidic Dynasty] ''YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe'', accessed 26 October 2026.</ref>
 +
<ref name="Magid">Shaul Magid, [https://web.archive.org/web/20251105010134/https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/belief/articles/satmar-anti-zionist The Satmar Are Anti-Zionist. Should We Care?] ''Tablet'', 21 May 2020 (archived 5 November 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
 +
<ref name="JCStern">''The Jewish Chronicle'', [https://www.thejc.com/comment/comment/time-to-stop-the-shraga-stern-farce-1.494581 Time to stop the Shraga Stern farce] ''The Jewish Chronicle'', accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
 +
<ref name="YWNTerritories">''The Yeshiva World'', [https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/headlines-breaking-stories/244926/satmar-rebbe-of-kiryas-yoel-its-their-fault-for-living-in-the-territories.html Satmar Rebbe of Kiryas Yoel: It's Their Fault for Living in the Territories!] ''The Yeshiva World'', 3 July 2014, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
 +
<ref name="ICJ2024">International Court of Justice, [https://www.icj-cij.org/node/204176 Summary of the Advisory Opinion of 19 July 2024] ''icj-cij.org'', 19 July 2024, accessed 26 October 2026.</ref>
 +
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<ref name="JCYL">Simon Rocker, [https://thejc.com/family-and-education/dfe-lifts-sanctions-against-chasidic-school-in-stamford-hill-k2g7s2bl DfE lifts sanctions against Chasidic school in Stamford Hill] ''The Jewish Chronicle'', 2025, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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<ref name="VINSquare">''VIN News'', [https://vinnews.com/2022/11/15/after-stunning-victory-republicans-work-to-build-relationship-with-new-squares-leaders/ After stunning victory, Republicans work to build relationship with New Square's leaders] ''VIN News'', 15 November 2022, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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<ref name="FwdHochul">Jacob Kornbluh, [https://web.archive.org/web/20260516105429/https://forward.com/news/523456/kathy-hochul-lee-zeldin-yeshiva-education-orthodox/ In close race, Hochul walks a fine line on yeshiva education] ''The Forward'', 2 November 2022 (archived 16 May 2026), accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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<ref name="Cuomo2025">Andrew Cuomo for Mayor, [https://web.archive.org/web/20251208183704/https://www.andrewcuomo.com/press/cuomo-receives-major-endorsement-satmar-williamsburg-led-grand-rebbe-zalmen-teitelbaum-one Cuomo receives major endorsement from Satmar Williamsburg] ''andrewcuomo.com'', June 2025 (archived 8 December 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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<ref name="JITrump26">Matthew Kassel, [https://jewishinsider.com/2026/09/trump-white-house-meeting-hasidic-rabbis-housing-taxes-prison-reform/ Trump and Hasidic rabbis discuss housing, prison reform and family tax credits] ''Jewish Insider'', 3 September 2026, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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<ref name="YWNTrump">''The Yeshiva World'', [https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/israel-news/2594035/historic-white-house-visit-inside-rebbes-extraordinary-meetings-with-trump-and-vance.html Historic White House Visit: Inside Rebbes' Extraordinary Meetings With Trump And Vance] ''The Yeshiva World'', 4 September 2026, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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<ref name="HeilmanSatmar152">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 152.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar153">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 153.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar154">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 154.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar155">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 155.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar156">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 156.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar157">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 157.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar158">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 158.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar159">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 159.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar160">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 160.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar161">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 161.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar162">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 162.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar163">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 163.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar164">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 164.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar165">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 165.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar166">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 166.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar168">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 168.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar169">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 169.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar170">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 170.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar171">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 171.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar172">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 172.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar173">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 173.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar174">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 174.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar175">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 175.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar176">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 176.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar177">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 177.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar178">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 178.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar179">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 179.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar180">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 180.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar181">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 181.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar182">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 182.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar183">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 183.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar184">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 184.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar185">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 185.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar186">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 186.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar187">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 187.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar189">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 189.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar190">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 190.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar191">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 191.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar192">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 192.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar193">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 193.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar194">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 194.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar195">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 195.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar196">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 196.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar197">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 197.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar198">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 198.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar199">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 199.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar200">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 200.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar201">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 201.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar202">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 202.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar203">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 203.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar204">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 204.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar205">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 205.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar206">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 206.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar207">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 207.</ref>
 +
<ref name="HeilmanSatmar209">Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in ''Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America'', Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 209.</ref>
 +
<ref name="TOI2018">TOI Staff, [https://www.timesofisrael.com/head-of-satmar-hasidic-sect-castigates-followers-for-admiring-israel-idf/ Head of Satmar Hasidic sect castigates followers for admiring Israel, IDF] ''The Times of Israel'', 9 June 2018, accessed 27 October 2026.</ref>
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</references>
  
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<references />
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[[Category:Hasidic dynasties]]
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[[Category:Hasidism]]
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[[Category:Satmar]]
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[[Category:Theological anti-Zionists]]
 
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[[Category:Hasidic Judaism in the United Kingdom]]

Latest revision as of 20:42, 27 October 2026

Hasidic dynasty founded in Satu Mare (Satmar), Romania, in 1928 and rebuilt in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, after 1947; split since 2006 between two rebbes

Hasidic dynasties
Overview

Hasidic dynasties | Haredi and Hasidic groups in the US | Chabad-Lubavitch movement

Dynasties

Belz | Biala | Bobov | Boyan | Breslov | Chabad-Lubavitch | Chernobyl | Dushinsky | Ger | Karlin-Stolin | Lelov | Munkacs | Nadvorna | Pupa | Rachmastrivka | Sadigura | Sanz-Klausenburg | Sassov | Satmar | Shomer Emunim | Skver | Slonim | Spinka | Toldos Aharon | Toldos Avraham Yitzchak | Tosh | Vizhnitz

