The women’s basketball team at Rochelle Zell Jewish High School in Chicago was practicing earlier this month ahead of its annual Senior Night when an announcement came over the intercom, presenting a special guest. That’s where the video starts — one of those designed-to-go-viral tearjerkers showing a child reuniting with their parent who is in the military.

“He is joining us after leaving the military service in Europe,” the announcer says. Team members start to look around, smiling but confused, when they see that the door to the gym is open.  

“We are grateful for his dedication, especially his daughter Hannah,” the announcer continues. That’s when one athlete, in a long-sleeve practice jersey and a ponytail, begins to cry and run toward the door. “Thank you for your service and sacrifice, and welcome home, U.S. Army Chaplain Rabbi Aaron Melman.” Everyone cheers. Throwing her arms around her father, Hannah sobs.

Melman, a Conservative rabbi who since 2021 has served as a chaplain in the Illinois Army National Guard, had just returned from a U.S. Army base in Western Poland. He submitted his request for leave back in September but didn’t tell his daughter, who was devastated most of all to learn his deployment conflicted with the pinnacle of her high school basketball career. (She was more upset that he would miss that game than her graduation.) When she hugged him, Melman took off his cap and revealed a light brown yarmulke that matched his fatigues.

“We made it happen,” Melman tells his daughter in the video, smiling. Days later, RZJHS won at Senior Night. Hannah scored four points.

For more than two decades after he graduated from the Jewish Theological Seminary in 2002, Melman was a congregational rabbi in the northern suburbs of Chicago. He had thought, early in his career, about joining the military — his father served in the U.S. Army Reserves — but decided against enlisting, recognizing that serving in active duty would be challenging as he raised two young children. 

But later, when his kids were older, the itch to serve returned. Melman was commissioned as an officer in the Illinois Army National Guard, a responsibility that typically required two days of service a month and two weeks each year, until he was sent to Poland earlier this year. That assignment made him one of several Jewish chaplains serving on the front lines of Europe, providing religious support and counseling to American soldiers — most of whom are not Jewish — who are stationed in Germany, Poland and other allied nations largely as a bulwark against Russia. 

Many Jewish chaplains serve in the military only part-time. They fit the training into already-busy schedules leading congregations and providing pastoral care to people in their own communities. 

Several military rabbis told JI that they view their mission as more than counseling the soldiers in their care and helping them deal with the hardships of military service. They explained that it’s also about reminding American Jews — many of whom have parents or grandparents who fought in World War II, Korea or Vietnam — about the value of service. During World War II, the military printed pocket-sized Hebrew bibles for Jewish soldiers. Today, some Jews don’t know anyone serving in the military. 

“Most Jews in America are not connected in any way, shape or form to the United States Armed Forces. The common reaction many of us get, when we go into the armed forces here in the States is, ‘Oh, you don’t want to go into the IDF?’ or, ‘Why didn’t you go into the IDF?’ And for the record, I happen to be a very strong Zionist,” Melman told Jewish Insider in an interview last week. “One of the things for me that I’ve really grown to appreciate is trying to connect the younger generation of American Jews into joining or thinking about joining the military and how important it is.”

Rabbi Aaron Gaber spent nine months at Grafenwoehr, a major American base in Germany, starting last summer. As a member of the Pennsylvania Army National Guard, his unit’s mission was to train Ukrainian soldiers, and Gaber was tasked with training Ukrainian chaplains. He took them to the Memorium Nuremberg Trials, a museum located inside the German courtroom where Nazi leaders were tried for their crimes after World War II. 

“That created a whole conversation about moral integrity and personal courage. How do you say to your commander, ‘Don’t commit atrocities’? Or how do you keep your soldiers who are angry at what’s happening and want to do things that are unethical or immoral from doing that?” Gaber told JI. “That elicited a whole conversation on a theological level about light versus darkness, good versus evil, but also then on a practical level: How do you advise your commander in a way that gives him or her the option not to do something that shouldn’t be done?”

Most of Gaber’s job, when dealing either with Ukrainian troops or American, involved assisting people who were not Jewish. 

“As a rabbi, I got to make sure every week there was a Protestant worship service happening,” said Gaber, who returned from Germany in June (and specified that he did not lead those services).

Last year, he volunteered to spend the High Holidays in Poland and Lithuania. He drove between several different bases to make sure Jewish soldiers had access to religious services, food and learning opportunities tied to the holidays. 

“I take the idea of ohr l’goyim, or bringing light to the world, I was able to bring light to the world. I was able to help Jewish soldiers celebrate their faith. If I met 10 Jewish soldiers through the entire two weeks, that was a lot. So it was individual work,” Gaber said. “In one case, I had one soldier travel, I think, three hours each way to be able to spend an hour with me. He couldn’t go by himself, so he had a noncommissioned officer, one of his squad leaders, go with him. That was the length that the military can and does go to make sure soldiers can access their faith.” 

