Historians of religion and true believers often find themselves at odds. Thus Yehoshua Mondshine—devout Chabad Hasid and scrupulous historian—was something very rare, winning the respect both of academic scholars and of members of his own community. Mondshine, who passed away last week, was responsible for publishing, editing, and sometimes discovering important manuscripts, as well as producing a staggering number of scholarly articles, bibliographies, and polemical essays. Eli Rubin writes:

In a 1992 article, the [historian David] Assaf described Mondshine’s special ability to uncompromisingly combine his unambiguously hasidic identity with the rigors of academic scholarship. He wrote that Mondshine “labors on the margins of the professional academy, but he knows well how to use the tools of that world. . . . His writing is characterized by comprehensive and impressive knowledge, originality, provocativeness—and a willingness to battle against what he sees as distortion of Chabad’s image by outsiders.”

Indeed, Mondshine wielded the scholar’s pen with surprising force. His textual knowledge, analytical skills, and perception as a hasidic insider were sometimes complemented by biting sarcasm to undo a thesis he disagreed with. As a Hasid operating in the academic sphere, he was unapologetic and unintimidated. Elements within each of the communities he straddled may have accused him of being under the sway of “external” influences, but Mondshine understood that the tools of critical research would help Hasidim better understand their own tradition.

This week, there have been numerous unconfirmed reports about the fate of Esmail Qaani, who is the head of the Quds Force, the expeditionary arm of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Benny Avni writes:

On Thursday, Sky News Arabic reported that Mr. Qaani was rushed to a hospital after suffering a heart attack. He became [the Quds Force] commander in 2020, after an American drone strike killed his predecessor, Qassem Suleimani. The unit oversees the Islamic Republic’s various Mideast proxies, as well as the exporting of the Iranian revolution to the region and beyond.

The Sky News report attempts to put to rest earlier claims that Mr. Qaani was killed at Beirut. It follows several reports asserting he has been arrested and interrogated at Tehran over suspicion that he, or a top lieutenant, leaked information to Israel. Five days ago, the Arabic-language al-Arabiya network reported that Mr. Qaani “is under surveillance and isolation, following the Israeli assassinations of prominent Iranian leaders.”

Iranians are desperately scrambling to plug possible leaks that gave Israel precise intelligence to conduct pinpoint strikes against Hizballah commanders. . . . “I find it hard to believe that Qaani was compromised,” an Iran watcher at Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies, Beni Sabti, tells the Sun. Perhaps one or more of [Qaani’s] top aides have been recruited by Israel, he says, adding that “psychological warfare” could well be stoking the rumor mill.

If so, prominent Iranians seem to be exacerbating the internal turmoil by alleging that the country’s security apparatus has been infiltrated.