Belz (Hasidic dynasty)

Belz is a Hasidic dynasty founded in the town of Belz in Western Ukraine, near the Polish border, historically the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland. The group was founded in the early nineteenth century by Rabbi Shalom Rokeach, also known as the Sar Shalom, and was led by his son, grandson and great-grandson before the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939. Most of the Belz Hasidim were murdered in the Holocaust, but Rabbi Aharon Rokeach escaped Europe and re-established the community in Israel after World War II. As of the 2020s, Belz has sizable communities in Israel, Western Europe and the Anglosphere.