True to My God and Country: How Jewish Americans Fought in World War II by Françoise S. Ouzan

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Studies in Antisemitism

True to My God and Country explores the role of the more than half a million Jewish American men and women who served in the military in the Second World War. Patriotic Americans determined to fight, they served in every branch of the military and every theater of the war.

Drawing on letters, diaries, interviews, and memoirs, True to My God and Country offers an intimate account of the soul-searching carried out by young Jewish men and women in uniform. Ouzan highlights, in particular, the selflessness of servicewomen who risked their lives in dangerous assignments. Many GIs encountered antisemitism in the American military even as they fought the evils of Nazi Germany and its allies.

True to My God and Country examines how they coped with anti-Jewish hostility and reveals how their interactions with Jewish communities overseas reinforced and bolstered connections to their own American Jewish identities.

Year first published: 2024