Arnold Resnicoff

Arnold E. Resnicoff (born 1946) is an American Conservative rabbi who served as a military officer and military chaplain.

He served in Vietnam and Europe before attending rabbinical school.

He then served as a U.S. Navy Chaplain for almost 25 years.

Following ordination from JTS in 1976, Resnicoff returned to the Navy as a chaplain, serving in many locations in the United States and overseas.

He promoted the creation of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and delivered the closing prayer at its 1982 dedication.

On Nov 13, 1982, Resnicoff delivered the closing prayer at the official dedication of "The Wall."

On October 23, 1983, while a chaplain for the United States Sixth Fleet, Resnicoff was present in Beirut, Lebanon, during the suicide truck bomb attack that took the lives of 241 American military personnel, and wounded scores more.

He had arrived on Friday, Oct 21, to lead a Memorial Service for Sgt Allen Soifert, a Jewish American Marine killed by sniper fire.

Transportation had been offered to return him to the Sixth Fleet flagship in Gaeta, Italy, on Saturday, but Resnicoff said he could not travel on Shabbat, the Jewish Sabbath, and would remain in Beirut with the Marines until the following day, when the first truck bomb attack occurred at 6:20AM on Sunday, Oct 23, demolishing the Marine barracks.

In 1983, Resnicoff held the first interfaith service (and first service jointly attended by men and women) held at the Western Wall since it came under Israel's control, conducted under the supervision of the Israel Ministry of Religious Affairs, as part of a special welcome for the U.S. Sixth Fleet.

He also led Israel's first official Martin Luther King Jr. Day ceremony, held in the President's residence.

He helped establish the Haifa, Israel, USO and a center for Sixth Fleet personnel on leave in Jerusalem; led the first official visit to Israel by the United States Army, Navy, and Air Force Chiefs of Chaplains, as well as the first visit by officers and crew of the aircraft carrier, USS John F. Kennedy (CV-67), to Israel's John F. Kennedy Memorial and Peace Forest.

In 1984 the President of the United States spoke on his eyewitness account of the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing.

After retiring from the military he was National Director of Interreligious Affairs for the American Jewish Committee and served as Special Assistant (for Values and Vision) to the Secretary and Chief of Staff of the United States Air Force, serving at the equivalent military rank of Brigadier General.

Resnicoff holds several degrees, including an honorary doctorate.

His awards include the Defense Superior Service Medal, the Department of the Air Force Decoration for Exceptional Civilian Service, and the Chapel of Four Chaplains Hall of Heroes Gold Medallion.

Resnicoff's father, a World War II Navy veteran, encouraged Resnicoff to serve with the military as one way for the family to "pay its dues" to America.

He served as an enlisted man in the Naval Reserves during High School, then after graduation from NROTC at Dartmouth College served in the rivers of Vietnam (and a short time in Cambodia as well, when his ship became the first U.S commissioned vessel to cross the border) as part of "Operation Game Warden," the operation aimed at keeping the rivers free from Viet Cong, and then with Naval Intelligence in Europe before leaving the Navy to attend rabbinical school.

Four days after the attack, the White House team that visited Beirut, led by Vice President of the United States, George H. W. Bush, asked for a report on the attack and its aftermath—and on April 13, 1984, President Ronald Reagan read that report as his keynote address to the Rev. Jerry Falwell's "Baptist Fundamentalism '84" convention, in Washington, DC.

During the delivery of the speech, President Reagan was interrupted by a small group of protestors, holding pre-printed banners, chanting, "Bread, not bombs."

Reagan later commented, "Wouldn't it be nice if a little bit of that Marine spirit would rub off, and they would listen [to the chaplain's words] about brotherly love?"

During the rescue efforts following the bombing, a Catholic Chaplain named George Pucciarelli tore off a piece of his Marine camouflage uniform to make a skullcap ("kippah") for Resnicoff, after Resnicoff used his to wipe the blood from a wounded Marine's face.

