Why do people think of Ashkenazi Jews as light?

[CYKA]

Russian jews in Israel are russian AF

[Thykingdomcome]

I know many Ashkenazim and on average they look exactly like Sicilians and far southern Italians (with both groups looking more alike than either looks to say, Germans, Poles, Spaniards or Greeks). Blonde hair and blue eyes are rarer than people think among them. They do not look like Bar Rafaeli or Barbra Streisand on average, nor do they look fully Levantine.

Why do people find it surprising where they cluster genetically?

They arent light but they are much much lighter than levants and middle easterns, from personal experience. Many pass as north euro.

[Thykingdomcome]

Its always funny when certain people say: Israeli Jews are Eastern European or Khazarian. Its like they take 1/10 of the picture and ignore the rest.
Most of Israel isnt Askhenazi. And even Askhenazi are only party European.

Anyway there are some Jews who can pass as North Slavic or Nordic but they are minority. Probably more of those in US than Israel.

I have also seen "nordic" phenotype among afghans, but obviously not representative of most afghans, same goes for jews who might have some nordic strain in them, but not representative of most of them. I think its just more cool to see a levantine or middle eastern have white phenotypes, because the majority of them dont look it, so this leads to confusion, because someone might see a white med and imagine him as representative, when they are not.

[Zroota]

Because some famous American and British Askhenazi Jews tend to be fairly light (and people may base it on those).

Look at Daniel Radcliffe, Seth Green, Jesse Eisenberg, Harrison Ford, Jake Gyllenhaal, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Sean Penn, Adam Brody, Kate Hudson, Daniel Day Lewis, Paul Newman, Jason Isaacs, etc - And I could go on and on.

I know that the people above would have native European ancestry as well.

[Tooting Carmen]

Because some famous American and British Askhenazi Jews tend to be fairly light (and people may base it on those).

Look at Daniel Radcliffe, Seth Green, Jesse Eisenberg, Harrison Ford, Jake Gyllenhaal, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Sean Penn, Adam Brody, Kate Hudson, Daniel Day Lewis, Paul Newman, Jason Isaacs, etc - And I could go on and on.

I know that the people above would have native European ancestry as well.

Many of those are only 50% or less Jewish in ancestry though.

[Tauromachos]

The Sicilian-Askenazi thing is over exaggerated. Mel Brooks or Jeff Goldblum or Nethanyau would simply never pass as Sicilian.

A realy Sicilian looking Jewish man is the man below talking in the video

[Congolese Rice]

Because ashkenazis are strongly mixed with europeans for many decades xd

[Kamal900]

Jewish people are not Whites or Europeans.

[Meerkat]

Im Jewish (by 'religion' dna i dont show european Jewish and im mixed race) i go to Ashkenaz shul weekdays and turkish shul shabbat. Ashkenazim have a much higher percentage of light hair and eyez, i grew up in an italian hood, they dont look italian except maybe in the nose lol. They are like white people but shorter. Turkish Jews look really Italian though.

I don't think most Ashkenazim look Italian but it's not because they're "too Northern looking." I'm a pure Ashkenazi who doesn't look Italian or Sicilian and I have been told that I cannot pass for European.

There are plenty of Ashkenazim who fall into this category:







And blonde hair really isn't common among adults. Among kids, yeah. And a lot of light eyed Ashkenazim cannot pass for European either.

[Meerkat]

Because some famous American and British Askhenazi Jews tend to be fairly light (and people may base it on those).

Look at Daniel Radcliffe, Seth Green, Jesse Eisenberg, Harrison Ford, Jake Gyllenhaal, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Sean Penn, Adam Brody, Kate Hudson, Daniel Day Lewis, Paul Newman, Jason Isaacs, etc - And I could go on and on.

I know that the people above would have native European ancestry as well.

Daniel Radcliffe and most of the people on that list aren't fully Ashkenazi. Daniel Radcliffe's dad is Irish ffs.

A lot of half Ashkenazi half something else people cannot pass for fully Ashkenazi, and many of the people on that list would fall into that category.