Ohr l’goyim is a phrase that comes up often for Jewish military chaplains. For Rabbi Laurence Bazer, a retired U.S. Army colonel who is now a vice president at the JCC Association and the Jewish Welfare Board’s Jewish Chaplains Council, those words — from the Book of Isaiah — commanded him to be a light unto the nations. “And that’s not just to our own fellow Jews, but to the rest of the community,” Bazer told JI. 

A friend of his from the North Dakota National Guard once took Bazer, who served in the Massachusetts Army National Guard, to visit North Dakota’s state partner in Ghana. He sat down with a group of Ghanaian soldiers and told them to ask him anything they might want to know about Judaism. 

“Now, these are all Catholic, Protestant and Muslim chaplains from the Ghanaian army,” Bazer recalled. “I said, ‘You could ask me, like, why Jews don’t believe in the New Testament, or Jesus, whatever.’ That’s part of the role that I love doing, of being, again, ohr l’goyim, a light unto the nations, to be able to share the positive, affirming side of Judaism so that they felt enriched. It was all in true fellowship of, we’re all servants of the Divine.” 

Bazer spent his final years in the military in Washington, working full time in an active duty role at the National Guard’s headquarters. He oversaw the religious response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 racial-justice protests and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. 

“I was advising commanders up to four stars at a senior level about what’s going on religiously, which really meant the moral welfare of their troops,” said Bazer, who had served in New York during the 9/11 attacks and later led the chaplaincy response to the Boston Marathon bombings in 2013. “That emotional level affects readiness, and chaplains are the key to help that readiness.” 

In 2023, Bazer was asked to go to Europe to lead Passover services and programming for Jewish troops. He led Passover Seders in Germany and Poland, and then drove between Lithuania and Latvia, delivering matzah and visiting with Jewish soldiers. 

The Seder at Grafenwoehr took place on a large lawn on the base. After he spoke about opening the door for the prophet Elijah, a symbolic act tied to hope that the Messiah will come, a Christian chaplain on base who had attended the Seder pulled Bazer aside. He pointed to a tower that stood next to the lawn.

“He says, ‘You know, Hitler used to go up there and watch,’” Bazer said. The base — now so central to America’s operations in Europe — was once used by the Nazis. “To think that back then he used to watch the Nazis do formation, and now, in 2023 we’re holding a Passover Seder on the same base in the shadow of that tower is an incredible experience.”

LONDON — When he arrived at the Ohrdruf concentration and forced labor camp in Germany in April 1945, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower was appalled by what he saw. 

The first to be liberated by U.S. troops, the camp was strewn with the decomposing remains of hundreds of prisoners murdered by the SS, who had days earlier fled the scene of their crimes. 

Three days later, Eisenhower, the supreme commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in Europe, wrote to U.S. Army Chief of Staff George C. Marshall saying, “The things I saw beggar description. … I made the visit deliberately in order to be in a position to give first hand evidence of these things if ever, in the future, there develops a tendency to charge these allegations merely to ‘propaganda.’”

Eighty years later, Eisenhower’s great-grandson, Merrill Eisenhower, the CEO of People to People International, is carrying the torch for Holocaust remembrance, as he seeks to ensure the world never forgets.

Earlier this year, he joined the March of the Living from Auschwitz to Birkenau in Poland. In a powerful act of remembrance and continuity, he walked alongside Holocaust survivor Eva Clarke, who he now considers a good friend. Last week, the pair were reunited in London to raise awareness and funds for the charity behind the annual march. 

Eisenhower told Jewish Insider in an interview this month he hadn’t heard of the organization before they approached him a year ago. But when he was invited to join this year’s event commemorating the 80th anniversary of VE Day, he didn’t hesitate.

“I said ‘absolutely, I’d be honored to’. It was humbling,” he said, adding that he immediately suggested organizing a fundraiser in Washington beforehand. That was where he first met Clarke, who was born on April 29 inside the gates of Mauthausen, just days before Eisenhower’s forces liberated the camp in Austria. 

“We’ve been friends ever since,” he said of Clarke. “You know how you meet somebody and you just connect — it was one of those things.”

Although he never met his famous great-grandfather, who later became the 34th U.S. president, Eisenhower was close to his maternal grandfather. John Eisenhower served alongside his father in Europe and would later serve him in the White House, too. 

“On June 6, 1944, D-Day, my grandfather John graduated West Point and became aide-de-camp to Gen. Eisenhower, and so he was with him the whole time through Europe,” the younger Eisenhower said.

“When my great-grandfather arrived at his first camp, he said directly to my grandfather: ‘Make sure you document this, take photos. Bring Congress, bring the press. One day there’s going to be some bastard that says this never happened.’”

Sadly those words proved prophetic. Holocaust denial and distortion are surging around the world, including in the U.S. 

The haunting images are part of what motivates Eisenhower. “Those photos that he [his grandfather] was taking, some of those still sit in my house and some are in the National Archives and some are in the Eisenhower Presidential Library in Kansas,” he said. 

