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Fascinating and Lesser Known People Who Changed American History

Khalid Elhassan May 5, 2020 33 min

Normandy landings - Operation Overlord — Men of the 320th in Normandy. YouTube

36. Dealing With Antisemitism in the Navy

Jews being relatively few in America back then, and quite rare in the Navy, Levy faced considerable anti-Semitism. He loathed to tolerate it. His reactions to insults got him court-martialed six times, demoted from the rank of captain once, and kicked out of the Navy twice – although he was reinstated both times.

He eventually became commander of the Mediterranean Squadron – a position that came with a promotion to commodore. At the time, it was the Navy’s highest rank.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.