By COLlive in Israel
Kfar Chabad magazine, the oldest publication in Lubavitch, won’t be printed this week due to financial difficulties and changing ownership.
The Hebrew weekly, established 27 years ago in the Israeli village of Kfar Chabad, is considering returning to its previous status as a public-held paper published by Agudas Chassidei Chabad, the Israeli umbrella organization, as the Rebbe instructed in 1990.
Kfar Chabad’s latest edition, published for Sukkos, arrived at many subscribers’ homes only for Simchas Torah. The late arrival was due to the printing plant’s refusal to print until the magazine’s debts were paid. Local businessman Zalman Stambler donated the printing of the current issue.
COLlive sources claim R’ Binyomin Zilbershtrum, a Lubavitcher from Rishon L’Tzion and the magazine’s administrator 10 years ago, is in negotiations to take over a second time.
While Chabad-Lubavitch in Israel and around the globe has grown in the past decades, even after 3 Tammuz 5754, the magazine has suffered from low readership and has been in heavy debt for some time. Insiders attribute it to bad management and heavy competition from haredi dailies and weeklies, a Chabad messianic weekly and the ever-growing Chabad news websites.
Its founder, owner and editor, Rabbi Aharon Dov Halperin, depended on fundraising for its survival.
Halperin was quoted today as saying the deal is not done yet and “regardless, the management will stay the same.”
Its a shame if we lose this magaizine, it is a lubavitch institution.