Genetics presents surprises, which turn out to be very logical. Importantly, the science exposes the political, racist brainwashing, and especially the anti-Semitic «theories» of all sorts, from Hitler to the modern «left-wing defenders of Palestine.» I mean the racist narrative about “alien Jewish-European colonialists” who drove the unfortunate Palestinian “Indians” from their homeland. By the way, Palestinian racists (including the first of them Abu Mazen) repeat daily the mantra of the Khazarian origin of the Jews, posing this hypothesis as well-established fact. So, what about objective scientific research?
- JEWS AND OTHERS
“Children of Abraham in the era of the genome: the main populations of the Jewish diaspora consist of separate genetic clusters with a common Middle Eastern origin” (Atzmon et al, 2010).
Today this work is the most comprehensive and thorough of all the scientific studies on the genetics of the Jews and Arabs of Israel. I will base my conclusions primarily on this study (but not only), and then I will introduce amendments in the light of newer studies on DNA genealogy.
The authors of the Children of Abraham compared the genetics of a number of Jewish and non-Jewish populations. Using the methods developed by geneticists, the authors obtained two-dimensional graphical diagrams that allow us to estimate the degree of genetic relatedness of the 16 populations they studied.
I have carefully studied these diagrams, and will try to convey in words what I saw.
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The first diagram allows to estimate the genetic remoteness of the mentioned 16 populations from the native people of Africa, North America and East Asia. If someone declares that the Jews should return to their brothers in Cambodia or Uganda, or that we are relatives of American Indians (anti-Semites like to send us far away, for example to the moon, if possible), then we will say NO with good reason.
And yet … Among the near circle of our non-Jewish relatives were the Arabs of Israel and the Europeans. A little further away than the Europeans are placed North Africans (Berbers).
As for Europe, everything is clear: when the ancient people of the Middle East and Iran learned to cultivate the land 15,000 years ago, and provided themselves with abundant food, they began to multiply wildly, and settled in all directions. Some moved through Turkey and the Balkans to Western Europe. Their relatives went to Egypt, and from there to North Africa, or south, to East Africa. The Iranians went east. Genetics have established a pattern: the center from which people have settled over the past 15,000 years, that is, the Middle East, has the richest set of haplogroups, while on the outskirts this set is shrinking. Europe and North Africa were such «outskirts.»
Over the past millennia, gene mutations have occurred. These mutations are “caught” by DNA genealogy specialists. Based on mutations they develop the family tree of both individuals and populations. Regarding Jewish men, the conclusion by DNA is that they descent mostly from the Middle East. The question of Khazar descent remains open to discussion. The Ashkenazi haplogroup R1a (14% of Ashkenazi males) may be explained by three ways: Slavic, Khazarian or ancient Middle Eastern origin. Mitochondrial (maternal) lineage of the Ashkenazi Jews indicates Northern Italy origin.
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The second and third diagrams give a graphic display of the genetic proximity or remoteness of 16 populations that were under the microscope of geneticists.
In the center of the field, we find three groups of Jews from Greece, Turkey and Syria. They partially overlap, indicating a close genetic link. Let’s call them «genetically central Jews.»
The closest to the three “genetically central” groups of Jews were, on the one hand Ashkenazi Jews, on the other, opposite side — the Jews of Italy. And on the third side (partially overlapping with the Jews of Syria) were … Druze! The ones that serve in the Israel Defense Forces. It turns out that they are not only our brothers in arms.
Immediately behind the Druze, partially overlapping with them, are placed the Bedouins of Israel and the Jews of Iraq.
At a slightly longer “genetic distance” from the “central” Jews, but closer to the Ashkenaz were the inhabitants of Northern Italy (non-Jews) and the separate Italians of Sardinia, who are genetically distant from their continental brothers living on the “boot” of Italy.
- PALESTINIANS AND OTHERS
And here we go to the most interesting part of the movie — the Palestinians. It turned out that genetically Palestinians are divided into two groups distant from one another, almost equal in size. One Palestinian group «genetically close» to the Jews partially overlaps with the Bedouins of Israel. It is at the same “genetic distance” from the Jews, as the inhabitants of Italy and the Circassians. But the second, somewhat larger group, turned out to be “far away” both from its Palestinian brothers, and from all Jews with Druze and Bedouins. Even “farther away” than the French and Basques, but at the same «distance» that the Russians. According to these data, more than half of the ancestors of the Palestinian people were not of the Levantine (Syria-Palestine) descent.