Founders and early masters

Baal Shem Tov | Dov Ber of Mezeritch | Elimelech of Lizhensk | Shneur Zalman of Liadi | Nachman of Breslov | Moshe Leib of Sassov

Present-day rebbes

Aaron Teitelbaum | Zalman Teitelbaum | Yissachar Dov Rokeach | Yaakov Aryeh Alter | Yisroel Hager | Ben Zion Aryeh Leibish Halberstam | David Twersky | Boruch Meir Yaakov Shochet

20th-century rebbes

Joel Teitelbaum | Aharon Rokeach | Menachem Mendel Schneerson

Politics and communal bodies

Agudat Yisrael | United Torah Judaism | Degel HaTorah | Edah HaChareidis | Neturei Karta | Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations

Places

Uman | Stamford Hill | Williamsburg, Brooklyn | Kiryas Joel, New York | Bnei Brak | Beitar Illit | Modi'in Illit

United Kingdom

Satmar institutions in the UK | Belz Communities | Satmar Kolel

-
Satmar
Founded 1928 Szatmárnémeti (Satu Mare), then in Romania
Founder Joel Teitelbaum (1887–1979)
Leader Rebbes Aaron Teitelbaum (Kiryas Joel)
Zalman Teitelbaum (Williamsburg)
Headquarters Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York, and Kiryas Joel (Town of Palm Tree), Orange County, New York
Type Hasidic dynasty
Languages Notes

Satmar is a Hasidic dynasty founded in 1928 by Joel Teitelbaum (1887–1979) in Szatmárnémeti (Satu Mare), then in Romania. Teitelbaum escaped from Bergen-Belsen on the Kasztner train in 1944, spent two and a half years in Palestine and arrived in the United States in 1947, where he rebuilt the court in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. YIVO describes it as the world's largest Hasidic sect, with about 100,000 followers and branches in Kiryas Joel, Los Angeles, Montreal, Antwerp, London, Buenos Aires and Jerusalem.[1] Since the death of Moshe Teitelbaum in 2006 the court has been divided between his sons Aaron Teitelbaum, based in Kiryas Joel, and Zalman Teitelbaum, based in Williamsburg.[1][2]

Satmar is known for its theological rejection of Zionism and of the State of Israel, set out by Joel Teitelbaum in Va-Yo'el Mosheh (1959–1961).[1][3]

History

Sighet and Satmar

The dynasty descends from Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhely (1759–1841), a disciple of the Seer of Lublin and author of Yismaḥ Mosheh. His great-grandson Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum (1808–1883) became rabbi of Sighet in 1858. Joel Teitelbaum was the youngest son of Hananiah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum of Sighet (1836–1904). His elder brother Chaim Tzvi Teitelbaum (1880–1926) and that brother's son Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum, who died in Auschwitz, were the last Sigheter rebbes in Europe.[1]

Joel Teitelbaum became rabbi of Orsova in 1911 and of Carei in 1926. He was invited to Satmar in 1928, but opposition meant that he could take up the post only in 1934.[1] At the 1922 congress of anti-Zionist rabbis at Csap, organised by Hayyim Elazar Shapira of Munkács, his signature appeared first on the declaration excommunicating the Zionists and Agudat Yisrael.[1]

The sociologist Samuel Heilman gives a fuller account of the dynasty's early history, with some dates that differ from YIVO's. He dates Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhely to 1758–1841 (YIVO: 1759–1841) and says he brought Hasidism from Poland to Hungary and opposed any modernising trend.[4][5] In 1834 Moshe tried to install his son Elazar Nissan (1786–1856) as rabbi of Sighet, but the town refused to accept him. Moshe's grandson Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum, known as the Yetev Lev, was expelled from posts in Ujhely and Drohobych before establishing himself in Sighet in 1858. There he closed a 50-year-old school and replaced it with his own yeshiva.[5] His son Hananiah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum faced a breakaway community in Sighet and placed it under a ban. Heilman says there are reports that he used thugs against opponents, and that he grew the yeshiva to about 300 students.[6] Lipa's first marriage was childless. With a decree signed by a hundred rabbis he took a second wife, his cousin Chana; their eldest son, Chaim Tzvi Teitelbaum (Heilman: 1879–1926; YIVO: 1880–1926), succeeded him in 1904.[7]

Heilman gives Joel ("Yoelish") Teitelbaum's dates as 1886–1979 (YIVO: 1887–1979). As the younger son he had no place at the Sighet court. At 17 he married his cousin Chavah Horowitz, and he was given a minor post at Muzhijevo.[4][7][8] On the advice of the Belzer Rebbe he settled in Satmar in 1905, without an official post. He became rabbi of Orsova (Orshiva) in 1911, returned to Satmar in October 1914 and stayed until 1922.[9][10] In 1920 Satmar's religious council rejected his application to be its rabbi, and in 1922 he went back to Orsova, where he enlarged his yeshiva to about 100 students. In 1926 he moved it to Carei (Krole).[11][12] In the same year his brother Chaim Tzvi died. The Sighet court passed not to Joel but to Chaim Tzvi's 14-year-old son Zalman Leib (1912–1944), who later married Joel's daughter Rachel.[12][13] Heilman describes Joel and Hayyim Elazar Shapira of Munkács as ideological allies but political competitors, neither willing to let the other lead the camp.[11]

