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Friday, May 25, 2018 MRFF Information/Contact: (505)-250-7727
INTERFAITH ALLIANCE
JOINS COALITION BACKING MRFF's JEWISH CLIENTS
AT FORT CAMPBELL
"We are privileged to act in coalition with Mikey Weinstein and the Military Religious Freedom Foundation."
—Rabbi Jack Moline,
President, Interfaith Alliance
THIRD UPDATE
Thursday, May 24, 2018
THE FORWARD's LATEST ARTICLE RE: MRFF's JEWISH CLIENTS AT FT. CAMPBELL
"Shabbat Services Resume
At Major U.S. Army Base
After Firing Of Jewish Leader"
By: Aiden Pink | Deputy News Editor | The Forward
Date: May 24, 2018
[...]
"There were services last Shabbat, and we have every expectation that there will be services every Friday night with this new lay leader," said Rabbi Irving Elson, the director of the Jewish Welfare Board, the organization that certifies Jewish worship leaders for the armed forces.
Elson said that there appeared to be a formal gap in Shabbat services between the end of March and May 10, but argued that such a gap, while regrettable, was because the base's chaplains "were not simply rushing around to fill in [the position], they were finding the right person."
[...]
Whether Shabbat services had in fact been occurring prior to this past Friday was a point of contention: The base's website says that Jewish worship is "temporarily suspended," and the base's spokesman told the Forward on Tuesday that he could not answer any questions, including whether services had in fact resumed, due to the ongoing investigation.
Mize's lawyer, Mikey Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, told the Forward that it made no sense for the base not to proclaim that services had resumed, given the negative coverage it had received for firing Mize.
"If they're saying that services are going uninterrupted, our response would be, that is f—-ing b———-," Weinstein said. He pointed out the base spokesman had issued a statement on April 28 that Jewish soldiers could turn to "more than 70 Army chaplains" on the base - but not mentioning a Jewish volunteer leader (none of the base's chaplains are rabbis). The MRFF has filed a Freedom of Information Act request for information on all Jewish services that may have been conducted this year.
[...]
Mize, who is 69 and led services since 1999, claims that the base's top chaplains, who arrived in 2016, were "fundamentalist Christians" who had isolated her from important meetings and refused to distribute publicity materials for Jewish events before firing her, citing the low attendance.
[...]
The JWB is also backing the chaplains under investigation.
"We've got nothing but the greatest support from the chaplains, and particularly the two chaplains that are at the center of this," Elson said.
[...]
Previous Forward Articles
Re: MRFF's Jewish Clients at Ft. Campbell
Additional Background Info:
MRFF's Jewish Clients at Ft. Campbell
Mikey Renames Spineless
Jewish Welfare Board (JWB)
"Jewish WIMPS Board"
Thursday, May 24, 2018
May 24, 2018
The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) has for many years observed the cowardly and non-confrontational behavior of the so-called "Jewish Welfare Board" (JWB) from the perspective of the JWB's alarmingly epic failure to assist Jewish armed service members in matters of brutal, anti-semitic bigotry and pernicious church-state separation battles. The JWB's repulsive actions in totally failing to oppose the bullying levied upon MRFF's Jewish clients at Fort Campbell predictably aided and abetted in the facilitation of anti-Jewish, prejudice-spewing by the religious extremists in the chaplaincy at Fort Campbell. Sadly, JWB's craven failure to stand and fight for the victims of bigotry at Fort Campbell may be tragic but it is hardly surprising.
Indeed, it is MRFF's opinion that the JWB can best be described as spineless, lickspittle, obsequious sycophants obediently yielding to the antisemitic orders of their fundamentalist Christian military chaplain overlords. In the constant, ongoing daily battle against this fundamentalist, Christian religious extremism in the U.S. military, the JWB has simply been dishonorably MIA.
Therefore, "JWB" has ignominiously earned from MRFF the title of "Jewish Wimps Board".
Why MRFF Has A Longstanding
Problem With JWB
By: Chris Rodda,
MRFF Senior Research Director
Correspondence between MRFF's Senior Research Director, Chris Rodda, & Mikey Weinstein
Date: May 24, 2018
I found the article written by Jason Leopold in 2007 about the case of Rabbi Jeffrey Goldman, the Jewish chaplain at Fort Stewart who was subjected to the most blatant and outrageous anti-Semitism imaginable, and how the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council's "help" was basically to tell this Jewish chaplain to just suck it up and do what the Christians want.
As you probably recall, this was the case where the anti-semitic harassment went as far as an evangelical Christian chaplain actually hanging Nazi uniforms and swastikas on the wall of the officers' club so that they would be prominently displayed during an interfaith prayer breakfast that Rabbi Goldman was ordered to attend.
The reason this particular case came to mind now was that it was the first time that I had heard of the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council -- and even more particularly because I remember my complete shock at the mind-bogglingly outrageous statements made by Rabbi David Lapp, the head of the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council at the time, when Rabbi Goldman reached out to the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council for help.
And how did the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council stand up for Jewish chaplains and "help" Chaplain Goldman? By telling him "not to rock the boat" and just go along with what the evangelical Christians wanted!
JWB Jewish Chaplains Council's Rabbi Lapp actually blew off the Nazi display put up by the Christian chaplain by saying: "Lots of people collect Nazi material and swastikas."
So, if anyone wonders why MRFF has a problem with the JWB Jewish Chaplains Council proclaiming themselves to be anything like "protectors" of Jews in the military, just point them to this article:
INTERFAITH ALLIANCE PRES.
RABBI JACK MOLINE'S LETTER
Thursday, May 24, 2018
ADDITIONAL LETTERS
OF SUPPORT
U.S. Republican Congressman Sends Maj. Gen. Poppas Letter in Response to MRFF's Formal Complaint re: Dismissal of
Jewish Lay Leader at Ft. Campbell
(click here to enlarge letter)
U.S. Democratic Congressman Sends Letter to Sec. of Def., James Mattis, On Behalf of MRFF's Client, After MRFF's
Media Exposure of Jewish Lay Leader's
Dismissal at Fort Campbell
(click here to enlarge letter)
Colombus, Ohio Jewish Foundation's CEO Calls MRFF "vanguard of the battle, providing leadership and support for Jewish lay leaders for the Fort Campbell Jewish community" In Letter Sent to Col. Sylvia & Col. Faria
(click here to enlarge letter)
California Council of Churches Impact
Sends Letter To Ft. Campbell Leadership Condemning Dismissal of Jewish Lay Leader (click here to enlarge letter)
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