Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson met with Yasser Arafat and made disparaging remarks about New York’s Jewish population.
By Shula Rosen
Ashley Jackson, daughter of the late civil rights leader Rev. Jesse Jackson, has converted to Judaism after what she described as a long spiritual search, saying the faith’s emphasis on learning, community, and repairing the world resonated with the values she was raised to embrace.
In an essay published Friday in The Washington Post, Jackson wrote that she officially completed her conversion last month under the guidance of Rabbi Sharon Brous of IKAR in Los Angeles, taking the Hebrew name Miriam Yiskah.
She said her father encouraged her throughout the process, joining her for Shabbat services and offering his blessing before his death.
Jackson said she was drawn to Judaism because its traditions and teachings reflected principles that had long shaped her life. “I was raised to believe that faith must lead to action,” she wrote. “In Judaism, I found an enduring expression of this belief.”
She also expressed hope that her experience as both Black and Jewish could help strengthen ties between two communities whose relationship has experienced both solidarity and strain.
That history was reflected in her father’s own public life. Jesse Jackson forged close partnerships with Jewish organizations during the civil rights movement, frequently highlighting the common fight against bigotry and discrimination.
Those relationships later deteriorated after Jackson met with Palestine Liberation Organization leader Yasser Arafat in 1979 and, several years later, referred to New York as “Hymietown,” an antisemitic slur that sparked widespread criticism and became a lasting controversy during his 1984 presidential campaign.
In the decades that followed, Jackson publicly apologized and worked to rebuild trust with Jewish leaders. By the end of his life, many viewed him as having repaired those relationships and renewed his standing as a partner in interfaith and civil rights causes.
Ashley Jackson wrote that her decision to embrace Judaism grew naturally from the moral foundation her father instilled in her, describing her conversion as another expression of the commitment to justice and service that defined her upbringing.
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