When Satmar's rabbi died in 1928, Joel won an election by a plurality. Opponents alleged fraud, and a rabbinical court ordered a new vote, which he won more clearly. He received a letter of appointment in October 1928, and a rabbinical court confirmed it in early 1929. His opponents then held a further election in April 1929, which he lost, and his supporters set up a separate congregation.[14] He moved to Satmar only in 1934. There his yeshiva grew to about 350 students, one of the largest in Transylvania, and Satmar gradually eclipsed Sighet.[14][15] Heilman says Joel visited the Holy Land in 1932 hoping to be chosen to lead the Edah HaChareidis. In 1936 King Carol II of Romania greeted him first among the dignitaries at the Satmar railway station.[16] His first wife died in January 1936, and in August 1937 he married Alte Feige Shapiro (1912–2001), daughter of the Częstochowa (Tchenstechover) Rebbe. Neither marriage produced a surviving son. His last surviving daughter, Roysaele, died in 1953.[16][17]

Holocaust and the move to New York

In 1944 Joel Teitelbaum was among those taken from Bergen-Belsen on the Kasztner train. He spent two and a half years in Palestine and arrived in the United States in 1947. He settled in Williamsburg, where he gathered Hungarian survivors around a new court.[1] Some earlier accounts give 1946 for his arrival in Williamsburg; YIVO gives 1947.

Heilman gives a more detailed account. Joel opposed emigration through the Zionists and in 1939 condemned supporters who tried to obtain him a visa for Palestine. In late 1943 he sought certificates himself; by many accounts the Jewish Agency asked him to sign a recognition of the Zionist Organisation's authority, and he refused.[18] In spring 1944 he tried to escape to Romania disguised in a Red Cross ambulance, but was caught at Cluj and placed in the ghetto. He was then added to the Kasztner transport after someone paid what Heilman calls a "huge sum".[18][19] The train left Budapest on 30 June 1944 and reached Bergen-Belsen on 9 July. Teitelbaum crossed into Switzerland in early December 1944, arriving at St Gallen on 21 Kislev, a date Satmar still marks as a day of thanksgiving.[19] He sailed from Italy for Haifa on 19 August 1945. In Jerusalem he started a yeshiva with ten students in Mea Shearim, but had little success there.[20] Heilman says he arrived in the United States by the Jewish New Year of 1946, which differs from YIVO's 1947. He first lived in a borrowed house on President Street in Crown Heights before moving to Williamsburg.[20][21]

According to YIVO, Teitelbaum became president of the Edah HaChareidis of Jerusalem in 1953 while living in Williamsburg.[1] Shaul Magid, writing in Tablet, dates his appointment as titular head (av beit din) of the Edah to a visit to Jerusalem in 1952, and says he remained its honorary president until his death.[3]

Frimet Goldberger, who grew up in the Satmar community, wrote in a 2013 opinion column in The Forward that Joel Teitelbaum was the leading force in modern American Hasidism. She wrote that he transplanted a pre-modern way of life from Szátmár, in the remote Máramaros region of Hungary, to New York. She quoted the scholar Allan Nadler as calling this achievement "nothing short of miraculous", and wrote that Teitelbaum set up satellite communities around the world and influenced Orthodox Jewish life in the United States well beyond Hasidism.[22]

In 1973 Teitelbaum asked for the creation of Rav Tov International Jewish Rescue Organization (Rav Tov), a refugee organisation.[23]

Kiryas Joel

Kiryas Joel, in Orange County, New York, was settled by Satmar Hasidim in the mid-1970s. It became an incorporated village in 1977, with powers over housing permits and zoning. Its population grew from about 2,000 in 1980 to 13,000 in 2000 and 25,000 in 2019. In July 2018 Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the law creating the Town of Palm Tree, an English rendering of "Teitelbaum".[24] The American Community Survey 2023 five-year estimate gives a population of 36,572.[25]

Heilman describes how Joel Teitelbaum built the Williamsburg community. In 1948 he set up a community structure, Yetev Lev, whose regulations were issued in 1952. The first Torah V'Yirah schools opened in 1950–51, followed by Satmar-certified butcher shops in 1955 and summer camps in the Catskills in 1956.[26] He prescribed rules on women's dress, including opaque stockings; in 1978 a Satmar hosiery maker, Lipa Brach, produced the "Palm Stockings" still worn in Satmar. Television was excluded, and the community bought the Yiddish newspaper Der Yid, which became its semi-official organ.[26][27] Heilman cites census figures putting about 65 per cent of Satmar Hasidim below the poverty line.[28] He says Teitelbaum wanted his followers in small towns of their own outside the city. The first families moved to Kiryas Joel near Monroe in late 1974 and 1975, often against local opposition, and the village was incorporated in 1977.[29] Heilman gives Satmar about 95,000 members, with nearly 22,000 people in Kiryas Joel in 2013. In late 2014 the community announced a new settlement, Kiryas Yetev Lev, with 400 apartments in Bloomingburg, Sullivan County.[30]

Succession and split

Joel Teitelbaum was succeeded in 1979 by his nephew Moshe Teitelbaum. YIVO gives his dates as 1915–2006; some sources give his year of birth as 1914.[1] The court then split between Moshe's sons Aaron Teitelbaum in Kiryas Joel and Zalman Teitelbaum in Williamsburg. YIVO records that the dispute involved some violence and that the succession had not been resolved.[1] In 2006 the New York Times reported that Satmar was the largest Hasidic group in the United States and that its New York schools, if counted as a public school system, would be the fourth-largest in the state after those of New York City, Buffalo and Rochester.[31]

Moshe Teitelbaum's succession (1979)

Joel Teitelbaum had a severe stroke in February 1968. Heilman writes that during his ten-year decline his wife Feige and his gabbaim (aides), including Yosef Ashkenazi, Azriel Glick and the yeshiva head Nosson Yosef Meisels, acted for him.[29][32] Heilman credits Feige with founding the Satmar Ladies Auxiliary and Satmar's Bikur Cholim service for Jewish patients in New York hospitals.[32] She opposed the succession of the rebbe's nephew Moshe Teitelbaum, who had urged Joel to divorce her. Heilman says she hoped the community would accept an appointed rabbi rather than a new rebbe.[33][34] Joel Teitelbaum died at Mount Sinai Hospital early on 19 August 1979. Heilman says the New York Times reported 100,000 people at his funeral.[35][36]

