"What's hot? Respect for people," begins the 30-second spot airing on a plethora of television networks, including CNN and MTV. "What's not hot is hating people because of their color or religion. Antisemitism and racism are the same thing. Let's fight all types of racism and antisemitism together."

It's a tried-and-true message with an unlikely twist: The producers and talent are hip-hop impresarios Russell Simmons and Jay-Z.

"I understand the Jewish struggle. It's similar to the black struggle," says Simmons, reflecting on the centuries of intolerance endured by Jews and African Americans alike.

But why exercise his considerable clout-Simmons is the founder of mega-billion-dollar Def Jam Recordings and the Phat Farm sportswear line-to call attention to a scourge that does not affect him personally, particularly when intolerance and inequality remain issues in the African American community?

"As you promote civil rights for others, you are promoting your own," Simmons explains.

He says he is also attempting to rekindle the once-strong and visible partnership between blacks and Jews, as well as create alliances with other ethnic groups whose presence today is part of the U.S. population landscape.

"It's about getting in the room and talking and finding common agendas…that's why I'm there. I'm there to facilitate dialogue," Simmons says. "We have the same needs and the same aspirations, and we should have an appreciation for each other."

Simmons says his respect for and appreciation of Judaism dates to his interaction with Jewish children during grade school in Queens. But today, for some reason, the camaraderie that he fondly recalls does not seem to happen as readily, Simmons says.

"There's a rigidity between all communities and we have to break down the doors. Everyone needs dialogue," Simmons says.

There was a time when blacks and Jews formed a close partnership to bring about racial equality.

Jewish involvement was key in the founding of both the NAACP and the Urban League. Both the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were drafted in the conference room of the Religious Action Center (RAC) of Reform Judaism in Washington, D.C.

Jews were also foot soldiers in the civil rights movement. According to RAC, more than half of the young people who participated in Freedom Summer, a massive attempt in 1964 to register as many African American voters as possible throughout the south, were Jewish.

Why take on a task of such magnitude for a cause that wasn't theirs?

"To preach is one thing…to put into practice, another. It seemed like a gift…an opportunity," says retired Rabbi Everett Gendler, 78, of Great Barrington, Mass., recalling his 1962 jailing in Albany, Ga., with Martin Luther King, Jr., for protesting that city's segregation practices, and subsequent marches with King in Birmingham and Selma, Ala., and Arlington, Va.

For many, the involvement was life-altering. In a world where segregation kept the races apart, close ties were forged with black Americans and career paths were taken where lessons learned through membership in the civil rights fraternity could be applied.

"I have spent my life attempting-sometimes successfully, sometimes not-to integrate the world of social justice and Judaism. I've primarily done that through my work as an educator, and I think the meaningful integration of religion and social justice is a lesson that I learned from Dr. King and [the late Jewish civil rights activist] Rabbi Abraham Heschel," says Peter Geffen, 61, founder of the Abraham Joshua Heschel School in New York City, which promotes a pluralistic approach to Jewish learning and observance. He is also founder and director of Kivunim, which offers additional programs for young people and teachers in Jewish education and leadership.

Geffen had just completed his freshman year at New York's Queens College in 1964 when he was inspired to join the civil rights movement. The impetus? The murder of classmate Andrew Goodman, who had gone to Mississippi to assist in registering black voters.

Along with fellow Jewish civil rights worker Michael Schwerner and local black Mississippian James Earl Chaney, Goodman was abducted and killed by members of the Ku Klux Klan.

"I vowed I was going to take his place," recalls Geffen.

Over the objections of his family, Geffen ventured to Orangeburg, S.C., where, as a member of the Summer Community Organization and Political Education (SCOPE) project, he met King and taught poor blacks to read and write, thus making them eligible to register to vote.

It was frightening, daunting work. SCOPE's primary focus was the sharecropper whose livelihood was tied to white-owned land.

"It was not a good thing to get on the bad side of these people, and attempting to register to vote was the best way to get on their bad side. Even if you were not in danger from the Ku Klux Klan, which you were, you were also in danger in a very practical way of creating a circumstance for you and your family," Geffen says.

"We were meeting in the kitchen [at a black home]. The Ku Klux Klan…fired a shotgun blast into a large glass picture window that faced into the living room. Had we been in the living room, lots of people would have been hurt," he recalls.

It was not the only time shots were fired in his direction. Geffen says fear was part of the daily landscape. Jewish activists, however, were additionally reeling from the atrocities of the Holocaust that were still coming to light.

"…as Jews, I think all of us felt a magnet that drew us to the civil rights movement," Geffen says. "We carried around a consciousness of the impact of people being bystanders to murder or to injustice."

Willy Siegel Leventhal, 60, an educator/author and consultant in Montgomery, Ala., has written extensively about his activist experiences, which began in 1965 after King came to the University of California Los Angeles, where Leventhal was a student, seeking white participants for the civil rights movement.