This widely reported story, recounted in President Reagan's 1984 speech, was entered into the Congressional Record.

The story was credited with helping the passage of the religious apparel amendment allowing military personnel to wear head coverings for religious reasons (an amendment that had failed to pass in the House of Representatives for two years prior to the recounting of this story).

This story was also quoted by some military leaders who had previously opposed the uniform policy change, but now supported it, including the Commandant and Sergeant Major of the Marine Corps.

This amendment reportedly laid the groundwork for the directive (later, changed to a Department of Defense Instruction) that established wide-ranging changes to official military policies and procedures for the Accommodation of Religious Practices Within the Military Services.

In 1984, Resnicoff's efforts to convince the United States Department of Defense to participate in the national annual program for the Days of Remembrance of the Victims of the Holocaust (DRVH) were successful.

In 1984, the first official year of military involvement, Resnicoff coordinated a meeting between Rabbi Seymour Siegel, Executive Director of the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, and Vice Admiral Edward Martin, Commander, United States Sixth Fleet, and then conducted the first shipboard Holocaust Days of Remembrance Ceremony, on board USS Puget Sound (AD-38), the Sixth Fleet Flagship.

Resnicoff worked to support the rights of men and women of all sexual orientations, as well as those of all faiths.

In 1986, Resnicoff was sent to Iceland to lead Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement) services during the historic Reagan-Gorbachev pre-summit meetings.

The symbolism of Resnicoff's participation in this initiative made an impression on many Americans.

Senator Claiborne Pell (D-RI) entered the text of the October 8, 1986, Providence Journal article, "Navy Rabbi To Join Iceland Team: Russian immigrant's grandson picked to lead staff services," in the October 9, 1986, Senate Congressional Record.

Rabbi Resnicoff has lectured on pluralism, religious freedom, and ethics and values, at many civilian and military forums, including the Northeastern Political Science Association; the International Society for Military Ethics (ISME); the Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute; the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre in Clementsport, Nova Scotia and the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, in Israel's Bar Ilan University.

His work has been recognized by long-time advocates of LGBT rights, including his work at the Naval War College as far back as the early 1990s.

He was later chosen by the White House to deliver the prayer at the Presidential signing ceremony for the repeal of the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.

From 1992-1994, Resnicoff served as Command Chaplain for Recruit Training Command ("RTC"), Orlando, Florida, where he was part of the team headed by Captain Kathleen Bruyere that integrated men and women into basic training for the first time, and created a new chaplain message for the recruits: "Chapel helps you make it through Boot Camp; Faith helps you make it through life."

From 1997 to 2000, Resnicoff was the first Jewish Chaplain to serve at the level of Command Chaplain for a Unified Combatant Command, serving as chaplain for the United States European Command (USEUCOM), under the leadership of General Wesley Clark.

He served as a principal advisor to General Clark and the USEUCOM staff on matters of religion, ethics, and morals; coordinated religious support for more than 100,000 U.S. military personnel and families of all military branches and all faiths; and served as liaison to the chaplaincies of other nations throughout the USEUCOM area of responsibility (AOR), leading and coordinating three International Military Chiefs of Chaplains Conferences in Europe, where he introduced a new vision of the potential role of chaplains as liaisons to religious leaders, and of religion as a force for peace and conflict resolution, and for reconciliation after the battles.

During the time of American involvement in Bosnia and Kosovo, he worked with U.S. and NATO troops, civilian relief workers, political and military leaders, religious representatives, and refugees, and represented the military in the first conference of religious seminary students from Kosovo, Bosnia, Albania, and Macedonia; and led a delegation representing the four official religions of Bosnia—Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Muslim, and Jewish—on an historic visit to the U.S.

Resnicoff was part of a group of Vietnam veterans, led by Jan Scruggs, that worked to create the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, in Washington, D.C. Scruggs was an Army corporal with the 199th Light Infantry Brigade who had been wounded on the battlefield in Vietnam.