Heilman gives Moshe Teitelbaum's dates as 1914–2006. Moshe's first wife and three children were murdered at Auschwitz, and he survived Theresienstadt. In 1945 he returned to Sighet and married another cousin, Pessel Leah (1922–2010). He reached Williamsburg in autumn 1946, after a short stay in Brazil, and became rabbi of the Sighet congregation at 152 Hewes Street. In April 1965 he moved to Borough Park.[36][37] Before 1979 he ran small businesses and oversaw the kashrut certification of the Meal Mart food chain.[36] He flew to the funeral by helicopter and said Kaddish for his uncle. According to Heilman, no will was ever read.[38] A letter purporting to name the young gabbai Shulem Halpert as successor was declared a forgery by the dayan Yecheskel Roth.[39] On 14 September 1979 Moshe was named rabbi of Yetev Lev and guardian of Satmar's assets.[40] A minority, the B'nai Yoel led by Yossel Waldman, broke away, and its opponents called its members "the rebbetzin's Hasidim".[40] Moshe was crowned in Kiryas Joel at the end of the year of mourning, before a reported crowd of more than 20,000.[41][42]

Aaron and Zalman

The day after the coronation Moshe made his eldest son, Aaron Teitelbaum (born 1947), head of the yeshiva in Kiryas Joel. His third son, Zalman Leib (Yekutiel Yehudah, born 1952), took over the Sighet community in Brooklyn.[4][43] Aaron's 1966 marriage to a daughter of the Vizhnitzer Rebbe Moshe Hager had been criticised by Feige's supporters as a match into a "Zionist" family.[37][38] On 10 November 1984 Aaron was installed as rav of Kiryas Joel, the first appointment of a son in Sighet–Satmar during his father's lifetime.[44] Heilman says Aaron's supporters and Feige's came to blows in the following years.[45] Zalman was later moved to lead the small Satmar community in Jerusalem, reportedly at Aaron's urging.[46]

Heilman says that in 1996, after kidney surgery, Moshe reportedly told his sons that Aaron would succeed him. Critics accused Aaron of high-handedness, and in 1999 the succession was reopened.[47] At Passover 1999 Aaron's supporters gathered in Williamsburg to celebrate his appointment as rav tza'ir (deputy rabbi), but Moshe did not attend.[47][48] In June 1999, at the suggestion of the gabbai Moshe Friedman, Moshe installed Zalman as av beit din and yeshiva head of Yetev Lev in Williamsburg. Moshe's letter said Zalman's hand was "like my hand", and Zalman said he had never asked his father for power.[48][46][49] The two camps became known as the "Aaronis" and the "Zalis".[50][51]

Moshe Teitelbaum died on 24 April 2006.[52] Heilman sets out each side's case:[52][53][54][55]

  • Aaron's supporters cited a 1996 verbal will naming Aaron, supported by witnesses but not by any document. They said the later letter was signed after Moshe had developed dementia, when he was over 80, and that the gabbai Moshe Friedman had obtained it.
  • Zalman's supporters published a 2002 letter appointing Zalman, with witnesses to its signing. His brother Lipa said in public that their father had asked him in 1999 to support Zalman.

Der Yid, then partly owned by Friedman, announced Zalman as successor on the day of the death.[53] On the first Sabbath both brothers held separate gatherings in Williamsburg: Zalman in the Yetev Lev hall on Rodney Street, and Aaron in a tent in a school playground. Aaron's supporters later built a synagogue on Hooper Street in 14 days.[55][56] Heilman notes the observation that the brothers' theological differences are "thin as a page in the Talmud".[57]

Rebbes of Sighet and Satmar
Rebbe Dates Seat Notes
Moshe Teitelbaum of Ujhely 1759–1841 Ujhely Disciple of the Seer of Lublin; author of Yismaḥ Mosheh[1]
Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum 1808–1883 Sighet (from 1858) [1]
Hananiah Yom Tov Lipa Teitelbaum 1836–1904 Sighet Father of Joel Teitelbaum[1]
Chaim Tzvi Teitelbaum 1880–1926 Sighet Elder brother of Joel[1]
Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum 1912–1944 Sighet Died in Auschwitz[1]
Joel Teitelbaum 1887–1979 Satmar (from 1934), then Williamsburg (from 1947) Founder of Satmar[1]
Moshe Teitelbaum 1915–2006 (YIVO); 1914–2006 (Heilman) Williamsburg Nephew of Joel[1]
Aaron Teitelbaum born 1947 (Heilman) Kiryas Joel Eldest son of Moshe; rav of Kiryas Joel from 1984; one of two rival successors[1][37][44]
Zalman Teitelbaum born 1952 (Heilman) Williamsburg Third son of Moshe (also known as Yekutiel Yehudah); rav in Williamsburg from 1999; one of two rival successors[1][4][48]

Communities

United States

  • Williamsburg, Brooklyn: the historic centre. ShulMap lists Satmar alongside Pupa, Vien, Klausenburg and Nitra synagogues in the area, including halls on Rodney Street and at Kent Avenue.[58]
  • Kiryas Joel (Town of Palm Tree), Orange County: the seat of Aaron Teitelbaum. In December 2023 the community publication Shtetl reported claims of 24,000 pupils across the two flagship Satmar school systems (12,000 each) and, citing the publication Hayovel, about 8,000 families in Kiryas Joel.[59]

United Kingdom

Stamford Hill in Hackney, north London, is the main British centre. There are also Satmar institutions in Salford and Prestwich, Greater Manchester.[60][61][62]

