Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 57, No. 15, Ed. 1 Thursday, April 10, 2003 Page: 3 of 40
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Texas Jewish Post
Passover Issue
War in Iraq
$
April 10, 2003
3
First Jewish casualty recorded
First known Jewish casualty
talked of enlisting in the IDF
By Joe Berkofsky
NEW YORK — As a young boy,
Mark Evnin insisted on wearing a
yarmulke to the Boy Scouts and
later talked of enlisting in the Israel
Defense Force.
Now, even without his body, the
family of the first known lewish
casualty of the war on Iraq is sitting
shiva, the Jewish mourning period,
at their home in Burlington, Vt.
On April 1, Mindy Evnin got a
call from her son, a Marine sniper
scout, who was somewhere south of
Baghdad.
“It was the first time I’d spoken
to him since he was deployed” to
Kuwait from Camp Pendleton,
Calif., in February, she said. “You
can always tell his mood by his
voice, and he sounded good.”
Two days later, Mark Evnin, 21, a
corporal with the 3rd Battalion, 4th
Regiment of the Marines’ 1st Divi-
sion, was killed in the town of Kut
by Iraqi machine-gun fire.
“He was a macho kid with a gen-
tle soul,” his mother told JTA this
week as she was preparing her house
Mark Evnin of Burlington. Vt.. the first known Jewish casualty of Operation Iraqi
Freedom.
for the shiva. “He was like a sabra,”
using the term for a native-born
Israeli
And like most Israeli men, Mark
seemed to know he was destined for
military service from a young age.
“He was always interested in the
military, ever since he was a child,”
recalled his maternal grandfather,
Rabbi Max Wall, 87, of Burlington.
“He had some kind of inborn
see EVNIN p. 15
MTV reporter kept from Iraq
By Rachel Pomerance
NEW YORK — It’s not just Ted
Koppel and Wolf Blitzer blaring
news from the war-torn Persian
Gulf anymore.
Meet Gideon Yago, the 25-year-
old Jew from New York, who was
sent to cover America’s war in Iraq
for MTV.
Yago’s assignment underscores
the war’s draw among a generation
otherwise tuned in to sex, drugs and
rock ‘n roll. The war, in fact,
superceded drugs as the chief con-
cern among young people,
according to an MTV poll last
month. It was the first time a foreign
subject ranked top on their radar.
But it also reveals the challenges
— and from Yago’s perspective,
opportunities — of being a Jewish
reporter in an Arab country.
“I think it behooves American
Jews in particular to put themselves
out in hairy situations like that,
because how else are you going to
get a dialogue” and “call people out
on their stereotypes," said Yago,
whose angelic face glimmers against
his drab, camouflaged parka.
“Fundamentally, you’re able to
make changes by forcing people to
confront one another.”
Yago said he was picked to cover
the war for MTV because he was the
only reporter willing to stomach
swirling sandstorms and other
rough conditions.
Yet attitudes about Jews and Israel
in the Arab world have already hin-
dered his work.
Yago, who recently returned here
from a stint in Kuwait, where he
hosted an MTV special about the
lives of young Kuwaitis and the
American marines there, was pulled
from a different news assignment in
Baghdad due to security concerns.
His religion and the fact that his
father is an Israeli who heads a fund-
raising group for Israel raised “too
many red flags,” Yago said.
Glenn Yago’s Pups for Peace,
which began shortly after the Sept.
11 terrorist attacks in the United
States, trains and supplies Israel with
bomb- sniffing dogs.
An economist, Glenn Yago
founded the program hoping to find
a cost- efficient measure against sui-
cide bombings.
Even before Yago could enter
Jewish man flees Iraq
Kuwait, he needed a fresh passport
to eliminate the Israel’s stamps since
Israeli nationals are blocked from
the country.
Now that the Americans are in
Iraq at Baghdad’s doorstep, Yago is
waiting for clearance to go to Bagh-
dad to do another show, yet to be
determined.
Asked if he fears for his security,
Yago responded flatly: “No. It’s just
not anything I think about.”
And though he witnessed
episodes of anti-Semitism for the
first time in his life while in Kuwait,
he takes it lightly.
“I’m a Jew from New York,” Yago
said. “I went through 25 years of life
without having an ounce of preju-
dice weighed on me.”
All in all, “I think that’s a pretty
good run.”
And for the most part, Yago said
his Jewishness was rarely a problem,
with only a few “glaring exceptions.”
In those cases, hearing anti-
Semitic statements shocked him.
“You read about them, and then
when you hear them to your face,
there’s always a little bit of a discon-
nect.”
By Rachel Pomerance
NEW YORK — Imagine Iraq on the
verge of war, where Jews are seen as
collaborators with the U.S.-led inva-
sion.
Now imagine the plight of a Jew
planning his escape.
Iraq places severe restrictions on
citizens who want to leave the coun-
try — and the few remaining Jews
are not permitted to leave, accord-
ing to the American Jewish Joint
Distribution Committee.
The kingdom’s ruthless “deter-
rence” policies are well-known: ABC
News’ Barbara Walters recently
interviewed an Iraqi expatriate who
said she had seen, in an Iraqi jail, a
torture device for live humans akin
to a meat grinder.
But for “Jacob” — not his real
name — a shy man in his mid-50s
who has spent a lifetime in Baghdad
keeping quiet about his Jewish iden-
tity, staying was riskier than leaving.
Jacob’s recent retirement as a gov-
ernment engineer meant two
things:
• He could now obtain a passport, a
privilege previously forbidden
because of the nature of his work.
• He may, however, have outlived
his usefulness to the regime, he
told the Hebrew Immigrant Aid
Society.
Given the history of anti-Semi-
tism in Iraq, and the widely held
view in the Arab world that the war
is being waged at Israel’s behest,
Jacob thought he might be in dan-
ger when war broke out, a HIAS
source said.
With Iraq distracted by the
buildup of U.S. troops along its bor-
ders, Jacob crossed the frontier just
days before America began raining
bombs on the country.
His wish was to join his sister and
her family, who fled Iraq two years
ago for a Western European coun-
try.
The Jewish groups who spoke to
JTA did so on condition that details
that might endanger Jacob or his
family would not be revealed.
Copying their escape route
through a neighboring country,
Jacob posed as a non-Jcwish Iraqi
and lived with a Christian Arab
family once outside Iraq.
He immediately informed his sis-
ter of his whereabouts, and she
relayed the information to HIAS.
A week later, an undercover HIAS
official met Jacob in his country
of refuge and put him on a flight to
see JACOB p. 8
MTV News correspondent Gideon Yago
Va.. before his assignment in Kuwait.
Yago declined to give details, but
cited, for example, “people who are
in the Grand Mosque,” the central
mosque in Kuwait, “who are a little
less receptive to Jews and Judaism.”
Still, he downplays the virulence
of the region, saying conservative
religion anywhere promotes slightly
extreme views.
And he attributes the area’s nega-
tive outlook toward Jews to simple
misinformation.
attends media training camp in Quantico,
“You’re going to breed misunder-
standing if you have policies at the
door that are going to exclude peo-
ple,” he said, referring to Kuwait’s
policy of excluding Israeli nationals
from the country.
As for living as a Jew in such an
environment, Yago displays cool
defiance: “I make no bones about
who I am, and where I come from.”
Rachel Pomerance is a TJP/JTA corre-
spondent.
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Wisch, Rene & Wisch-Ray, Sharon. Texas Jewish Post (Fort Worth, Tex.), Vol. 57, No. 15, Ed. 1 Thursday, April 10, 2003, newspaper, April 10, 2003; Fort Worth, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth755102/m1/3/: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; .