"The whites that were involved, including the Jews, were a bridge that helped…that gave society an option," Leventhal says. He says King's electrifying visit on the heels of the murders of the Jewish civil rights workers, and his own Jewish identity, led him to participate in risk-fraught black voter registration drives in the Georgia cities of Macon and Americus, first as a SCOPE volunteer and then as a staff member of King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC.)

"We registered 3,0000 voters…that was a good feeling…but on my last night in Americus, a call came in and a voice said, 'If you're in town in 24 hours, you're dead,'" Leventhal recalls.

He says youthful idealism-he was 18-played a role in his decision to place himself on the frontline, as did religious conviction.

"Jews have historically supported the civil rights movement because we have a common history with African Americans. We were slaves. Part of our history is about our bondage and so we identify with them who are also in bondage," says Leventhal.

Leventhal's involvement with SCOPE and SCLC led to careers in education-he has worked at inner-city schools in Los Angeles; taught sociology courses at universities and community colleges; and engaged in labor relations and political consulting. He has also written a number of books about the civil rights experience.

Jewish participation was appreciated, says Elizabeth Omilami, daughter of the late civil rights activist and King confidant Hosea Williams. Williams was a leader of the "Bloody Sunday March" on March 7, 1965, where 600 demonstrators for voter rights were attacked by Alabama law enforcement officers on their way from Selma to Montgomery. Historians consider the televised brutality of that day a watershed moment of the civil rights movement. For Williams, the event was another in a long line of more than 100 incidents where he willingly placed himself in harm's way. His daughter, then a young teenager, frequently accompanied her father and was well aware that they were not the only ones inviting wrath.

"There was always a Jewish presence, whether in financing or out front. It was noticed," recalls Omilami, 55. Today she runs Hosea Feed The Hungry and Homeless, an Atlanta-based outreach organization started by Williams. With a support base that includes the Jewish community, it provides for the basic needs of impoverished people around the world.

But as progress was made in the civil rights arena, relations between the black and Jewish communities frayed. The rise of the Black Power movement, critical of King's inclusive and nonviolent approach to ending racism, led to increased tensions. More recently, a riot in 1991 in the ethnically diverse Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, N.Y., further eroded Jewish support. The three days of mayhem began when a car, connected to an entourage of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, struck and killed a seven-year-old black child and severely injured another. Over the belief that police response to the accident was racially tinged, violence ensued and a rabbinical student was killed. Sixteen years later, Crown Heights residents continue to work on neighborhood relations.

Adam Clayton Powell III, son of the powerful black lawmaker from New York who was responsible for legislation affecting the minimum wage, education, and voting-and himself an educator and promoter of diversity programs-points to Crown Heights as one divisive incident.

"There just seemed a time when separatism and suspicion grew almost explosively. Part of it was because we were living next to each other," Powell says. But he also says the violence spewed in Crown Heights was more happenstance than actual targeting of Jews.

"With urban disorder, it's who is close at hand, who is owning…the stores. Today [the target] would be Koreans or Indians," Powell says.

He says while matters pertaining to civil rights have progressed legislatively, obstacles to cohesive black/Jewish, or for that matter, black/white partnerships, fester in part because issues of civil rights are not as defined as they once were. "It was easier to say we can change laws, that we can't have 'separate but equal,' but now it's a different challenge," says Powell, who, among other responsibilities, oversees integrated media systems at the U.S. National Engineering Research Center for Multimedia, based at the University of Southern California.

Earlier in his career, Powell spent 15 years at the Freedom Forum, a nonpartisan foundation that focuses on a free press and newsroom diversity. "Today the real taboo word is 'class' and that cuts across racial lines. The new civil rights battle…is to reach out to everyone, to those left in poverty. The key…starts with education…That's harder than rewriting a law," he says.

A leader in the arena of reaching out is Rabbi Marc Schneier, chairman of the World Jewish Congress American Section. He is also president and founder of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, a national nonprofit organization created in 1989 to strengthen Jewish relations with other ethnic groups.

Additionally, Schneier is the author of "Shared Dreams," a book that discusses the relationship between King and the Jewish community.

"The role of the rabbi is to make a spiritual and political contribution to the community. In 50 years, the current minorities will be the majority, demographers say. You can't ignore that," says Schneier. "I thought a vehicle that would strengthen [relations] would be an important contribution."

Schneier's work attracts celebrity support. The group includes Russell Simmons, who joined the foundation's board in 2002 and currently serves as chairman. The PSA encouraging blacks and Jews to work together against racism and antisemitism was made by the foundation.

Last year, Simmons and Schneier were featured at the "Save Darfur: Rally to Stop Genocide" on the National Mall in Washington. The rally is an example of the kind of interaction going on today between the Jewish and black communities, Schneier says. Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the RAC, agrees that sharing activities "holds potential." He also says there should be more grassroots connections between blacks and Jews.

"We need to socialize. We tend to be with our own groups. We need to create opportunities on college campuses, churches, and synagogues," he says.

B'nai B'rith International Executive Vice President Dan Mariaschin says, "Jews and blacks worked together during some of the most tumultuous times this country has ever known. The positive nation-altering advances that partnership heralded can provide a useful roadmap to pick up the trail of dialogue and understanding."

