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ALUMNI IN THE NEWS
feel we can claim his as one of our own. He recently returned from serving in Iraq as an
assistant Chaplain in the Air Force. The articles below, recently published in The Forward
and Jewish Veteran Magazine, tells of his unique experience as an Orthodox Jew serving
his country in a combat zone. We thank Mike for his service to our country and for his
"kiddush hasem", sanctification of G-d's name. Mike can be reached at
Mikhail.Ekshtut@adab.centaf.af.mil
Update (June/July 2005): Mike has been re-deployed to the Middle East, his latest article
on his experiences can be found at JEWS IN GREEN.
Orthodox Warrior Keeps Kosher on the Front Lines
By DAVID KLINGHOFFER (The Forward)
Mikhail Ekshtut is a warrior. His mom is a worrier.
So when the Air Force Reserve called Ekshtut up to active duty in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, he had a problem.
One of the relatively few Orthodox Jews in the American military, Technical Sergeant Ekshtut hesitated to commit an
untruth. But he also guessed that his mother would be consumed by anxiety if she knew where her boy was headed. So he
told a little white lie.
"My mom thinks I'm in Turkey," he told the Forward, "so don't tell her otherwise."
Actually, his white lie wasn't exclusively for his mother's sake; the intelligence section at the unit to which Ekshtut is currently
assigned advised him that he cannot disclose which Arab country he is in. "I can't disclose names or places or my mission
details," he explained. He can say, however, that he works with Air Force Special Operations, whose squadrons provided
air cover to the elite troops that grabbed Saddam Hussein out of a hole last month.
Ekshtut, 32, is a chaplain assistant, in which capacity he has served since transferring last year to the Air Force Reserve from
the Marines. His duties include providing security for the chaplains, accompanying them — "armed and dangerous," he said,
with a 9mm pistol — when they venture outside the base.
Ekshtut, a cheerful fellow with a mischievous grin and a certain military swagger, downplays the level of danger. "There have
been only a few incidents around, out in town," he said. "So yeah, there's potential danger, but not immediate danger."
Life on the base is relatively secure, he noted, and sometimes downright lighthearted. When the holiday season rolled
around, for instance, Ekshtut had the chance to share some Chanukah traditions with his unit.
"I got a package from the Aleph Institute, which is a Chabad organization," he said. "They send out these packages with
menorahs, candles, dreidels and little tiny pamphlets for Chanukah. All these goodies, but there's only a couple of Jews to
give them to. So I distributed them to some of the people around here. I even gave a pink one to my commanding officer.
So at the daily briefing, he whips out the dreidel and says: 'Did any of you guys get your dreidel? I've got mine and we're
going to start doing dreidel checks.' So he gives me the floor, and I had to stand up and tell everyone about the basics of
Chanukah."
If there are no Jews around to minister to, it's not a problem. Ekshtut and the chaplain he's assigned to work with, an
Episcopalian, serve soldiers of all faiths and denominations. "By teaching the goyim about Judaism," he said, "I want to be a
Kiddush Hashem" — a sanctification of God's name in the world. But Ekshtut has a special yen to discover fellow Jews in
the military, to "find out where they are in terms of their yidishkayt, invite them to a Shabbes service, light Chanukah candles
or put on tefillin."
That's why he tried to sneak an extra set of tefillin into the undisclosed Arab country. To reach their current location, he and
his chaplain flew on commercial airlines, which, they learned on arrival, lost their luggage. Their bags turned up a couple of
days later, but the captain who met him at the airport reported the bad news: "The customs guys took your religious stuff,"
Ekshtut recalled his captain saying. "They found your four bottles of wine and those black boxes. Oh, and they also took
some little black book. I didn't know what the black boxes were for. I told them they were religious incense holders or
something."
The wine was kosher, to say kiddush over on the Sabbath. The little black prayer book was a military-issue siddur. But the
tefillin were the really precious items.
Ekshtut and the captain returned to the airport, where the latter did the talking. In the end, a customs agent returned
everything but the wine. In a plastic shopping bag marked with Arabic writing, there were the siddur and the tefillin, the latter
in a big mess, all unwrapped like a bundle of black spaghetti but otherwise intact.
"When you're away from home," Ekshtut reflected, "you really learn to value mitzvot, like tefillin, that outside America aren't
always so easy to do."
Though he's sometimes called on to act as if he were a member of the clergy, Ekshtut is a relative newcomer to this way of
life. He was born in the Ukraine and immigrated to America with his family when he was 6 years old. Settling in Seattle, the
Ekshtuts occasionally attended a local Chabad, mainly for the free vodka, and cared enough about being Jewish to let
Mikhail — who goes by "Mike" — be circumcised at his own initiative at the advanced age of 11. Otherwise, he knew little
about his ancestral religion, although he retained a definite sentimental attachment to it.
In the first Gulf War, in 1991, he saw combat in Kuwait as a Marine artillery meteorologist. He lit Chanukah candles aboard
a military vessel in the Persian Gulf while oil fields burned on shore. But in the years following the war, he became more
observant, keeping kosher and observing the Sabbath. And his growing fascination with Judaism started to come into
conflict with his love affair with the Marine Corps.
