Tagged Veterans Day

‘Greetings’ and mazel tov — why a nice Jewish boy enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1969

Bob Kovitz during his U.S. Army basic training at Fort Ord in Monterey, California, in 1969. Courtesy Bob Kovitz
November 8, 2019 / Bob Kovitz, Special to the AJP

Fifty years ago, I reported to the U.S. Army induction center in Los Angeles. My father, who was a World War II veteran, later described the experience of driving me to the center as the worst day of his life. Why was a Jewish graduate student from the University… Read more »

From soldier to rabbi, one Afghanistan war veteran takes unusual path
November 7, 2011 / Hillel Kuttler, JTA
Joshua Knobel, shown at Kandahar Airfield in southern Afghanistan in 2007, says he wanted to "help people figure out how to live their lives with purpose and intent." (Joshua Knobel)

BALTIMORE, Md. (JTA) — When West Point’s Jewish chaplain left the academy during Joshua Knobel’s freshman year, Knobel filled in for him, running Jewish prayer services at the military school’s chapel. In the years following his 2001 graduation, Knobel led services more than 6,000 miles east while deployed in… Read more »