It’s bad enough America’s armed forces are sloughing through two unconventional wars in Iraq and Afghanistan with no satisfactory end in sight. To compound the problem, recent reports have exposed disgraceful treatment of injured vets in military hospitals. Then there was the cover-up over how Army Ranger Pat Tillman died in 2004 in Afghanistan. A few weeks ago, Defense Secretary Robert Gates charged the Air Force was not fulfilling its mission in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now charges of religious bigotry and prejudice have been added to the mounting list of abuses and errors of the armed services.

(Rabbi Rudin, the American Jewish Committee’s senior interreligious adviser, is the author of the recently published book “The Baptizing of America: The Religious Right’s Plans for the Rest of Us.”)