Lubovitcher Rebbe and Jewish Taqiya (تقية)

Amazing behind the scenes look at the crazies running Israel from The Vineyard of the Saker examines the Jewish fundamentalism captured in the videoclip The First Thing When Moshiach Comes:

Even though the Saker is wrong to conclude that crazies like the deceased Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson are running Israel (see Chabad, Jewish Political Elites), the video and the article do highlight some important facets of Jewish and Zionist behavior.

• Because Lubavitchers and Hassidim in general consider money touched by a Rebbe to be something special, the video focuses on the passing of money from this Rebbe to his followers.
• Despite the claims of messianic Lubavitchers, who believe that Schneerson is the Jewish Messiah, he seems to be more or less denying himself any messianic status in his conversation with Rav Gershon Salamon.
• To my ears Schneerson seems rather uncomfortable in Modern Israeli Hebrew (certainly in comparison with Salamon) and at a few points on the clip seems to be on the verge of stammering.
• The Rebbe makes a conscious effort to avoid Zionist terminology by using eretz Yisrael (the land of Israel) instead of medinat Yisrael (the State of Israel) and by using am yisrael (people of Israel) instead of haam hayehudi (the Jewish people).
• The Rebbe seems to be referring to a discussion in which he participated along with Yitzchak Shamir and other Israeli government official and in which it was agreed that the Israeli negotiators would feign to negotiate with the Arabs in order dishonestly to convince the public and in particular Jews that Israel was engaging in peace talks in good faith.

It is hard to give a better example of practicing taqiya (تقية) or kitman (كتمان), and as a Jewish religious scholar Schneerson would have been aware that the RAMBAM (Maimonides) gives permission to Jews to engage in prudential or precautionary dissimulation under various circumstances.

The Saker provides a pointer to The Hasidic Gentile Campaign: The Rebbe Speaks, which includes a list of the goals of Lubavitcher outreach to non-Jews. One of the important action items is:

Encouraging the abandonment of Christianity: "...according to the known Jewish legal ruling that Christians are idol worshippers. --Likutei Sichos 37:198, from a letter of the Rebbe dated 26 Iyra, 5726, cited in Kol Boi HaOlam, p. 389.

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