From 2016 a Hasidic community grew on Canvey Island, Essex, around a former school building bought on 24 March 2016.[63] According to K., the community's founders included Joel Friedman of Interlink and the Pinter Trust. Satmar Hasidim affiliated with Aaron Teitelbaum are the largest group there, but it is a general Hasidic community rather than an exclusively Satmar one.[2]

Between the early 1990s and 2010 Satmar brought an estimated 20 Yemenite Jewish families to Stamford Hill. The Jewish Chronicle reported that problems with integration quickly became apparent.[64]

Schools

Independent schools identified with Satmar
School Address Pupils Proprietor / charity Notes
Beis Rochel d'Satmar Girls' School 51–57 Amhurst Park, London N16 5DL Girls, 2–19 The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust (charity 281371) Income £6,976,785 in the year to 31 December 2024[65]
Beis Rochel D'Satmar School 180 Bethune Road, London N16 5DS Boys, 2–11; 611 pupils Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited (charity 1136378) URN 147296; opened 28 January 2020; headteacher Rabbi Emmanuel Patcas[66][67]
Beis Ruchel D'Satmar London 117 Stamford Hill, London N16 5RS Girls, 2–11; 1,108 pupils Proprietor Abraham Klein; Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited (charity 1125988) URN 137505; opened 14 September 2011; income £3,718,860 in the year to 30 August 2025[68][69]
Talmud Torah Yetev Lev Stamford Hill, London Boys, 7–11; 438 pupils The Department for Education lifted restrictions on admitting new pupils in 2025 after an inspection found the school met the standards checked[70]
Beis Rochel Mcr Salford Girls, primary Ofsted admitted an error in criticising the school for not teaching about LGBT identity and said it would amend its report[71]
Beis Ruchel Girls School Rico House, George Street, Prestwich, Manchester M25 9WS (charity address) Girls Beis Ruchel School Ltd (charity 1074439; company 03561612) Income £1,749,924 in the year to 31 May 2025[62]

Synagogues

Satmar synagogues in the United Kingdom
Name Address Notes
Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev 86 Cazenove Road, London N16 6AB Founded about 1962; member of the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations[60]
Beis Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev 42 Craven Walk, London N16 6BU From about 2003[60]
Beis Hamedrash D'Chasidei Satmar 57 Bethune Road, London N16 5EE From about 2010[60]
Beis Hamedrash Tehillois Yoel 148 Upper Clapton Road, London E5 9BA From about 2011[60]
Beth Hamedrash Kehal Yetev Lev (former) 26 Clapton Common, London E5 From about 1993; JCR-UK notes that it may no longer exist[60]
Beis Hamedrash V'Yoel Moshe (former) 67 Heathland Road, London N16 6PQ From about 2006[60]
Beth Hamedrash Satmar Veyoel Moshe 37 Northumberland Road, Salford Run by KH D'Satmar Ltd (charity 1160643), whose office is at 315–317 Great Clowes Street, Salford M7 2FZ[61]
Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd Salford, Greater Manchester Charity 1115899; income £238,120 in the year to 31 August 2024[72]
Canvey Island Jewish Centre Former Castle View School, Meppel Avenue, Canvey Island SS8 9RZ Bought 24 March 2016; synagogue, hall, grocery, boys' and girls' schools and a junior yeshiva[63]

Charities and trustees

Satmar-linked charities registered in England and Wales
Charity Number Trustees listed by the Charity Commission Other trusteeships shown
The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust 281371 Abraham Schreiber, Jacob Frankel, Victor Langberg Frankel: Vyoel Moshe Charitable Trust, Nextgrant Limited, Friends of Yeshiva Luzern[73]
Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited 1136378 Solomon Berkowitz, Maurice Freund, Aaron Langberg Berkowitz: Yeitev Lev Eretz Israel Ltd, Just Kidding; Freund: Keren Yetev Lev Ltd, Congregation Yetev Lev Dsatmar Antwerp Limited, Yeitev Lev Eretz Israel Ltd, Nextgrant Limited[74]
Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited 1125988 Jacob Kernkraut, Jacob Herzka, Abraham Klein Kernkraut: Alte Feiga Trust, E and E Kernkraut Charities Limited, The Knightland Foundation[75]
Beis Ruchel School Ltd 1074439 Chaim Shimen Lebrecht, Paul Rothschild, Berusch Krausz Rothschild: Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd; Lebrecht: Friends of Toldos Avrohom Yitzchok[76]
Just Kidding 1186598 Solomon Berkowitz (chair), David Schreiber, Feige Krausz Children's services in Hackney and Haringey; registered 26 November 2019; income £131,825[77]

Modesty rules and restrictions

In her 2013 column in The Forward, Frimet Goldberger argued that Satmar had moved steadily towards greater stringency in the decades after Joel Teitelbaum's death in 1979. Her starting point was a photograph of two small girls in the Williamsburg Bulletin, a weekly newsletter for the Satmar community in Williamsburg, in which the girls' faces had been blurred out. She linked the trend to a Yiddish saying, di doyres falen ("the generations are in decline"), which she said was used to justify new restrictions.[22]

Goldberger wrote that Teitelbaum had condemned married women who let their hair grow beneath turbans and wigs, but that most Hasidic women complied only after his death, many out of fear of the consequences. According to her, it had become accepted practice in Satmar to expel children from school if their mothers did not shave their heads. Teitelbaum had also criticised the thin stockings and uncovered wigs worn in the 1960s and 1970s, and she wrote that most Satmar women now wore thick, seamed stockings.[22]

She listed further restrictions, which she said applied especially to Satmar and the smaller Skver group. They included a new rule against the long robes traditionally worn on the Sabbath, and bans on the internet, smartphones and concerts. Strawberries, raspberries and grapes were banned in case they contained insects, and in Kiryas Joel eye make-up applied by make-up artists was also banned.[22]

