Home of Rebbe of Melitz burned down • tefillin burned too

While the Melitzer Rebbe was at the Hakafos - his apartment was burnt: A fire which broke out on the night of Shemini Atzeres in Boro Park , NY, destroyed all the property of the Rebbe of Melitz and four other apartments.

Fire broke out in a two-storey building, on 54th Street between 11th and 12th Avenue, on Shemini Atzeres at 9:30 pm. The cause of the fire was an electrical cable which exploded. The cable passed between the ceiling of the first floor apartment and the floor of the Rebbe.

The Rebbe's son, Rabbi Naftali Horowitz, told what had happened: "We were at the end of hakafos, when suddenly a neighbor arrived and told that smoke is billowing from the windows of the house and that he had ordered the fire department. I rushed home and firefighters were indeed there and managed to break into the house. My mother was not home, since before the outbreak of fire she felt a strange heat inside the house and went down, minutes before the wood floor exploded and caught on fire in the floor and walls. Miraculously no one was hurt."

"After a while in which the firefighters tried to control the fire, it turned out that the fire broke out as a result of the power cord. An hour later we were allowed to go home, but unfortunately we found that everything burnt down, including the Rebbe's Tefillin, many holy books, many valuables which were inherited. My brother, who came with his family to celebrate with us was left destitute. We are left with a shtreimel, a beketshe and tallis of Yom Tov, even the Rebbe's hat was burned."

The son further relates that "neighbors immediately organized, collected food and brought it to the Beis Midrash, where we ate the Seudas Yom Tov. Hassidim volunteered to host us and the other families affected by the fire."
On Motzaei Shabbos, neighborhood activists held an emergency meeting and opened a donations line. The neighborhood hat shop opened its doors and provided new hats for the Rebbe and his sons. An additional store also opened for the Rebbetzin, in order for her to acquire basic clothes which completely burned.

'בחדרי' גם ברשתות החברתיות - הצטרפו!