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Tens of thousands of Hasidic Jews flood tiny Hungarian town for ‘miracle rabbi’ pilgrimage
(JTA) — As many as 50,000 Jews traveled to a Hungarian town for the anniversary of a noted rabbi’s death this week, marking significant growth for the annual pilgrimage and generating what the town’s mayor called “culture shock” for non-Jewish locals.
Since the fall of communism in 1989, Jewish pilgrims have been visiting Bodrogkeresztur, known as Kerestir in Yiddish, in April, timed to the death of Rabbi Yeshaya Steiner, a Hasidic rabbi known as Reb Shayele whom some believe had special powers. The number of pilgrims has swelled in recent years, thanks in part to efforts by the rabbi’s descendants to elevate his profile.
The estimated 50,000 visitors this year — other estimates placed the number lower, but still in the tens of thousands — would be over 60 times the number of the town’s year-round population. It also would likely set a new record for a Jewish pilgrimage in Europe, outpacing even the famed gatherings in Uman, Ukraine, at the grave of Rabbi Nachman of Breslov.
“It’s all a bit surreal,” Istvan Rozgonyi, mayor of the town in northeast Hungary, told Agence France-Presse this week. “Christians and Jews co-existed peacefully here for centuries, but the sudden influx in the last decade of so many foreign Jews has been a culture shock for some locals.”
(Barnabas Horvath)
In fact, Kerestir has not had a significant Jewish population since 1944, when the town’s Jews were murdered in the Holocaust. Some of Reb Shayale’s family members were among them, though the rabbi himself died in 1925 and others in his family, including a brother and some of his children, had previously made their way to the United States, where his brother’s Staten Island grave is a pilgrimage site of its own.
Reb Shayele is considered in some Hasidic circles to be a “miracle rabbi” who had supernatural powers of healing. He also famously advised a follower about how to rid his granary of mice, leading to the practice of affixing a picture of the “Mouser Rabbi” in one’s home to keep mice away.
“People call me every day to ask if I have the power from my grandfather,” Israel Grosz, the rabbi’s grandson and oldest living relative, told AFP.
Grosz lives in the United States. He believes, as many of the pilgrims do, that access to Reb Shayele’s powers is strongest at his grave. Many of the Jewish pilgrims to Kerestir, mostly but not exclusively men who gather in the town a few days before the anniversary of his death, go to the grave to ask for help with personal issues or for blessings. They visit his former house and the local Jewish cemetery where he is buried.
In recent decades, family members have worked to build up a Jewish infrastructure in Kerestir. They purchased the family’s home and erected a permanent tent over Reb Shayele’s grave, then bought the building next door to serve as a guesthouse. During the pilgrimage season, they add more tents to accommodate visitors to the grave and run shuttles to and from the airport in Budapest. Dozens of buildings in the town of about 1,100 have been purchased by people affiliated with the pilgrimage.
United Hatzalah, a Jewish emergency service based in Israel, sent a delegation to Kerestir. It treated well over 100 people this week, mostly for minor injuries and illnesses, it said in a press release.
The influx briefly changes the town — police had to close it off for three days so fleets of buses full of Jewish pilgrims from across the globe could proceed through its narrow streets — and has induced tensions among locals who are divided on whether the pilgrimage is good for Bodrogkeresztur.
“They should go back to where they came from. I do not care that they used to live here,” one woman told the Christian Science Monitor in early 2020, arguing that Jews were driving up housing costs by buying buildings to serve as guesthouses. Another villager disagreed, telling the outlet, “They have the right to be here as their ancestors were unjustly taken away and killed in 1944.”
Orthodox Jews make other yearly pilgrimages to the burial sites of prominent rabbis across Europe, including in Turkey and elsewhere in Hungary. The most prominent of the pilgrimage sites is Uman, where the Rosh Hashanah event is known as a raucous affair. It took place last year despite the dangers of the Russia-Ukraine war and against the wishes of authorities, with a lower-than-usual number of visitors.
The highest estimate for Uman attendance was 40,000, in 2018. This week’s Kerestir pilgrimage could have topped that, according to its organizers.
“We are proud that more people than ever came to Hungary this year to commemorate my grandfather’s memory and his influential teachings,” Menachem Mendel Rubin, who organized the event from his home in the United States, said in a press release. He thanked local police and the Hungarian government for their support.