I cannot say that, for me, such a «Palestinian result» was unexpected, quite the contrary is correct. I have long paid attention to the fact that the ancient, Jewish and non-Jewish cities and especially the villages of Israel gradually became empty by the middle of the Middle Ages. It is enough to look into the history and archaeology of any village in the Galilee, in the history of Haifa, Tiberias, and even of Jerusalem, to be sure: there was a break in almost all of these settlements, when the people who inhabited them disappeared. And only after the break, the same settlements were re-populated. But now other people have settled in them, who often (but not always) differed genetically from their predecessors.
Only in a few settlements did the old and new populations reside simultaneously. The “old population” there were the Jews, whom the new settlers, the ancestors of the current Palestinians, gradually got over. The local Jews, called “mustaarab” (Arabized), or Moriscos (Moors) in the language of Spanish Zionist immigrants, fled from their villages to the refuge cities of Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem and Hebron, where they joined the communities of rich people from Spain, who arrived after the expulsion of Jews from Spain, Portugal and Italy.
Only one of the dozens of Palestinian clans (Hamulas) recognizes its Jewish origin. All the rest believe that they are descendants of the Arabian tribes or Kurds, soldiers Salah ad-Din (Saladin’s army consisted of Turks, Circassians and Kurds). Many Arabs of Israel and Palestine consider themselves to be descendants of immigrants of 16-20 centuries from Syria, Lebanon, Transjordan, Egypt, Hejaz, Maghreb, Iraq, Bosnia, etc., although they do not like to admit it. Such is the opinion of Palestinians remaining in their homeland in Palestine.
But there is another opinion, too.
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In order to better understand the «genetic division» of the Palestinian population, let’s try to understand who the ancestors of the Palestinians actually were. The armies of Salah ad Din, Khorezmians, Mamluks, Tatar-Mongols, Seljuk Turks, Fatimids, Ottoman Turks, who rushed through Palestine \ Land of Israel on their way to Egypt, destroyed, first of all, Jews, as the most defenseless part of the population, and raped Christian women. Some of their soldiers and commanders settled in the devastated by them cities and villages of Palestine. It is a well-known fact that Saladin settled deserted Jerusalem and some of Galilee villages with his soldiers.
All these armies were completed by captive slaves who were captured in the steppes of the Volga region and in the mountains of the Caucasus. Then they became Mamluks, a caste of professional warriors. The rulers of the state of the Mamluks, the sultans of Egypt, the Seljuk Turks, the Ottoman Turks — all of them bore Turkic names. So there is enough reason to believe that a significant part of the Palestinian people genetically goes back to the various Turkic and other soldiers of the medieval conquerors. Whoever doubts, let him look at the portrait of smiling, chubby Ismail Haniya.
Numerous and heterogeneous medieval conquerors of Palestine were professional warriors. Among these warriors were at first Arab Muslims, genetically close to Levantines, but later came Turks, Khorezmians, Mongol-Tatars, Kurds, Circassians and other Caucasian highlanders who were genetically distant to the inhabitants of Western Asia. Of these, Saladin and the Mamluks, Seljuk Turks, and Ottoman Turks recruited their armies. During the period of Shiite Fatimid domination, North African settlers (mughrabis) could have entered Palestine.
These soldiers had no families. When they resigned and settled in cities and in the villages of Palestine, they had to look for (or seize by force) wives from the local population. From these wives, local maternal genes are trapped in the Palestinian gene pool.
Yes, but why is the other part of the Palestinians still genetically close to the Druze, the Jews and the Bedouin?
First, the recent waves of the immigration of Muslims and Christians to Palestine (initiated by the Turkish Sultan), came from Lebanon and Syria, as well as from Egypt and Arabia. Most of them are genetically close to the Druze and Bedouin, and ultimately to the Jews.
- ORIGIN OF PEOPLES, IDEOLOGY AND POLITICS
So, from a genetic point of view there were in Palestine two large groups of Muslim conquerors and settlers. These two groups of Palestinian ancestors were genetically “distant” from each other. The first of these were the Arabs, the warriors of Muhammad, who died shortly before the invasion of Muslims in Palestine. These were the same former pagans from the Aws tribe who, under the leadership of Muhammad, expelled and exterminated the Jews of Arabia, and then, having conquered Iraq and Syria-Palestine, began to do the same on the newly conquered territory.