Goldberger also described Teitelbaum as a pragmatic leader. She wrote that in Hungary he had been a fierce critic of the Bais Yaakov girls' school movement, but that in America he led the creation of the Satmar girls' school and encouraged teaching girls the basics of both Jewish and secular subjects. In her account he also relaxed his position on wigs. She argued that he had never encouraged the blurring of girls' faces, and that his followers had taken his cause much too far.[22]

Opposition to Zionism

Joel Teitelbaum set out his opposition to Zionism in Va-Yo'el Mosheh (1959–1961), which relies on the rabbinic "three oaths", and in ʻAl ha-ge'ulah ve-ʻal ha-temurah (1967), written after the Six-Day War. He also forbade the use of spoken modern Hebrew.[1] Shaul Magid writes that Teitelbaum almost never discusses Zionist thinkers by name, and that he regarded Agudat Yisrael's pragmatic acceptance of Zionism as like the righteous who were misled into serving the golden calf. Magid places him in a longer line of Haredi anti-Zionism that includes Hayyim Elazar Shapira of Munkács, Elchonon Wasserman and the Lubavitcher rebbes Sholom Dovber Schneersohn and Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn. He argues that Abraham Isaac Kook and Teitelbaum "disagree less than we think".[3]

Heilman writes that in Va-Yo'el Mosheh, written in the mid-1950s, Teitelbaum presented Zionism as the sin for which the destruction of European Jewry was the punishment, and accused the Zionists of reserving immigration certificates for their own followers. Heilman also notes that in 1967 Teitelbaum prohibited visiting or praying at the newly captured Western Wall.[20][21] Heilman judges that under Moshe Teitelbaum the campaign against Zionism became more muted. In the later succession dispute, Zalman's supporters questioned whether Aaron was anti-Zionist enough, alleging that he spoke modern Hebrew at home with his Israeli wife.[78][79]

The Jewish Chronicle has stated that Joel Teitelbaum described the PLO and similar organisations as antisemitic murderers.[80]

In July 2014, after the killing of three Israeli teenagers who had been studying at a yeshiva in the occupied West Bank, Aaron Teitelbaum told a class in Kiryas Joel that their parents were to blame: "Who permitted them to go there [to live] among these known murderers?" He attributed it to "the lust called 'Shleimus Haaretz and Zionism'".[81] The International Court of Justice found in 2024 that Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem "have been established and are being maintained in violation of international law".[82]

On Sunday 3 June 2018 Aaron Teitelbaum addressed a Satmar gathering at the Nassau Coliseum on Long Island, speaking in Yiddish. Quoting a Hebrew translation broadcast by the Israeli public broadcaster Kan, The Times of Israel reported that he criticised followers who admired Israel and its army. It also reported that he said Satmar had "no part in Zionism" or "in their wars", and that he rejected any compromise over the Israeli military draft law for yeshiva students. The paper set the speech against an ultimatum by United Torah Judaism and Yaakov Litzman over the draft, after Israel's High Court struck down the exemption in September 2017.[83]

In October 2025 the Central Rabbinical Congress organised a "Cry of the Exile" rally outside the Israeli consulate in New York against the IDF draft of Haredi students. The Times of Israel reported that organisers claimed 100,000 protesters and that the rally answered a call from leading anti-Zionist rabbis, including the rival Satmar rebbes.[84]

Neturei Karta

In 2006 Satmar issued a public notice against seven Neturei Karta members who attended Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's Holocaust-denial conference in Tehran, calling on the public to dissociate themselves from the seven, whom it accused of walking "hand in hand" with Arabs.[85]

In November 2023 Zalman Teitelbaum condemned Neturei Karta demonstrations in New York in support of Hamas as a "terrible desecration" of God's name. The Jewish Press noted that Satmar, unlike Neturei Karta, keeps ties with pro-Zionist Haredi communities.[86]

Relations with Chabad

Jewish Currents contrasts Menachem Mendel Schneerson of Chabad, who built an "army" of emissaries to bring non-Hasidic Jews into the fold, with Joel Teitelbaum, who encouraged his followers to separate themselves from other Jews, whom they largely saw as heretics.[87]

In 1977 the New York Times reported a feud between Satmar and Lubavitch Hasidim in Brooklyn. A candy store was burned, a caravan was stoned, Israeli flags were burned and a rabbi was hung in effigy. The paper said the main ideological dispute was Lubavitch support for the Entebbe raid, and that a fistfight in April had started when Lubavitchers marched into the Satmar neighbourhood for a religious holiday.[88]

Heilman writes that Joel Teitelbaum's approach was the opposite of outreach and that his Hasidim often fought with the Lubavitchers. He also describes a later clash in which Satmar accused Schneerson's followers of trying to win over its members, and says Moshe Teitelbaum fended off Lubavitch.[89][78]

Frimet Goldberger, writing in The Forward as someone raised in Satmar, argued that Chabad was not part of the radicalisation she saw in Satmar and other Hasidic groups. In her view, presenting Lubavitchers as the typical face of Hasidism, in America and worldwide, seriously misrepresents Hasidism. She wrote that many other Hasidic groups shun Chabad as a separate, modernised body, comparable to Modern Orthodoxy, whose religious stringencies are far more lenient than their own. She also said Chabad's skill with the media and its ease with secular society reflect a worldliness that most Hasidim, being insular, lack.[22]

Politics

Williamsburg Satmar's civic arm is the United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg (UJO). Rabbi David Niederman has been its executive director since 1989. Before that he was executive vice-president of Rav Tov from its founding in 1973. UJO reported 93,131 walk-in clients in 2024.[23][90] In November 2025 Mishpacha described Rabbi Moishe Indig, founder and leader of the Williamsburg Jewish Community Council, as a political "kingmaker" and questioned him about his endorsement of Zohran Mamdani.[91]