Q -- Do you feel there was a special bond between the Jewish and black communities during the civil rights movement?

A -- Absolutely. Blacks and Jews marched together and, in some instances, died together during the struggle for civil rights. The bond between the two communities was one based on a mutual understanding…a shared history of sorts. It wasn't just a civil rights thing. It was a commitment to basic human rights for people of all walks of life. The majority of blacks and Jews share a commitment to religion and religious tolerance as well.

Q -- What is your opinion of that relationship today, and what factors have contributed to the current state of affairs?

A -- I think that the current state of black and Jewish relations is strong and steadfast. But I also think that there is much room for improvement and growth. All too often, we bank on what has happened in the past and forget that coalitions are not one-time events. If you want a coalition and partnership to grow, then you need to keep feeding it. Antisemitism is not only a threat against the Jewish community, but it's a threat against all of humanity, just like all forms of racism, xenophobia, and all forms of discrimination and intolerance. Those in the black community who think that antisemitism doesn't [affect] them are being just as naïve as those in the Jewish community who think that racism doesn't affect them. The same people who hate Jews usually hate blacks, too.

Q - A number of people interviewed for this article say there is a need for more cooperative activities between the black and Jewish communities, as this would promote dialogue.

A -- They're absolutely correct. Blacks and Jews must continue having the discussions that we are having today in Washington, but they must also happen in every community in the country. Most importantly, it must happen on a regular basis and not just when conflict arises.

Interacting on a local level appears to be today's challenge.

In Richmond, Va., members of Reform synagogue Congregation Beth Ahabah volunteer twice a month at a food pantry for low-income residents that operates out of the African American Greater Mt. Moriah Baptist Church.

"Faith-based groups make the food and serve it. It's a joy to do, but there's no mixing at all. We're just these white folks that come in," says Janice Freed, one of the Beth Ahabah participants.

In Baltimore, Rabbi Steven Fink, of Reform Temple Oheb Shalom, expresses frustration that a once-a-year "pulpit exchange" with the pastor of Bethel AME Church, Rev. Frank Reid III, warrants being singled out by the Black/Jewish Forum of Baltimore as an example of a successful effort of building bridges between the communities. The event takes place on the weekend of King's birthday.

"It's sad that we're worthy of note. That a Martin Luther King pulpit exchange is worthy of being honored, that's pathetic," says Fink. He says he has made repeated efforts to expand the interaction between the congregations.

"We like each other, [but] it's very difficult to have ongoing relations," Fink says.

Founded in 1978 to broach the estrangement between the black and Jewish communities, Baltimore's Black/Jewish Forum spearheads an assortment or programs to advance its agenda.

These include one that pairs black and Jewish high schools for periodic all-day sessions where participants visit museums that showcase their respective cultures. They also participate in community activities, such as working at a local food bank. As for the pulpit exchange salute, Bernard Berkowitz, a past president and current treasurer of the forum, says: "Anything we can do to encourage this exchange is good."

Reid says he would also like there to be more of a connection with Temple Oheb Shalom and is hopeful that, over time, there will be.

"I share his frustration, but the frustration is a good thing because…all relationships have frustrations if they're serious, but it will take time. It will take the members from both congregations to take the bull by the horns and develop individual relationships," Reid says.

He says he wishes the local black and Jewish communities could present a unified front over the crisis in Darfur.

"We know we've got a strong interest but…we need to build a communal interest," he says.

Even for those who immersed themselves in the cause 40-plus years ago and have made its continuation their life's mission, mingling can require a concerted effort.

"I don't see black faces in my neighborhood very often," says Geffen, who lives in New York City. "We don't acknowledge it, we don't talk about it, but…that means in order to have racial understanding, you have to really extend yourself…to get beyond the boundaries of the restrictive white and even the white Jewish world that people like me live in; people who believe in all of this stuff."

The lingering separation is cause for reflection, particularly for Jewish activists who made the fight for civil rights their own personal battle, at times paying dearly for that decision.

Rita Schwerner Bender, whose husband, Michael, died with Andrew Goodman and James Chaney, says white/black and Jewish/black relations stall over the government's refusal to acknowledge that race remains an issue.

She points out that it took exactly 41 years to the day of the murders before Klansman Edgar Ray Killen, the mastermind, was convicted of manslaughter. Killen, now 82, was sentenced to three consecutive 20-year prison terms in June 2005.

"There are many people in that state who it is known were participants in many terrible events…and they continue to live in the same community," Bender says. Now an attorney practicing family law in Seattle, Bender, 65, says that unwillingness to acknowledge is not confined to Mississippi.

"In this country, people don't want to talk about race. It's embarrassing. They want this sort of notion of the color-blind society. They don't want to see it…but [race] is a factor," she says. "When you look at the issues of poverty in this country…and you see that African Americans are twice as likely to be living below the poverty line, that's an appalling statistic. None of us [has] come to terms with the legacy of racism, so moving forward is very difficult."