Just over a century ago, Mark Twain wrote a letter in Harper’s Weekly magazine suggesting that jews had “an unpatriotic disinclination to stand by the flag as a soldier.”
In response to the slanderous attacks by Twain and other would-be revisionists of the day, 63 Jewish Civil War veterans – including six recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor – met in New York City in March 1896, and founded what would later become the Jewish War Veterans of the U.S.A.
As the oldest veterans organization in America turns 100 this month, the Jewish men and women who served in America’s armed forces continue to wave the flag of Jewish pride and American patriotism.
The record shows that nearly one million Jewish soldiers have served in every armed conflict in which the U.S. has been engaged – from the Civil War to the 1991 Persian Gulf War – as well as in peacekeeping operations, most recently in Bosnia.
Still, the veterans say there is as great a need today as ever for Jews to defend themselves against charges that they never served their country.
“There has always been a feeling that Jews buy their way out of everything, that Jews have a dual loyalty, that Jews are only interested in money and not their nation, that they lack patriotism,” said Robert Zweiman, chairman of the JWV Centennial Committee. “We put a lie to it.”
At a national centennial celebration in Washington this month, more than 500 Jewish veterans from across the country gathered to salute the organization, visit members of Congress and walk through the 100th anniversary exhibit at JWV’s National Museum of American Jewish History.
As veterans recalled war stories and looked at old photographs during one gathering, strains of “God Bless America” drifted easily into “Jerusalem of Gold.”
Richard Marowitz, one of more than 500,000 Jews who served in World War II, talked about entering Munich with American liberation forces on April 30, 1945.
As a point scout in an intelligence and reconnaissance platoon, Marowitz was assigned to search Hitler’s home in Munich, where he made a surprising discovery.
“I opened up a closet and I saw something dark on an upper shelf,” recalls Marowitz, now 70. “So I pulled over a chair, climbed up and grabbed this thing. It was a beautiful hat. I looked inside and saw the initials A.H.”
Marowitz recounted the story at the JWV’s museum, standing astride the top hat that belonged to Adolph Hitler, now encased in glass. The hat has been verified as authentic.
“I envisioned his head in it because after seeing Dachau, I was a little bit hot, and I threw it on the floor and jumped on it,” he said. “I wanted to crush his head.”
After keeping the partially crushed hat stored in his basement for 50 years, he loaned it to the museum last year for display.
“The story in the division is that when Hitler found out on the 30th of April that some skinny Jewish kid stomped on his favorite top hat, he committed suicide,” Marowitz said.
JWV has about 100,000 members nationwide affiliated with 424 posts in 34 states and the District of Columbia. Most of the members, veterans of World War II, are in their 70s and 80s.
Aware that it is an aging organization, JWV in 1988 started up a “Descendants of the Jewish War Veterans” division to carry its message through to a younger generation.
Throughout the organization’s history, JWV has supported veterans and Jewish interests on a variety of levels.
“During the past 100 years JWV has stood for a strong national defense and for just recognition and compensation for veterans,” said National Commander Neil Goldman in testimony this month before the Joint Senate-House Veterans’ Affairs Committee.
“The Jewish War Veterans prides itself in being in the forefront among our nation’s civic groups in supporting the well-earned rights of veterans, in promoting American democratic principles, in defending universal Jewish causes and in vigorously opposing bigotry, anti-Semitism, and terrorism – here and abroad.”
The group works in conjunction with other veterans organizations in securing veterans benefits and in providing social services for hospitalized veterans and the homeless.
Ruth Sondak of Surfside, Fla., is one of many JWV members who volunteer time caring for veterans in their community. As JWV Commander for Dade Country, Sondak has helped, among other things, to organize Shabbat dinners, Passover seders and Chanukah parties for Jews at local VA hospitals.
“I joined the Jewish War Veterans 20 years ago a way of giving me something to look forward to when I retired,” said Sondak, 72, who served as an instructor in the army finance training school from 1943 to 1945.
JWV has long played a central role in promoting veterans’ interest in the political realm as well. In 1927, JWV won passage of legislation in Congress requiring that the graves of Jewish soldiers be marked by the Star of David, rather than a cross.
JWV spearheaded a nationwide boycott of German goods during the 1930s; brought out more than 250,000 Jewish veterans to parade in New York City in support of the State of Israel in 1948; and took the lead among veterans groups in calling for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam in 1970.
The organization today remains active in the political fray, sometimes taking positions that run against the grain of opinion in much of the Jewish organizational world.
JWV, for example, recently raised a long voice in the Jewish community opposing the deployment of American ground forces as part of a peacekeeping mission in Bosnia.
“There is no vital national security interest in the former Yugoslavia,” JWV said in a statement last year. “American entrance into this quagmire can lead to a protected engagement involving countless U.S. troops.”
Many in the Jewish organizational world “look at us as an anomaly, who don’t conform, who don’t follow what they may deem to be politically correct thinking,” Zweiman said.
Gen. Mick Kicklighter, who heads the Defense Department’s World War II Commemoration Committee, said he has been proud of his association with JWV.
“They’re very dedicated and committed,” Kicklighter said as he walked through the 100th anniversary exhibit. “They have a great story to tell and they tell it very effectively.
“I think they perform a great service, not only recognizing veterans, but in helping our nation remember our history.”
It is a history which Jewish veterans helped shape with great pride.
To those who would deny them that pride and charge that they never served their country, the veterans simply point to the record, which shows 15 Jewish recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor.
They point to their museum, which chronicles a century of Jewish patriotism.
And they point to the graves in military cemeteries across America that bear the Star David.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