In 2022 the Kiryas Joel Satmar faction and the Skver community in New Square endorsed Governor Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, against the Republican Lee Zeldin. Skver also backed Sean Patrick Maloney.[92][93] The Forward reported that the Williamsburg Satmar faction, called the Zalis, did not endorse anyone in the race for governor, and that the Skver community had about 3,000 votes.[94] Jewish Insider also put the New Square bloc at about 3,000 votes in 2024.[95]

In 2025 Andrew Cuomo's mayoral campaign announced the endorsement of the main Satmar community in Williamsburg, led politically by David Niederman, with a coalition of congregations including Pupa, Viznitz, Vien, Tzelim, Nitra, Krasna, Skver and Klausenburg. The campaign said Satmar Ahronim and the Bobov community had already endorsed Cuomo, and described the group as the largest Orthodox voting bloc in the city.[96]

On 3 September 2026 both Satmar rebbes, the Bobov rebbe, the Vizhnitz rebbe of Monsey and a son of the Skver rebbe David Twersky met President Donald Trump and Vice-President JD Vance at the White House. Jewish Insider reported that housing, prison reform and family tax credits were discussed; The Yeshiva World also reported discussion of the Israeli draft.[97][98]

Heilman describes Joel Teitelbaum as a power broker whom politicians, including the New York mayor John Lindsay, visited.[99][26] By late October 1979 Moshe Teitelbaum was signing directives on how Satmar Hasidim should vote in a state assembly primary.[44] In July 1984 Satmar Hasidim were officially designated a "disadvantaged minority", which made them eligible for public economic and welfare benefits. Heilman says Satmar yeshiva budgets later exceeded $20 million a year.[100]

Controversies

Civil cases

Heilman writes that the B'nai Yoel dispute after 1979 produced a stream of lawsuits in New York state courts, because neither side would accept the other's rabbinical judges.[45][100] The dispute between Aaron and Zalman also went to the New York courts. It covered the Kiryas Joel cemetery where Joel Teitelbaum is buried, as well as study halls, schools, ritual baths, camps and matzah bakeries, assets Heilman values at about $500 million. Both factions held separate elections for the board of Congregation Yetev Lev D'Satmar in Williamsburg.[51] Heilman says the judges treated the core issue as ecclesiastical and left it to the congregation to decide.[101] In Moshe Teitelbaum's last years one faction asked a court to declare him incapacitated and to appoint co-guardians. Heilman says Zalman and the gabbaim fought this.[101]

Allegations

Heilman reports a number of allegations of violence connected with the succession disputes:

  • After 1984, he says, supporters of Aaron and of Feige Teitelbaum came to blows, and the B'nai Yoel dispute involved mass protests, violence and attacks on property.[45][100]
  • At the September 2000 bar mitzvah of Aaron's grandson in Williamsburg, fighting broke out after a gabbai who supported Zalman did not call the boy to the Torah. Heilman says Aaron's supporters responded with physical and verbal violence.[50]
  • Heilman quotes a press report that, after the Zalis had repelled an earlier attempt, the Aaronis entered the Williamsburg synagogue with nightclub bouncers who struck several men.[56]

