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For some cadets at West Point, Jewish life is shelter in a storm
JTA.org ^ | 12/04/03 | Peter Ephross

Posted on 12/05/2003 1:35:16 PM PST by veronica

WEST POINT, N.Y., Dec. 4 (JTA) — There’s a joke at the U.S. Military Academy that 50 percent of the first graduating class was Jewish — and that it’s been downhill for Jews ever since.

The joke is true, at least on the face of it: Simon Magruder Levy was indeed half of West Point’s two-person graduating class in 1802, and Jews have made up a much smaller proportion of graduating classes since. But Jewish life appears to be alive and well among the 80 or so Jewish cadets currently enrolled at the hilly campus beside the Hudson River.

“It’s a really close-knit group. They’re my closest friends,” Megan Williams, West Point’s Hillel student representative, says of the other Jewish cadets.

That friendship can be crucial for cadets at West Point, where the roughly 4,000 students who make it through four grueling years receive a free education in exchange for at least five years of post-graduate service in the army.

Some of the Jewish cadets come from military families. Some are descendants of Holocaust survivors who want to give something back to the country that provided a safe haven for their grandparents.

A few admitted they had to overcome parental resistance to enroll. After all, while becoming a U.S. military officer is no shame, it’s not the career most Jewish parents envision for their children.

Jacob Bergman found that out when he informed his Israeli parents of his plans to attend the military academy.

“When I said I was going to West Point, they were like, ‘What?!’ ” Bergman recalls.

But Bergman — recruited as a track athlete and attracted to West Point by the promise of something beyond a normal college experience — persevered.

Now, four years later, Bergman, who was born in Israel but grew up in White Plains, N.Y., is a senior at West Point. He has earned the prestigious appointment of honor captain, the student who sits with the academy’s superintendent and decides what punishment should be meted out to cadets who have violated regulations.

His parents have since come around, he says, and his father now is proud to visit him at the academy.

His father “lives vicariously through me,” Bergman says.

Bergman’s years at West Point haven’t just educated him and taught him leadership and military skills — ranging from fieldwork in weapons training and hand-to-hand combat, to classes in military strategy and ethics — they’ve also made him feel more Jewish.

It started the summer before his first, or plebe, year.

Known as Beast, cadet basic training is “five weeks of all the things you’ve seen in movies: sudden-death haircuts, buckle-shining, wall-jumping, scrambling cadets looking perplexed,” writes David Lipsky, author of “Absolutely American,” a recent book on West Point.

One of Bergman’s older friends told him to ask for permission to participate in prayer services on Friday nights during Beast.

“No matter how scared you are during basic training, tell them you want to go to services on Friday nights,” Bergman remembers his friend saying.

Bergman did and his commanders complied, allowing him and the other Jewish cadets to attend services at the school’s Jewish chapel.

The multimillion-dollar edifice at the top of the campus “was a sanctuary during basic training,” Bergman says.

Dedicated in 1984, the chapel recently hosted the third “Jewish Warrior Weekend” when some 40 students from civilian universities, as well as some from the other service academies, visited West Point to get a taste of cadet life.

The tall white building features a sanctuary that seats several hundred people. The services draw cadets, faculty members and local Jews, including members of the Jewish War Veterans of the United States of America.

The building also has a library, small exhibits and a hallway plaque with the name of every known Jewish cadet graduate, from Levy through Lt. David Bernstein, a 2001 West Point graduate who was killed this fall in Iraq.

The most famous of the Jewish graduates, David “Mickey” Marcus, is known for parachuting into Normandy on D-Day and then helping convert the Haganah into a regular army during Israel’s 1948 War of Independence. He was killed in the 1948 war by friendly fire.

Like Jewish students at other colleges, West Point cadets celebrate the Jewish holidays on campus, and they mark Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Living a completely observant Jewish life at West Point is difficult, cadets admit: There aren’t enough observant students to merit making kosher food available, and the demands of studies and military training make Sabbath observance nearly impossible.

Some Jewish students, like Matt Moosey, say they refrain from eating pork and shellfish.

“People do their best here,” said Moosey, a Sephardi Jew from a military family in Fort Collins, Colo.

The military does its part for soldiers in the field, providing kosher MREs — meals ready to eat — for those who want them.

There’s also a Jewish choir at the academy that is about two-thirds Jewish and performs songs such as “Ani Ma’amin” and “Jerusalem of Gold” alongside old military standards at synagogues and college campuses.

“I’ve been as active in Jewish life here as I was at home,” says Ben Diamond, a plebe who was a member of the Conservative movement’s United Synagogue Youth in his hometown of Houston.

The choir also is a way to introduce soldiers — particularly non-Jewish cadets from small towns with few or no Jews — to Jewish culture.

One Jewish student quoted in Lipsky’s book said other cadets tried to convert him.

“Basically, lot of ’em say Jesus is really the best way to go,” George Rash is quoted as saying.

Changing such sentiment is a matter of education, says Maj. Elizabeth Robbins, who has served as the cadets’ Jewish lay leader while West Point’s Jewish chaplain, Rabbi Carlos Huerta, is deployed in Iraq.

“Almost all of the issues of religious intolerance are based on ignorance, not malice,” Robbins says.

Maj. Huerta, described by students as a dynamo, is credited with galvanizing the West Point Jewish community since he arrived in 2000.

