GULF CRISIS YEAR END CLEARANCE ALL '90 FURS AND LEATHERS MUST BE SOLD REDUCTIONS FROM 40 % to 60 Many Items At Cost or Below Keeping Kosher, Over There Whether a soldier can observe kashrut in Saudi Arabia depends on whom he asks. JAY LECHTMAN Special to The Jewish News L MALTER FURS IN CROSSWINDS MALL Orchard Lake Road, Corner Lone Pine Road 626-0811 West Bloomfield Monday, Wednesday. Thursday 9:30-8:00; Tuesday, Friday 9:30-6:00 Saturday 9:30-5:30; Sunday 12:00-5:00 Tables • Desks Wall Units Bedrooms Dining Rooms L For Appt Call 12 Years' Experience & Expertise in the Design of Affordable Laminate, Lucite & Wood Furniture Muriel Wetsman GORNBEIN'S 0 ,6teWls 9 90 00 30-40% OFF All Merchandise Sale Through Dec. 24, 1990 ro GORNBEINO JEWELERS 34 Fidelity Bank Building 24901 Northwestern Hwy. Southfield 357-1056 FRIDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1990 661-3838 Right in Your Own Driveway! / THE TUNE -UP MAN Certified by the National Automotive Institute of Excellence Comes to your home or office with the garage-on-wheels Valet service that doesn't cost-one penny extra • Expert diagnostic tune-up • Elecronic analyzer all engine systems • Professionally trained mechanics • Perfect results assured Expanded Services Call Sanford Rosenberg for your car problems 2E398-3605i L t. Cmdr. Victor Stiebel keeps a duffel bag packed in his Baltimore home. He's ready physically, if not mentally, to leave for Saudi Arabia with a day's notice. The 32-year-old Navy doc- tor hopes "there is room in my bag for my tallis and tefillin," he said. He also hopes that enough space exists within the ex- traordinary strictures of Operation Desert Shield for kashrut-observant ser- vicemen. At Bethesda Naval Hospital, near the Jewish communities of Washington and Baltimore, Dr. Stiebel has no trouble keeping kosher as an active-duty serviceman. Should he be shipped out, however, he and other Jew- ish servicemen in the United States worry about their ability to observe this tenet of Jewish law while serving in a military that doesn't of- ficially provide for them, and in an Islamic nation in- tolerant of other faiths. The Defense Department doesn't provide kosher alternatives to its standard military rations, called Meals-Ready-to-Eat, or MREs. But the military does allow servicemen to provide for their own "separate ra- tions," said Lt. Col. Rick Oborn, a department spokesman. "The bottom line, in terms of Department of Defense regulations, is that we're not going to do anything special for a small number of peo- ple," he said. However, according to offi- cials with the U.S. military overseas, kosher basic staples can be provided for Jewish servicemen in the Persian Gulf through its own food service operations, if they are requested through a chaplain or food service officer, said Col. David Peterson, head of chaplains for the military's central command in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. So far, no Jewish per- sonnel have requested kosher rations, apart from High Holy Day meals and "other times when they have wanted to keep kosher for special occasions," Col. Peterson said in a telephone interview from Riyadh. "If we do have a serviceman who wants to keep kosher 100 percent of the time, however, we can do it." Furthermore, "anytime we want extra, we can get spe- cial kosher food from the JWB (Jewish Chaplain's Council of the Jewish Com- munity Centers Association of North America), when we request it," he said. The chaplain's council is the U.S. government- accredited agency oversee- ing the religious and spiri- tual needs of Jewish military personnel. "There is no problem with active-duty servicemen," said David Lapp, the coun- cil's director, adding that only Jewish reservists at home have expressed con- cern over keeping kosher in Saudi Arabia. But Dr. Stiebel, who has raised concerns about the ability to keep kosher in the desert, is on active-duty with the Navy. After discussing the needs of Jewish servicemen with representatives of the U.S. military Chief of Chaplain's office in Washington, Rabbi Lapp believes those concerns to be unfounded, he said. The JWB is expecting a Jewish chaplain's report on the status of Jewish ser- vicemen in the Persian Gulf shortly, Rabbi Lapp said. Additionally, he asserted that vegetarian portions of the 1VIREs would be accep- table to kashrut-observant soldiers, even if they don't "taste like something you're going to buy in Lou Siegel's," a kosher restau- rant in New York City, he said. Despite these assurances, Dr. Stiebel and others re- main skeptical. The military and the Chaplain's Council have given contradictory and often confusing messages about the ability to keep kosher in Saudi Arabia, they say, and several have taken the matter into their own