Chabad evicted from center in Kathmandu amid dispute with landlord

The Chabad House in Kathmandu, Nepal, which hosts thousands of Israeli backpackers every year, said on Sunday it was being forced to relocate abruptly because of growing pressure from its landlord, accusing the landlord of “antisemitism.”

However, people familiar with the issue strongly rejected the charge, telling The Times of Israel that the decision was purely a financial matter. The couple that runs the Chabad, Rabbi Chezky and Chani Lifshitz, had failed to pay rent for as much as several years and owed more than $100,000 in back payments, multiple sources said.

In a Facebook post, Chani Lifshitz said that she and her husband were “told explicitly: Leave. Now,” after months of “another request from the landlord, another demand, another restriction, another decree.”

At first, she wrote, “we were asked to remove all the Hebrew signs — so it wouldn’t be seen that there was a Jewish presence here, so [the landlord] wouldn’t be suspected by Iran of being a spy.”

At the same time, said Lifshitz, the landlord raised the rent repeatedly until it reached a point that was “impossible to meet.” It was becoming clear, she said, that “they don’t want this place to be a home for Jews,” and that their presence was “unnecessary and disruptive.”

The entire experience, she said, came with “a clear feeling of antisemitism, one that could no longer be ignored.”

Rabbi Chezky Lifshitz later told The Times of Israel he never intended to accuse the owner of his building of antisemitism after his organization was evicted last week.

“People didn’t understand the post,” Lifshitz said. “The owner had asked us to take down signs written in Hebrew because he was worried that the building would be targeted by antisemites. The landlord himself is not anti-Israeli.”

Once they were kicked out, Chani said, they packed everything into a large storage space and are now looking for new locations where they can reopen.

Despite being in “a crisis,” Lifshitz wrote, “we are not abandoning the mission. We are here. And we’re staying here in Kathmandu.”

Kathmandu residents disputed the perceived antisemitism claim.

“It is shameful that the family took a financial dispute and blamed it on antisemitism,” said Rina Lamsal, an Israeli expat who has run a travel agency in Nepal for 13 years. “The family that owns the property includes wonderful Jews and Zionists, and doesn’t deserve this. Others would have kicked them out after several months.”

Since they opened the Chabad of Nepal some 25 years ago, the couple and their six kids have hosted countless travelers for Jewish holidays, including more than 2,000 people at what has been called the largest Passover Seder in the world. Their experiences have served as inspiration for the Israeli show “Kathmandu,” which can be seen on Netflix in Israel.

In September, when Nepal was engulfed by deadly protests, the Chabad house provided shelter to hundreds of visiting Israelis and Jews.

Chabad outposts around the world — often a country’s most visible Jewish target — have repeatedly been subjected to antisemitic attacks, including last month in Sydney, Australia, when 15 people were gunned down at a Chabad Hanukkah celebration.