The Nationals' July 23 game against the Chicago Cubs will see the opening of a glatt kosher stand that will be serving Abeles and Heymann all-beef hot dogs, Neshama spicy Italian sausages, soft pretzels, peanuts and bottled beverages.

The stand, located near Section 220 along the third-base line, will be run by Kosher Sports, a 3-year-old New York-based company that also has been running the kosher food service for the past two seasons at Baltimore Orioles and Baltimore Ravens games. The company also operates kosher stands at Shea Stadium for New York Mets games and at Lincoln Financial Field for Philadelphia Eagles fans, among other sites.

Jonathan Katz, president and CEO of Kosher Sports, said the company is certified by Star-K and a mashgiach will be present at all times. The stand will be closed for Friday evening and Saturday games. Katz called the remaining 2 1/2 months of the season a "trial run," and hoped to expand the stand's offerings next year.

Katz credited the new owners of the team, Ted Lerner and his family, for bringing hot kosher food to RFK.

"Ever since Mr. Lerner bought the Nationals, it's been a priority to offer a glatt kosher stand," said Katz, whose company already works with RFK concession vendor Aramark at other sites.

Katz said Kosher Sports had been approached last winter about providing kosher service at RFK, but Major League Baseball, which then owned the team, did not offer the financial flexibility to make the deal work. Last season, kosher box lunches had been sold at the stadium.

Katz said prices will be competitive with other food offered in the stadium ‹ kosher pretzels and peanuts will carry the exact same price as the nonkosher variety, while hot dogs will sell for $4.50 and sausages for $5.75.

And if fans tire of singing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" at the seventh-inning stretch, they have a new option. Katz said that siddurim will be available for Ma'ariv or Mincha prayers, depending on the game time.

Air Force activist praises Navy

The Military Religious Freedom Foundation is applauding the U.S. Navy's rejection of a chaplain complaint as "without merit."

Lt. Gordon Klingenschmitt had complained that he was "censored" and "harassed" after preaching at a memorial service that only those who believe in Jesus will have eternal life.He had charged that his commanding officer had retaliated against him for the sermon at a shipboard memorial service for a deceased petty officer.

The Navy, according to a Washington Times article last week, said that Klingenschmitt's performance evaluation was based on his commanding officer's "legitimate evaluation of his performance of duty." The chaplain's commanding officer received some two dozen complaints about the sermon from sailors and family members.

"This ruling, in which the Navy has taken the position that 'commanders can influence what chaplains say at public events, such as the memorial event, as opposed to a divine worship service,' should set an example for the other segments of our nation's military which continue to blatantly violate the United States Constitution," said foundation founder and president Mikey Weinstein.

Weinstein has been a persistent critic of the U.S. Air Force and its handling of charges of religious intolerance at its Colorado Springs, Colo., academy.

"This is the first time that the leadership of a branch of our nation's armed forces has spoken out against discriminatory prayer at mandatory military formations," Weinstein said.

The report added that there was no evidence Klingenschmitt's commanding officer "took any adverse reaction against Lieutenant Klingenschmitt based on the content of his regular Protestant worship service."

Mikulski: Don't slash

security aid

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) is denouncing the elimination of $25 million in federal funding to protect high-risk, nonprofit institutions from terrorist attacks.

Mikulski has joined with Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) to introduce an amendment to return the funds to the 2007 Homeland Security spending bill. Twenty Jewish organizations received a total of $1.6 million from the federal government for security improvements last year after a similar $25 million pool of money was appropriated last year.

Tension with Turks

U.S. Jewish leaders who met last week with the Turkish foreign minister disagreed sharply over Turkey's relations with Hamas.

Participants in the meeting with Abdullah Gul said it was unusually tense, with Jewish leaders questioning Turkey's insistence on defying the Western boycott of the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority government. Gul argued that such ties were useful to Israel, citing Turkey's recent, unsuccessful attempt to intervene with Hamas to free a captive Israeli soldier.

Currently led by an Islamist-based party, Turkey relies on U.S. Jewish lobbying to maintain its profile in Washington. Representatives of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, United Jewish Communities, Jewish Council for Public Affairs, B'nai B'rith International, Anti-Defamation League and American Jewish Committee took part in the meeting.

HUD cites pro-Jewish bias

Federal officials have charged a real-estate company in New Jersey of violating the Fair Housing Act in favor of Jewish families.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development alleges that Triple H. Realty of Lakewood, N.J., kept minority residents out of the nicer parts of a housing complex, provided them with poorer maintenance and subjected them to rules not applied to the Jewish residents.

Lakewood is home to a large Orthodox Jewish community.

Reform Jews push'blue helmets'

The U.S. Reform movement has launched a campaign to urge permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to send a peacekeeping force to Darfur. The Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism announced on Thursday of last week that it is encouraging people worldwide over the following 30 days to send "Blue Helmet" postcards to the Security Council's permanent members. The Blue Helmets are an internationally recognized sign of U.N. peacekeepers.

The postcards push for U.N. forces to take over the current African Union peacekeeping mission in Darfur. RAC director Rabbi David Saperstein said that while "the recent U.N. Security Council passage of a resolution seeking to persuade Sudan to cooperate with the U.N. as it prepares to take over peacekeeping in Darfur is an important step, more must be done."

‹ by Eric Fingerhut, with reports from Ron Kampeas at JTA News and Features