“Most of the time, I find myself on the verge of not understanding how someone could do it, and being grateful of the fact that there were people like my great-grandfather who stood up to the tyranny and the devastation, and the death and the murder,” he said.

“My great-grandfather being a part of it is important, but he was one of hundreds of thousands of American troops who marched across Europe liberating those camps.”

Being involved with March of the Living has given Eisenhower a fresh perspective on the devastation.

“It’s not just about going from Auschwitz to Birkenau in a march that represents the same death march that so many millions of people, mainly Jewish, suffered,” he said. “It’s about understanding that when you’re doing that march, you’re actually celebrating the lives and the liberation of all those people who were saved throughout Europe. Every step taken from Auschwitz to Birkenau is a little bit of erasing the evil out of that place, because we’re educating and teaching people the good that can happen.”

Eisenhower is grateful that survivors like Clarke, who lost most of her family in Auschwitz, including her father and brother, are still able to testify. 

“I’m thankful they’re here to spread the message and to combat antisemitism, discrimination, racism,” he said. “Being with people like Eva is refreshing, it’s eye-opening and I think that I’ve actually gained more from them [survivors] than I could ever give them. It’s amazing to find out how they were able to survive — their stories give hope to humanity.”

While in London, Eisenhower met with others who owe their lives to his great-grandfather’s forces and also visited the Houses of Parliament where he met with Lord Mann, the British government’s independent advisor on antisemitism.

Eisenhower lives with his wife, Nicole, and their children in Kansas, where he works in property development. “I build high-rises — that’s my day job,” he said. Beyond that, the 44-year-old is heavily involved in public service work and philanthropy. He serves on the international board of directors for People to People International, an NGO set up by his great-grandfather and which his mother, Mary, formerly headed. 

The youngest of John Eisenhower’s four children, his mother spent much of her early childhood in the White House. But Ike was not the family’s only link to power.

“I’m actually related to two presidents, which is kind of wild, right?” said Eisenhower. His aunt Julie, married to his mother’s brother David, is Richard Nixon’s daughter. 

So does anyone else in the family have ambitions for 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue today? 

“Nobody is political at all,” he said. “In fact, we do the opposite of politics. We try to really get involved with improving international relations, but it’s more like world peace efforts.”

That said, he reserves the right to keep his options open. 

“I may one day run for office,” he admitted to JI. “But I can’t imagine wanting to be president of the United States of America. You have constant criticism even if you’re right, and even worse criticism if you’re wrong.”

Although he refused to be drawn on party politics or individuals, Eisenhower had this to say about the current climate: “Right now within politics you have people from both sides that are well beyond the point of reason. 

“This is what I tell people: if I agree with you in my day-to-day life 60% of the time, I’m probably going to be a pretty good friend of yours. For some reason, if I agree with you 80% of the time in politics, but I disagree with you 20% of the time, it means you hate me. 

“That type of complete divisiveness is why you had someone like Hitler rise to power, then all of a sudden the economy goes terrible and now we need someone to blame.”

The rise of antisemitism from both sides of the political spectrum “doesn’t make sense to me” and is “disappointing,” he said. What would his great-grandfather think? 

“I think he’d be disturbed with the way the current political environments are going, and he would give caution and warning, making sure we remember what people like Eva and her family went through so that we don’t do it again.

“I think when people stand still and say nothing, that’s when bad things happen. We have to crack down on that kind of rhetoric.”

He admitted that’s easier said than done, but added: “In the U.S. we have absolute freedom of speech; however, being a leader, you have the ability to say, ‘this is not right’ and ‘we cannot tolerate this behavior.’ I think there are certain presidents that have done a better job [of that].”

Clarke, 80, who traveled to London from her home in Cambridge, said the week with Eisenhower had been “incredible.” 

“I’m going to say this forever — he’s my new best friend and I’ve been dropping his name all the time,” she said.

“It is such an incredible privilege to have met Merrill in his own right and for all the good he’s doing, but just to think about what his great-grandfather did. … If he hadn’t done what he did, I wouldn’t be here now.”

She described the global rise in antisemitism as “very depressing and very worrying,” but has pledged to continue promoting Holocaust education, a role she has inherited from her mother who brought her to Britain as a preschooler. 

“All we can do is to carry on with what we’re doing because we can only take very small measures, but every small measure adds to the whole,” she said. “I feel it’s my duty, like Merrill does.”

The connection between the pair is all important, according to Scott Saunders, founder and chairman of March of the Living. 

“Merrill represents the next chapter in the ongoing story of witness and responsibility,” he told JI. 

“Earlier this year he marched with us at the March of the Living in Auschwitz, and now, meeting British survivors here in the U.K., he is demonstrating what it means to actively carry the torch of remembrance. 

“The March of the Living has always been about connection: between past and present, survivors and young people, memory and action. Merrill’s dedication embodies that mission.”