Yosef Yitzchak (Joseph Isaac)[1] Schneersohn (Yiddish: יוסף יצחק שניאורסאהן; 21 June 1880 – 28 January 1950) was an Orthodox rabbi and the sixth Rebbe (spiritual leader) of the Chabad Lubavitch Hasidic movement.

[2] In 1901, with financial support from Yaakov and Eliezer Poliakoff he opened spinning and weaving mills in Dubrovno and Mahilyow and established a yeshiva in Bukhara.

[citation needed] Upon the death of his father, Rabbi Sholom Dovber Schneersohn ("Rashab"), in 1920, Schneerson became the sixth Rebbe of Chabad.

As rebbe of a Russia-based Jewish movement, Schneersohn was vehemently outspoken against the state atheism of the Communist regime and its goal of forcibly eradicating religion throughout the land.

This was also commuted following political pressure from the outside, and in July 1927, he was finally allowed to leave Russia for Riga in Latvia,[4] where he lived until 1929 before traveling to Mandatory Palestine (now Israel).

[6] After his release, Yosef Yitzchak went to Mandatory Palestine where he saw holy gravesites, local yeshivas and Torah centers,[7] and met with rabbis and community leaders from 7–22 August 1929.

[8] He visited Hebron ten days before the massacre and, according to Chabad accounts, was the first Jew for many years to be allowed into the Cave of the Patriarchs.

[9] Following his trip to the Holy Land, he turned his attention to the United States, arriving in Manhattan on 17 September 1929 (12 Elul 5689) on the French passenger liner France.

[12] The purpose of his visit was to assess the educational and religious state of American Jewry, and raise awareness of the plight of Soviet Jews.

[12] Hailed as "one of the greatest Jews of our age,"[13] he was honored at a 28 October banquet in Manhattan by Orthodox, Conservative and Reform Jewish leaders.

The government of the United States of America, which was still neutral, used its diplomatic relations to convince Nazi Germany to rescue Schneersohn from the war zone in German-occupied Poland.

With the intercession of the United States Department of State in Washington, DC and with the lobbying of many Jewish leaders, such as Jacob Rutstein, on behalf of the Rebbe (and, reputedly, also with the help of Admiral Wilhelm Canaris,[24] the head of the Abwehr), he was finally granted diplomatic immunity and given safe passage to go via Berlin to Riga, Latvia, where the Rebbe was a citizen and which was still free.

[27] Major Ernst Bloch [de], a decorated German army officer of Jewish descent, was put in command of a group which included Sgt.

[23] Working with the government and the contacts Schneersohn had with the US State Department, Chabad was able to save his son-in-law (and future successor) Menachem Mendel Schneerson from Vichy France in 1941 before the borders were closed down.

[citation needed] After his successor's passing and burial next to his father-in-law, philanthropist Joseph Gutnick of Melbourne, Australia, established the Ohel Chabad-Lubavitch Center on Francis Lewis Boulevard in Queens, which is located adjacent to the joint grave site.

[citation needed] During his life in Smolensk, Rabbi Schneersohn set up a collection of his family's religious books and writings.

Another part of the collection was confiscated by Soviet troops in Nazi Germany during World War II and moved to Russia's military archive.

In 2014, Senior United States District Judge Royce C. Lamberth imposed fines of $50,000 a day for Russia refusing to return the Schneersohn collection of more than 12,000 books and 50,000 religious papers.

[36] Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak's escape from Poland was the subject of a 2011 Israeli documentary film Ha'rabi Ve'hakatzin Ha'germani (The Chabad Rebbe and the German Officer).