Caliph of Muslims had to stop their ardor. He sent a message to the troops indicating not to exterminate Christians and Jews, but to leave alive, to give them the opportunity to farm the land and to collect taxes from them. The Caliph was the “substitute” of Muhammad (in Hebrew: “Makhlif”). His message had the power of a religious decree and was pasted into Hadith. It was this resolution of the Caliph that the Hamas ideologues made the foundation of the Hamas Charter. A quote from this letter can be found in the text of the Charter.
It was for this Charter that the majority of Palestinians voted. Nationalist Mahmoud Abbas mumbles about the Canaanite ancestors of the Palestinians and about the Khazar Jews, but the people vote for Hamas, who explicitly stated: “The Palestinians are the only legitimate owners of the country, because in the 7th century Muslims won it, and the Jews are not our relatives.» In general, the Palestinian people know who their ancestors were, know family traditions, know what a tribe they belong, know their genealogy. Genetic studies can only confirm the facts known to the Palestinians.
As for “Christians and Jews converted to Islam», with whom Western “left” anti-Semites buzzed our ears, the policy of the first caliphs was not to convert Christians and Jews to Islam. The reason was quite practical: the Muslims were freed from the “jizya”, this tax was paid by Christians and Jews. No ruler wants to get less money. The Fatimid caliph al-Hakim broke this rule and forced Jews and Christians to convert to Islam, but after his mysterious disappearance his reforms were canceled.
It is this Caliph al-Hakim that the Druze consider to be the founder of their sect. DNA genealogies show that the Druze are the descendants of the local (Levantine) Christians whom Al Hakim converted to Islam. Therefore, Druze are closest genetically to the ancient inhabitants of Canaan and to the Jews. Druzes consider as their ancestor the prophet Shueib, he is Jethro, Moses’ father-in-law. The main shrine of the Druze, named after the prophet Shueib, is located near Tiberias, Galilee.
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But let’s go back from ideology to genetics. American Lebanese funded the study by Mark Haber and his comrades: (http://digital.csic.es/bitstream/10261/112719/1/genome_wide_diversity_Haber.pdf)
Scientists have built a Lebanese genetic tree. Our topic has a genetic branch, which scientists have called West Asian. This branch is divided into «Druze» and another, which, in turn, was divided into 4 branches, covering a number of peoples of Asia Minor, namely the Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews, the peoples of the Caucasus, Turkey and Iran, Armenians, Cypriots, Syrians, Jordanians, Lebanese (Muslims and Christians), and another branch of the Druze.
For some reason, there were no Palestinians among the «close relatives» of the Lebanese. Whether the Palestinians, unlike the Lebanese and especially the Druze, have little in common with the inhabitants of ancient Canaan, or the Palestinian men refused to participate in the tests of geneticists, not without the influence of politics. Palestinians do not like to be investigated, it is easier for them to call the Jews “alien Khazars». For the same reason, they do not like archaeological excavations in Palestine / the Land of Israel, too.
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The newest studies of DNA genealogy can make adjustments to the picture obtained by the Atzmon group, to which I referred at the beginning of the article. If previous studies relied mainly on data on male chromosomes, now have appeared new studies on female (mitochondrial) chromosomes. The picture given by these studies comes down to the fact that women have always been much less mobile than men.
Many populations of the planet were born as a result of the “mixing” of alien men with women attached to their native place and to children. True, the nomads could wander along with the «ballast», as long as the family did not interfere too much with their conquests.
On this occasion, it is worth remembering the story by Lev Gumilev about the Huns. The Huns were forced to leave China, fleeing extermination. At first they took women and children with them, but in the middle of the way they threw this “ballast” into the steppes (how not to remember Abraham with Hagar) and continued their way westward “lightly”. Arriving on the Volga, the Hun warriors seized by force local women and remained to live in a new place. After 25 years, when the new generation grew up and matured, the Huns moved further to the West, to Europe.
Possibly, this story repeated just the Jews. It was the Jewish men who went to trade in distant countries, and did not always return to their original families, create new families in different countries from Europe to China. Women were taken from the new places. Vikings, Mongol-Tatars, Alexander the Great warriors, etc., behaved in a similar way.
