Jews from Iraq voice support for war
- Despite tneir
complex heritage, Iraqi Jews who live
in the United States say there’s little
conflict in their feelings about the
Persian Gulf war.
“There is a very strong feeling of
support for the United States and Is
rael,” said David Sheena, a 46-year
old Jew raised in Baghdad.
“Our feeling toward Iraq is a cul
tural one. There has never been feel
ing for the government or the particu
lar landlord of the time.”
Fred Ezekiel, 61, also a native of
Baghdad, refers to himself as “a
Babylonian Jew” in reference to the
region’s ancient name. While dis
mayed by the bombing of his home
land, he called it justified by the
aggression of Iraqi President Saddam
Hussein.
“I’m proud to bean American and
A
mat we have taken the initiative to
drive him out,” he said.
Salim Mahlab, bom in Kuwait and
raised in Iraq, agreed.
“The war was inevitable,” he said.
‘This man (Saddam) is obsessed. After
Kuwait, what? Syria? Israel? Saudi
Arabia?”
All asked not to be identified by
hometown because of concerns about
terrorism.
Iraqi Jews are among Judaism’s
Sephardic branch, which developed
separately from the Ashkenazim of
central and eastern Europe.
They are credited with developing
some key religious institutions, such
as synagogues and the Babylonian
Talmud — the code of religious and
civil laws.
Mahlab, an officer in the Ameri
can Sephardic Federation, estimated
“II
There is a very strong
feeling of support for
the United States and
Israel.
Sheena
a Jew raised in Baghdad
-tt -
that 4,000 to 5,000 Iraqi-born Jews
live in the New York City area, while
about 100 settled in New England.
Smaller concentrations live in Los
Angeles, San Francisco, Kansas City,
Chicago and elsewhere.
About 1,000 Jews remain in Iraq,
including an estimated 600 in Baghdad.
As far as is known, they have not been
harassed during the current hostili
ties.
“They seem to be left alone and, in
fact, are under the direct protection of
Saddam Hussein himself,” said Nor
man Stillman, author of the just-pub
lished book, “Jews of Arab Lands in
Modern Times.”
That arrangement is less peculiar
than it sounds, said Stillman, a pro
fessor at the State University of New
York at Binghamton.
“There are so few left they don’t
really pose much of a problem,” he
said. In addition, “there is honor among
thieves and the idea of protecting this
small community has appeal for him.”
Historians said Jews have lived in
what is now Iraq for more than 2,500
years. They were carried into exile
there by the Babylonian King
Nebuchadnezzar after he conquered
Jerusalem, and survived invasions by
Greece, the Moslems and the Otto
man empire.
Despite being “politically second
class,” Jews lived relatively peace
fully in Iraq for centuries, Sheena
said. ,
“They were under more enlight
ened rulers than the Jews in Eastern
Europe,” he said.
By 1940, their population had
swelled to nearly 250,000. Those who
lived in Baghdad recall the city on the
Tigris River as a blend of 20th cen
tury commerce and ancient ways.
After 1948 and more stringent laws,
many fled to Israel, the United States
or England, often finding their assets
frozen as they left Iraq. Up to 120,000
departed in 1950 and 1951 alone,
Stillman said._
Recruiters: mixed results since start of war
Military recruiters in Nebraska are
reporting mixed results since the Jan.
16 outbreak of the Persian Gulf war.
TheU.S. Marine Corps Recruiting
Station in Omaha brought in 65 ac
tive-duty and reserve recruits last
month from a four-state area, said
Maj. Nick A. Sottler, commander of
the station. The recruitment goal was
36.
Sottler summed up many recruits’
attitudes this way:
“Doggone it, I want a piece of this
war. Let me go over there and take
care of it.’’
/“u my uiuudis saiu me numoer oi
active duty recruits was down slightly.
Recruiters from the Nebraska National
Guard said their enlistments were
down, especially for the Army Guard.
A recruiter at Offutt Air Force
Base in Bellevue said Air Force re
serve enlistments had increased since
the beginning of Operation Desert
Storm, the U.S.-led effort to drive
Iraq’s occupation forces from Ku
wait.
“Once we went to Desert Storm,
my recruiting went up significantly,”
said Tech Sgt. Dave Oman.
rseorasKa rsavy recruiters reterred
questions to the U.S. Naval Recruit
ing Force in New Orleans. An official
there said that nationally the Navy
was hitting its recruitment goals.
Most recruiters provided few
numbers on enlistments. They said
those who are joining now include
high school seniors, recent high school
graduates, college students and some
former members of the military.
The recruiters said they had not
noticed any decline in interest among
women considering the military.
“We haven’t seen any change in
our demographics as far as the per
centage of women that we would
normally expect to come in,” said
Barbara Sorensen, a spokeswoman
for the U.S. Army Recruiting Com
mand at Fort Sheridan, 111.
Nationally, the Army exceeded its
'recruiting goals by 1,200 from Octo
ber through December, Sorensen said.
“Our recruiting is down somewhat,”
although a number of individual re
cruiting stations are achieving or
exceeding their recruitment goals, said
Bob Vrana a spokesman for the Army
Recruiting Battalion in Omaha.
14 listed as dead
on memorial wall
living to see it
WASHINGTON (AP) - Fourteen
Americans can visit the Vietnam
Veterans Memorial and Find their
names carved in black granite among
those who died in the war.
“It was kind of scary,” said Eu
gene J. Toni, who lost part of both
legs in Vietnam. “It’s like seeing your
name on a gravestone.”
Toni’s name is there because a
government clerk typed a wrong
number into a computer. All 14
computer records have been corrected,
but the names can never be erased
from the polished granite.
“It’s a very sobering thing,” said
former Spec. 4 Andrew J. Hilden,
who found his name in 1987. “But I
guess we have been able to laugh
about it — that we’ve got a walking
dead man around.”
mere arc o»,i n names oi acaa
and missing carved on the V-shaped
wall. The fact that it lists 14 living
Army veterans as dead was buried in
computerized Defense Department
records at the National Archives. Only
three of those errors have been pub
licly acknowledged before — four
years ago.
Four of the 14 were located by The
Associated Press.
Toni’s journey to the wall began
on an October morning in 1970 when
he tripped a land mine on a reconnais
sance patrol for the 101 si Airborne in
mountainous jungle west of Hue.
Twenty years later, the 41-year
old former Army sergeant said: “I
woke up one day and decided I didn’t
want to be a double amputee any
more ... I fell like a prisoner who
wasn’t getting any time off for good
behavior.”
He sought treatment for post-trau
matic stress syndrome and “part of
the treatment was that I went down to
the wall” — just across the Potomac
River from his Virginia home.
Standing under a nearly full moon
on a mild night last March, he flipped
through the paperback directory of
names on Use wall, looking for friends.
He turned to the T’s in a long-shot
search for an uncle he never met.
Instead, he found his own name.
He and his wife, Nancy, walked
down to panel W7, counted to line
121.
“I showed her the name and then
we both looked at each other like we
couldn’t believe it.”
*
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