Three years ago, Ekshtut was serving in the Marines Reserve while working as a civil engineer in the Seattle area. Reserve
training was held one weekend a month at the nearby Whidbey Island Naval Air Station. That meant one Sabbath out of
four had to be spent in intensive Marine training — not exactly a model of traditional Jewish observance. He had reached a
crisis point in his life: It was either Judaism or the Marines. He chose Judaism.
Giving up his cherished Marine Corps pained him, but then a chance meeting with a rabbi in the Air Force chaplain corps
provided a happy resolution. The rabbi suggested that Ekshtut transfer to the Air Force Reserve as a chaplain assistant,
where observing the Sabbath wouldn't be a problem. He quickly did so.
Even in his current situation, however, being Jewish in the military brings certain challenges. "The difficulties are personal
ones," Ekshtut said. "Keeping Shabbes can be tricky, because in a combat environment people aren't used to someone not
doing any work for a whole day. I'll try not to turn on a light or touch a pen or whatnot. Thank God, I've been able to keep
Shabbes the two weeks I've been here so far."
Getting kosher food is another problem, he said. "They provide me with kosher MREs" — Meals Ready to Eat — "that
taste like preservatives. Apart from that, I have to really watch what I eat. I have canned tuna, and I found some chips and
salsa at the PX. At the chow hall I pretty much only eat salad and eggs. Some stuff might be suspect, like the waffles.
They're Aunt Jemima, imported from the States."
Despite these inconveniences, Ekshtut said he loves serving in the American military. After all, who wouldn't want to defend
a country where the toughest ethical dilemma facing an observant soldier is: The waffles, are they kosher?
Chanukah in the Sandbox
By Mikhail Ekshtut
From THE JEWISH VETERAN-The Official Publication of the Jewish War Veterans of the USA
It would seem like a coincidence that I again find myself in the Arab Middle East at Chanukah time. But as a Jew, I know
that there are no coincidences.
The last time I was here was during the Persian Gulf War. I was in the Marines then. We were on board a Navy ship,
waiting for the ground war to start. I was not observant then, but still a proud Jew, and I knew it was Chanukah time. I
made a crude menorah out of aluminum foil and lit Chanukah candles in the middle of the Persian Gulf.
I am no longer in the Marines. I am now an Air Force Reserve Chaplain Assistant. My job now is to provide religious and
spiritual support to the members of the Air Force and to our entire Armed Forces. I was recently called up to active duty to
support Operation Iraqi Freedom. So now I am back in the “Sandbox,” again at Chanukah time. Now, as a Chaplain’s
Assistant, and an observant Jew, it is my job to seek out the fellow Jews and to provide them with an opportunity for
religious observance. I found a total of five other Jews on our base.
Chanukah had also arrived. Thanks to donations from friends back home, I amassed an ample supply of prayer books,
menorahs, candles, dreidels, kosher cookies, candy, chocolate coins and other goodies to hand out.
The dreidels were most popular with the non-Jews. Everybody wanted one. While passing them out, I had the opportunity
to teach them, and subsequently the whole base, about Chanukah and the meanings behind it…and how to gamble with a
dreidel, of course.
In the course of my networking, and procurement of kosher wine for Shabbat (the local Arab customs officers had
confiscated my supply upon arrival, because alcohol is contraband in Muslim countries), I also found out that a nearby Army
camp had more Jewish soldiers there, and they were throwing a Shabbat/Chanukah party on Friday the 26th, the last night
of the festival. It was no simple matter to arrange the logistics and transportation for this trip, but I have found that when you
try to do God’s will, He matches your effort. We arrived shortly before sunset, just in time to light the menorah and the
Shabbat candles. I could now take off my pistol and welcome the “Shabbos Queen.”
Other Jewish soldiers also started trickling in; most were coming from other camps as well. Eventually, we were even able to
make a minyan. We started the service by kindling the lights. It was quite a sight to see. The Shabbat candles and a dozen
fully lit menorahs all standing on one table and burning bright…in the middle of the Arab Middle East no less!
The Jews that had gathered together that night were a mixed bunch, Army and Air Force, Officers and Enlisted, young and
old, and everybody with a different background. Most of our “congregation” had Reform or Conservative upbringings. One
kid however, was the son of an Orthodox congregational Rabbi.
The Chanukah party was a blast! We had lots of kosher snacks, sodas and Kedem grape juice. The Colonel made potato
latkes for us, and I cut up and passed around a kosher salami that was sent to me.
More presents were handed out and then we started the Vegas style dreidel gambling for Chanukah gelt. The big winner,
Mordechai, an Army Specialist, and former paratrooper, was taking his earnings, a shopping bag full of the chocolate coins,
back to his unit to share with his buddies. Before I left Seattle, I was talking about this war with one of my rabbis. He said to
me that this is a war against evil and the forces of Darkness. The way to combat the forces of Darkness is by bringing light
into the world. “How do you bring light into the world in the middle of a war zone?” I asked. “By continuing to study Torah
and doing as best you can,” he answered, “even in a war zone. That is how you bring light into the world.”
The theme of Chanukah is all about bringing light into the world, and about a miraculous military victory, generated by the
efforts of a small band of devout Jews. So surely, by keeping the Shabbat and observing the mitzvah of lighting the
Chanukah candles, we the small band of American Jewish soldiers, are not only doing our part militarily, but also spiritually,
in this war against the forces of evil and Darkness.
Technical Sergeant Mikhail Ekshtut is currently deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, until March 2004,
to an undisclosed location in the Middle East.
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