The Jewish cadets are well aware that they, like Huerta, could face dangerous duty in Iraq once they graduate.

While many Jewish college students elsewhere are at the forefront of student antiwar movements, Jewish students here appear universally supportive of the war on terrorism.

That the United States is allied with Israel makes the war personal, Jewish cadets say. But they’re clear about one thing: The United States comes first.

“We might be very proud of Israel, but our first and foremost duty is to the United States of America,” Moosey says.

And they’re as connected to God as to country.

When Bergman goes out in the field, for example, he makes sure he has his essentials, like his weapon and water. But he also carries a Bible and a camouflage yarmulke.

“You believe in religion in a foxhole,” he says.


TOPICS: Extended News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: jewishtroops; usma; usmilitary; westpoint
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1 posted on 12/05/2003 1:35:19 PM PST by veronica
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To: dennisw; SJackson; yonif; Yehuda; Salem; JohnHuang2; Brian Allen; Simcha7; quidnunc; yoe; ...
FYI.
2 posted on 12/05/2003 1:38:39 PM PST by veronica (I just realised I have a perfect part for you in Terminator 2....)
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To: veronica
There are also a few Muslim cadets at West Point.
3 posted on 12/05/2003 1:40:49 PM PST by MineralMan (godless atheist)
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To: veronica
Nice catch; thanks.
4 posted on 12/05/2003 1:42:04 PM PST by First_Salute
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To: veronica
GO ARMY ... BEAT NAVY!!!
5 posted on 12/05/2003 1:52:18 PM PST by Yasotay
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To: veronica
Shalom ..... and HOOOOAAAAAAHHHH!
6 posted on 12/05/2003 1:57:57 PM PST by Uncle Miltie (I used to think they were crazy when they said "Republicrats.")
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To: veronica
What good citizens these cadets will be!
7 posted on 12/05/2003 2:06:41 PM PST by The_Media_never_lie
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To: Yasotay
No No No Go Navy beat Army!!!!! My son was class of 2000!
8 posted on 12/05/2003 2:16:40 PM PST by DocJ69
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To: MineralMan
There are also a few Muslim cadets at West Point.

Thankfully the Jewish cadets outnumber them.

9 posted on 12/05/2003 2:17:56 PM PST by dennisw (G_d is at war with Amalek for all generations)
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To: veronica
bump
10 posted on 12/05/2003 2:29:24 PM PST by yonif ("If I Forget Thee, O Jerusalem, Let My Right Hand Wither" - Psalms 137:5)
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To: xzins
you might like to read this
11 posted on 12/05/2003 2:36:06 PM PST by TrueBeliever9
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To: dennisw
"Thankfully the Jewish cadets outnumber them."

They do. Closest number I could come up with was half a dozen or so Muslims in one class. Point is that West Point does not discriminate on the basis of religion. In that, it reflects our nation's Constitutional blindness to religion.

Since there are only, maybe, 5 million Muslims in the USA, that's a pretty good showing at West Point. Probably fairly proportional.

12 posted on 12/05/2003 2:44:08 PM PST by MineralMan (godless atheist)
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To: MineralMan
The Chaplin spy was a Muslim from West Point...
13 posted on 12/05/2003 3:08:45 PM PST by ItisaReligionofPeace (I'm from the government and I'm here to help.)
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To: veronica
Anybody remember General Creighton Abrams, the guy who ~30 years ago had command of our forces in Viet Nam?
14 posted on 12/05/2003 3:35:19 PM PST by Map Kernow (" 'Hate speech' is just 'speech liberals hate' ")
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To: veronica; All
SHABBAT SHALOM!

May The Living GOD of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (ISRAEL), Bless and Protect ALL of our Precious West Point Cadets, and ALL of our Men and Women wearing The US Uniform.

They Give their ALL so we can enjoy our FREEDOMS.

Please say a PRAYER for them and their Families tonight, and Give Thanks to our Loving GOD for allowing us to LIVE FREE.

Amen ~ and ~ Amen.

15 posted on 12/05/2003 4:27:50 PM PST by Simcha7 ((The Plumb - Line has been Drawn, T'shuvah/Return for The Kingdom of HaShem is at hand!))
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To: veronica
Great story!!!
16 posted on 12/05/2003 4:29:54 PM PST by Hildy
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To: Map Kernow
Anybody remember General Creighton Abrams, the guy who ~30 years ago had command of our forces in Viet Nam?

I don't think Gen. Abrams was Jewish.

17 posted on 12/05/2003 4:31:38 PM PST by Lurking Libertarian (Non sub homine, sed sub Deo et lege)
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To: Map Kernow
I was hazed at West Point by his grandson .... had dinner with one of his Company Commanders (from WWII ...Battle of the Bugle) .... know General Abrams .... no ....but it is a great tank.:)
18 posted on 12/05/2003 5:17:19 PM PST by Yasotay
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To: Simcha7
and Amen
19 posted on 12/05/2003 5:23:17 PM PST by OldFriend (DEMS INHABIT A PARALLEL UNIVERSE)
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To: Lurking Libertarian
I think you are right. Abrams was NOT jewish.
20 posted on 12/05/2003 5:25:43 PM PST by OldFriend (DEMS INHABIT A PARALLEL UNIVERSE)
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