I have never met that level of blatant hostility, but now, venturing out of my community and onto a university campus in Brooklyn and now Montreal, I do encounter confusion and questioning when I tell classmates that I’m a Syrian Jew. I’m often met with, “There are Jews in Syria?”

I know what you’re thinking. I don’t exactly have the “Jewish look.” You think of Jews as a people, with Jewish surnames, Jewish features, even our own genetic diseases. I understood what the community was telling me. That Jewish peoplehood was akin to race. Something immutable and hereditary. An exclusive club you had to be born into. And even though I had a Jewish father, with my Asian-American face, I would never really be Jewish.

IN AUGUST 2016, the Movement for Black Lives, a broad coalition of organizations associated with the Black Lives Matter movement, released a detailed platform that included a range of policy demands touching nearly every area of political concern, from criminal justice, to education, to the environment, to economics.

Diversity has always been — and will always be — fundamentally Jewish.

Debate sparked after Reform Movement website publishes article on how Jewish community can support Jews of color affected by pandemic. Response article argues it’s problematic to define 'Jews of color'

Aaron Samuels shares how traveling to Brazil made conversations about race in the United States more complex.

As a hub of Jewish innovation, the Bay Area has become the proving ground for not one but two major programs designed to move more Jews of color into Jewish leadership positions.

Although nowhere in Jewish texts and tradition was it ever suggested people with fair skin are superior, Jewish society is not immune to the disease of colorism.

In America, especially now, it is both hard to be Black and hard to be a Jew. So imagine, if you will, what life is like for a Black Jew.

Introducing the Jews of Color Campus Coalition, for Jews of African American, Asian, Latinx, Sephardic and/or Mizrahi heritage. Join us for the first gathering of Jewish students of color from campuses across NYC. Help us create a community and use our collective knowledge to influence the greater Jewish community.

Filmmaker Lacey Schwartz has an intriguing and compelling personal story to tell in her documentary, “Little White Lie,” screening at 3 p.m. at the Philadelphia Film Festival (PJFF) Pre-Fest, taking place Sunday at the Gershman Y, 401 S. Broad St.