As large as this year’s pilgrimage was, it’s unlikely to be the largest: Organizers expect record crowds in two years, for the 100th anniversary of Reb Shayele’s death.
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Israel Publishes Draft Law Seeking to Boost State Revenues From Dead Sea Minerals
A drone picture shows part of the Dead Sea and its shore near Ein Gedi, Israel, Feb. 7, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ilan Rosenberg
Israel on Wednesday published a draft law that aims to boost state revenues from a concession for extracting minerals from the Dead Sea as well as tackling its environmental consequences.
The Finance Ministry said the proposed law intends to redefine the concession to ensure the public and the state get their rightful share, while ensuring the preservation of nature and environmental values.
“The law serves as the basis for allocating the concession and the terms of the future tender for resource extraction from the Dead Sea, with an emphasis on promoting optimal competition, lowering entry barriers, and attracting leading international players,” it said.
Fertilizer maker ICL Group has held the concession, giving it exclusive rights to minerals from the Dead Sea site, for five decades, but its permit is set to expire in 2030.
Last month, ICL gave up right of first refusal for its Dead Sea concession under a government plan to open it up for tender, although it would receive some $3 billion if it loses the permit when it expires.
ICL, one of the world’s largest potash producers, has previously said its Dead Sea assets were worth $6 billion. ICL extracts mainly potash and magnesium from the concession.
Under the draft law, which still needs preliminary approval from lawmakers, the state‘s share of concession profits would ultimately rise to an average of 50% from 35% currently, partly through royalties, the ministry said.
The law also aims to tackle negative impacts of resource extraction activities in the Dead Sea, which continues to shrink.
ICL plans to participate in the future tender and has said it believes it is the most suitable candidate to operate the future concession.
Accountant General Yali Rothenberg said the law places emphasis on fair, efficient, and responsible use of one of Israel’s most important natural resources.
It “will ensure that the state maximizes economic value for the public, promotes optimal competition, and protects the unique environment of the Dead Sea region for future generations,” he said.
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Israel Says It Received Body From Hamas, Indicates Rafah Crossing to Open Soon to Let Gazans Cross Into Egypt
People hold images of dead hostages Ran Gvili and Sudthisak Rinthalak, whose bodies haven’t been returned yet, as Israelis attend a rally calling for the immediate return of the remains of all hostages held in Gaza, more than two years after the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, at the Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, Israel, Nov. 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Nir Elias
Israel received a body that the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas said was one of the last two deceased hostages in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, as Israel said it would allow Gaza’s gateway to Egypt to open once all hostages were returned.
A body has been transferred by the Red Cross to the Israeli military and will undergo forensic identification, a statement from the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office said.
Hamas also handed over remains on Tuesday, which Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office later said were not of any hostage.
The handover of the last hostages’ bodies in Gaza would complete a key condition of the initial part of US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the two-year Gaza war, which also provides for the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt to open in both directions.
Israel has kept the crossing shut since the ceasefire came into effect in October, saying that Hamas must abide by the agreement to return all hostages still in Gaza, living and deceased.
“The crossing will be opened both ways when all of our hostages have been returned,” Israeli government spokesperson Shosh Bedrosian told reporters.
Since the fragile truce started, Hamas has returned all 20 living hostages and 26 bodies in exchange for around 2,000 Palestinian detainees and convicted prisoners, but two more deceased captives – an Israeli police officer and a Thai agricultural worker – are still in Gaza.
ISRAEL SAYS PREVIOUS ‘FINDINGS’ NOT LINKED TO HOSTAGES
The armed wing of the Hamas-allied Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist group, the Al Quds Brigades, said it had found a hostage body after conducting a search in northern Gaza, along with a team from the Red Cross.
Hamas and Islamic Jihad said they had handed over the body to the Red Cross late on Wednesday afternoon. The groups did not say which of the two remaining deceased hostages they believed it to be.
The two are Israeli police officer Ran Gvili and Thai national Sudthisak Rinthalak, both kidnapped during Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel that triggered two years of devastating war in Gaza.
OPENING OF CROSSING COULD ALLOW OUT THOSE NEEDING TREATMENT
COGAT, the Israeli military arm that oversees humanitarian matters, said the Rafah crossing would be opened in the coming days to allow Palestinians to cross into Egypt.
