During World War II more than 1.5 million Jews participated in the fight against Nazi Germany as soldiers in the armies of the nations in which they lived. This fascinating phenomenon of Jewish history – the recruitment and service of Jewish soldiers across a number of countries – is ripe for critical investigation. In December 2014 the Center held an international conference on the subject with the participation of leading scholars in the field from Israel, Europe and North America. As Derek Penslar – a participant in the conference who presented the keynote address – has written in his seminal book Jews and the Military, “The Jewish soldier in the Diaspora deserves to be rescued from oblivion and subjected to serious historical study”. This new project proposes to do just that. As a result of the conference and its surrounding publicity, the Center has received a significant amount of archival materials from individuals whose family members served as soldiers in World War II. It is the intention of this project to organize these materials and upload them to a searchable online database so that they will be accessible to scholars and students in the field, as well as interested members of the public. 

Researcher: Dr. Galit Haddad

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