By the way, the Jews of Moses roamed for 40 years, and during that time two generations grew up. Joshua had to circumcise and sworn half-bloods born of Moabite wives, while the wives themselves were not taken on a new campaign.
Studies of geneticists have shown that this method of reproduction was very common in past epochs, especially during wars and long hikes. This also applies to Jews and Palestinians:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms3543
A substantial prehistoric European ancestry amongst Ashkenazi maternal lineages
“The article by Richards and his group suggests the following version of the development of events: 2 thousand years ago, part of the Jewish population of Palestine left this territory, going to Europe, in particular to the Apennine peninsula. Indeed, even before our era, Jewish communities appeared in many cities in the Mediterranean. According to some data, the community of Rome numbered at the peak from 30 thousand to 50 thousand Jews. However, among the immigrants, says Richards, there were almost no women. Local converts of Judaism became wives of visitors from the Middle East. ”
When female (mitochondrial) DNA will be sufficiently taken into account in research, the picture obtained by Atzmon and others may change.
The “long-distance” movement of women happened when Muslims and Europeans engaged in the slave trade. So the female genes from East Africa came to the Middle East. Well, Ukrainians, captured by the Crimean Tatars and sold to Turkey, massively moved to Turkey. It would be worth checking Erdogan’s DNA, maybe he is a Ukrainian at all, or a Mongol …
- CONCLUSIONS
But joking aside, let’s draw conclusions.
In the Middle Ages, a demographic catastrophe occurred in Syria, Palestine and Lebanon. Archaeologists have long established that in the 11-14 centuries in these areas there was a sharp decrease in the population (4 times), a reduction in acreage, irrigation systems and many cities and villages were abandoned. The ancient population survived only in Lebanon, where there was no desertification.
In time, other people, came from distant and near places settled in the empty ruins. The «confusion» of newcomers with the remnants of the local population took place within the confines of confessions: Christians married with Christians, Jews with Jews, Druze with Druze. Only Muslim conquerors captured wives from representatives of other denominations. In this way (and not by converting to a new religion) Islamization of the population of the Levant occurred.
As a result, we have a picture that is specific to Syria, Lebanon and Palestine: genetic and political fragmentation and enmity between confessions and groups. However, similar picture was observed in Canaan in ancient times, too, thousands of years ago.
The genes of the ancient population of Canaan were preserved in the Druze, in a part of Muslim and Christian Lebanese, Syrians and Palestinians, and in most Jews. The Bedouins were originally genetically close to the ancient population of the Levant. Such is My explanation of the results of genetic research in our turbulent region.
The Palestinians (like the Jews) are people of mixed origins. They carry genes of both local origin (Levant) and people who have come to Palestine / Israel in the last thousand years. The Jews were mixed at the place of residence, that is, across the globe.
The ratio between the «primordial» genes and «minor» genes also depends on gender. In almost all populations of the world, women were less mobile than men.
Well, the name «Khazars» I put in quotes. If the Jews had Turkic blood (maybe) entered through the Khazars, then the Palestinians got them through the Turks who were captured in the same places (Volga region) where the Khazar Khaganate existed before. Later, the Turks invaded and seized power over the Levant (the Seljuk Turks and the Ottomans). In addition, many other conquerors participated in the genetics of the Palestinians. In order to determine the genetics of the Palestinians, new research is needed on both the male and female lines.
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So, the Land of Israel \ Palestine is the birthplace of two peoples, which is difficult to divide. But it is even harder to reconcile these two peoples in the context of global anti-Semitism and Islamist aggression against Israel. How can the Palestinians abandon the idea of destroying Israel if everyone, Islamists, leftists, nationalists of all stripes and all-powerful «global» anti-Semites encourage them to repeat the genocide of the Jews?
Both right and left anti-Semites justify the genocide of the Jews by the “wrong” Jewish race. If Hitler accused us of being Semites, then today’s leftists seized Hitler’s racist primacy and accuse us of just the opposite: we are European colonialists, or Khazars, or even rootless cosmopolitans who enslaved the Aboriginal Palestinians. Scientific genetics refutes the fabrications of both leftist and right-wing racism and anti-Semitism.