The decision to open the crossing for those seeking to leave Gaza was made in “full coordination” with those that have mediated between Israel and Hamas during the war, Bedrosian said.
Egypt, along with Qatar and the US, has acted as a mediator.
COGAT said it would be opened under the supervision of a European Union mission – a similar mechanism to that employed during a previous Gaza ceasefire agreed in January 2025.
Before the war, the Rafah crossing was a key entry point for aid into the territory, as well as weapons smuggling for Hamas. It has been mostly closed throughout the conflict.
At least 16,500 patients in Gaza require medical care outside of the enclave, according to the United Nations. Some Gazans have managed to leave for medical treatment abroad through Israel.
Violence has tailed off since the Oct. 10 ceasefire but Israel has continued to strike Gaza and conduct demolitions against what it says is Hamas infrastructure. Hamas and Israel have traded blame for violating the US-backed agreement.
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Israel, Lebanon Send Civilian Envoys to Truce Committee for First Direct Talks in Decades
An Israeli citizen looks out from a viewpoint towards Lebanon, near the Israel-Lebanon border, as seen from northern Israel, Nov. 24, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Shir Torem
Israel and Lebanon sent civilian envoys to a military committee monitoring their ceasefire, top officials from both said on Wednesday, in a move set to expand the scope of talks between the long-time foes for the first time.
The meeting was a step toward a months-old US demand that the two countries broaden talks beyond monitoring the 2024 ceasefire, in line with US President Donald Trump’s agenda of peace agreements across the Middle East.
It came even as fears of a renewed flare-up between Israel and powerful Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah persist.
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam told journalists he hoped civilian participation in the meetings would help “defuse tensions,” saying further Israeli strikes in recent weeks had been a clear escalatory signal.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the atmosphere at the meeting was good and that the sides agreed to put forth ideas for economic cooperation.
LEBANON OPEN TO US, FRENCH TROOPS
Lebanon and Israel have been officially enemy states for over 70 years, and Beirut criminalizes contacts with Israeli nationals. Meetings between civilian officials of each side have been extraordinarily rare throughout their fraught history.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has said in recent months, however, that he is open to negotiations to pursue a more robust truce and dispatched Lebanon‘s former ambassador to Washington, Simon Karam, to head his country’s delegation to the truce committee‘s meeting.
Netanyahu’s office said that it had sent the deputy head of foreign policy division at Israel‘s National Security Council to the meeting, as part of what it said was the ongoing dialogue between Israel, Lebanon, and the United States.
The committee, chaired by the United States, met on Wednesday for approximately three hours on the Blue Line, which serves as the frontier between Lebanon and Israel.
A statement issued after the session concluded said attendees welcomed the added envoys as an “important step” toward ensuring the committee is “anchored in lasting civilian as well as military dialogue.”
It said it looked forward to working with the representatives to nurture peace along the long-volatile border.
Israel and Lebanon agreed to a US-brokered ceasefire in 2024 that ended more than a year of fighting between Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah. Since then, they have traded accusations over violations.
Salam said on Wednesday Lebanon was open to the committee taking on a direct verification role to check Israeli claims that Hezbollah is re-arming, and verify the work of the Lebanese army in dismantling the terrorist group’s infrastructure.
Asked by reporters if that meant Beirut was willing to have French and US troops on the ground, Salam said, “Of course.”
ISRAEL DEMANDS HEZBOLLAH DISARM
Netanyahu’s office said that regardless of any economic cooperation, Hezbollah must be disarmed.
Hezbollah’s media office did not immediately respond to questions from Reuters on the talks‘ expansion.
The Iranian-backed, Shi’ite Muslim group has repeatedly rejected any negotiations with Israel as a “trap.”
Despite the ceasefire, Israel has continued air strikes on what it says are Hezbollah’s efforts to rebuild its military capabilities in breach of the truce. Lebanon says Israel‘s bombardment and occupation of hilltop positions in south Lebanon amount to ceasefire breaches.
Fears have been growing in Lebanon that Israel will return to a full-blown military campaign after expressing frustration with the pace of Lebanese authorities’ efforts to seize Hezbollah weaponry across the country.