None of these accounts records a conviction.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 1.16 1.17 1.18 1.19 1.20 Allan Nadler, Satmar Hasidic Dynasty YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe, accessed 26 October 2026.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 K., Postcard from Canvey Island K. la revue, accessed 27 October 2026.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Shaul Magid, The Satmar Are Anti-Zionist. Should We Care? Tablet, 21 May 2020 (archived 5 November 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 153.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 154.
  6. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 155.
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 156.
  8. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 157.
  9. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 158.
  10. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 159.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 160.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 161.
  13. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 162.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 163.
  15. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 164.
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 165.
  17. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 166.
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 168.
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 169.
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 20.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 170.
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 171.
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 22.2 22.3 22.4 22.5 Frimet Goldberger, Blurring Out Satmar History The Forward (opinion), 2 August 2013, accessed 27 October 2026.
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg, Executive Director unitedjewish.org, accessed 27 October 2026.
  24. ↑ Glenn C. Altschuler, Satmar's micro-society: Kiryas Joel is a mirror of the American people Jerusalem Post, 27 January 2022, accessed 27 October 2026.
  25. ↑ Census Reporter, Kiryas Joel, NY censusreporter.org (archived 7 December 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.
  26. ↑ 26.0 26.1 26.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 175.
  27. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 176.
  28. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 172.
  29. ↑ 29.0 29.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 177.
  30. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 152.
  31. ↑ The New York Times, Report on the death of Moshe Teitelbaum The New York Times, 25 April 2006 (archived 2 November 2015), accessed 27 October 2026.
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 178.
  33. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 179.
  34. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 180.
  35. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 181.
  36. ↑ 36.0 36.1 36.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 182.
  37. ↑ 37.0 37.1 37.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 183.
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 184.
  39. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 185.
  40. ↑ 40.0 40.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 186.
  41. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 187.
  42. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 189.
  43. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 190.
  44. ↑ 44.0 44.1 44.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 191.
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 45.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 192.
  46. ↑ 46.0 46.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 197.
  47. ↑ 47.0 47.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 195.
  48. ↑ 48.0 48.1 48.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 196.
  49. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 198.
  50. ↑ 50.0 50.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 199.
  51. ↑ 51.0 51.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 201.
  52. ↑ 52.0 52.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 203.
  53. ↑ 53.0 53.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 204.
  54. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 205.
  55. ↑ 55.0 55.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 206.
  56. ↑ 56.0 56.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 207.
  57. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 209.
  58. ↑ ShulMap, Williamsburg Shuls shulmap.com, accessed 27 October 2026.
  59. ↑ Shtetl, Satmar community touts 24,000 students in flagship school systems Shtetl, 12 December 2023 (archived 11 April 2026), accessed 27 October 2026.
  60. ↑ 60.0 60.1 60.2 60.3 60.4 60.5 60.6 JCR-UK, Satmar synagogues, Stamford Hill JewishGen, accessed 27 October 2026.
  61. ↑ 61.0 61.1 Charity Commission, KH D'Satmar Ltd, charity 1160643 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  62. ↑ 62.0 62.1 Charity Commission, Beis Ruchel School Ltd, charity 1074439 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  63. ↑ 63.0 63.1 JCR-UK, Canvey Island Jewish Community JewishGen, accessed 27 October 2026.
  64. ↑ Ben Weich, Satmar Chasidim: Was the project to settle Yemenite families in Stamford Hill a 'failed experiment'? The Jewish Chronicle, 3 October 2019, accessed 27 October 2026.
  65. ↑ Charity Commission, The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust, charity 281371 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  66. ↑ Department for Education, Beis Rochel D'Satmar School, URN 147296 Get Information about Schools, accessed 27 October 2026.
  67. ↑ Charity Commission, Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited, charity 1136378 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  68. ↑ Department for Education, Beis Ruchel D'Satmar London, URN 137505 Get Information about Schools, accessed 27 October 2026.
  69. ↑ Charity Commission, Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited, charity 1125988 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  70. ↑ Simon Rocker, DfE lifts sanctions against Chasidic school in Stamford Hill The Jewish Chronicle, 2025, accessed 27 October 2026.
  71. ↑ The Jewish Chronicle, Ofsted admits error in criticising Charedi school for not teaching about same-sex parents The Jewish Chronicle, 17 May 2026, accessed 27 October 2026.
  72. ↑ Charity Commission, Cong Yetev Lev D'Satmar M/C Ltd, charity 1115899 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  73. ↑ Charity Commission, The Bais Rochel Dsatmar Charitable Trust: trustees Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  74. ↑ Charity Commission, Talmud Torah Torah Veyirah D'Satmar London Limited: trustees Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  75. ↑ Charity Commission, Beis Ruchel D'Satmar (London) Limited: trustees Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  76. ↑ Charity Commission, Beis Ruchel School Ltd: trustees Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  77. ↑ Charity Commission, Just Kidding, charity 1186598 Register of Charities, accessed 27 October 2026.
  78. ↑ 78.0 78.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 194.
  79. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 200.
  80. ↑ The Jewish Chronicle, Time to stop the Shraga Stern farce The Jewish Chronicle, accessed 27 October 2026.
  81. ↑ The Yeshiva World, Satmar Rebbe of Kiryas Yoel: It's Their Fault for Living in the Territories! The Yeshiva World, 3 July 2014, accessed 27 October 2026.
  82. ↑ International Court of Justice, Summary of the Advisory Opinion of 19 July 2024 icj-cij.org, 19 July 2024, accessed 26 October 2026.
  83. ↑ TOI Staff, Head of Satmar Hasidic sect castigates followers for admiring Israel, IDF The Times of Israel, 9 June 2018, accessed 27 October 2026.
  84. ↑ Times of Israel, Central Rabbinical Congress (topic page; item dated 20 October 2025) Times of Israel (archived 23 October 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.
  85. ↑ Ynet, Satmar court slams Neturei Karta Ynetnews, 15 December 2006, accessed 27 October 2026.
  86. ↑ The Jewish Press, Satmar Rebbe condemns Neturei Karta for supporting Hamas murders The Jewish Press, 13 November 2023 (archived 15 November 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.
  87. ↑ Jewish Currents, The Making of Satmar Williamsburg Jewish Currents, 8 May 2026, accessed 27 October 2026.
  88. ↑ The New York Times, Hasidim in Brooklyn Feuding Over Israel and Neighborhood Sanctity The New York Times, 1 June 1977 (archived 3 January 2022), accessed 27 October 2026.
  89. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 173.
  90. ↑ United Jewish Organizations of Williamsburg, Home page unitedjewish.org, accessed 27 October 2026.
  91. ↑ Yitzchok Landa, The Kingmaker from Williamsburg Mishpacha, 26 November 2025, accessed 27 October 2026.
  92. ↑ The Yeshiva World, Outliers: Skver Joins Satmar in Endorsing Hochul, Also Backs Maloney The Yeshiva World, accessed 27 October 2026.
  93. ↑ VIN News, After stunning victory, Republicans work to build relationship with New Square's leaders VIN News, 15 November 2022, accessed 27 October 2026.
  94. ↑ Jacob Kornbluh, In close race, Hochul walks a fine line on yeshiva education The Forward, 2 November 2022 (archived 16 May 2026), accessed 27 October 2026.
  95. ↑ Matthew Kassel, The high-stakes battle for the Skver vote Jewish Insider, 29 October 2024, accessed 27 October 2026.
  96. ↑ Andrew Cuomo for Mayor, Cuomo receives major endorsement from Satmar Williamsburg andrewcuomo.com, June 2025 (archived 8 December 2025), accessed 27 October 2026.
  97. ↑ Matthew Kassel, Trump and Hasidic rabbis discuss housing, prison reform and family tax credits Jewish Insider, 3 September 2026, accessed 27 October 2026.
  98. ↑ The Yeshiva World, Historic White House Visit: Inside Rebbes' Extraordinary Meetings With Trump And Vance The Yeshiva World, 4 September 2026, accessed 27 October 2026.
  99. ↑ Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 174.
  100. ↑ 100.0 100.1 100.2 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 193.
  101. ↑ 101.0 101.1 Samuel C. Heilman, "Satmar: Succession Charged with Conflict" in Who Will Lead Us? The Story of Five Hasidic Dynasties in America, Oakland: University of California Press, 2017, ISBN 9780520277236, p. 202.
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