Who do you consider white? Is white a valid race?

No, my family traces its descent directly back to the israelites. I already said this. My ancestors also knew hebrew and aramaic, and no babylonian jews are not converts. Genetic studies prove this as does history and common knowledge. Babylonian Jews trace their lineage all the way back to the deportations of 586 BCE. Kurdish Jews also have more genetically in common with other jewish groups than with native kurds, because we are israelites from the northern kingdom deported in 722 BCE.

I am ceasing communication with you because of your personal attacks, rude insults, false accusations, and other trolling on my thread.

 

how could you possibly know this?

 

History, linguistics, and genealogies. On the island of djerba there is a community made up of entirely cohens, who claim israelite descent. Genetics backs up that they are related to other cohens including those in my community. It all comes down to science and common sense.

Are greeks descended from kazakhs? Are roma gypsies descended from africans? Are sefaradi jews descended from chinese?

 

An Iraqi Jew. We are called yehudim bavlim (babylonian jews) in hebrew.



More Iraqi Jews

 

Paternally, sefaradic jews have strong y-dna links to kurdish jews, indistinguishable actually. The israelites on the tunisian island of djerba look identical to us, absolutely identical. We look middle eastern, but not arab. Jews even refer to themselves as israelites, there are synagogues called 'israelite synagogues', alliance israelite universelle, and we are known as '3am Yisra'el" the people of Israel, in Hebrew. This phrase has been used for centuries upon centuries for the jewish people.

Years ago people ignored the other important y-dna studies. Hammer showed that ashkenazi jews have very close dna to roman jews (italkim) who are neither ashkenazi or sefaradic, and to romaniotes (greek jews who have lived in greece since antiquity)

The only jews who don't cluster with us are ethiopian jews, indian jews, chinese jews, south american tribes, etc. all of these groups are mostly descended from converts. The sefaradim and ashkenazim are identical. We only differ from those european jewish groups maternally, iraqis lack the southern european component. We are pure middle eastern. The european jews are mostly middle eastern. Again, 40% of all ashkenazi jews trace maternal lineages to only four middle eastern women as shown in the Behar study which others have later attempted to contradict using invalid statistical methods.

Paternally ashkenazi and Sefaradi Jews are identical, and autosomal dna shows identical dna between ashkenazi and sefaradi (including north african and syrian jews). The 3adot HamizraH (from iraq and iran) cluster closer with the caucasian jews of azerbaijan, armenian, georgia, and dagestan. We don't cluster with arabs. We do share some linkage with assyrians, which isn't surprising at all.

People keep forgetting though that cohens are all related and trace back directly to the israelites, its the priestly line. Cohen is even a middle eastern name, hebrew. So are the names levy, and sandlar, among many other names.


A famous israeli of tunisian israelite descent.



He looks identical to iraqi jews, its not even funny. There is definitely a common jewish phenotype, not all jews have it, but most do. And my family never considers it offensive, just how italians don't consider it offensive when someone says they look italian. Ethnic jews share common looks, we are a nation, 3am yisra'el.

 

Mizrahi and Sefaradi Jews from different diaspora origins together. Indistinguishable in terms of phenotype. Israelites from these communities especially share dna that is almost entirely the same. The diaspora is the people of israel, the israelites when the lived outside Israel. This pic is in Israel. Its harder to tell jews from other middle eastern populations, but the jews or israelites that lived in europe greatly stood out in eastern europe because of their darker features which are common to caucasians, north africans, and middle easterners. Still, even in berber and arab countries, israelites still have their own look. Even arabs have said my family looks jewish, I don't take offense. Its true.

 

The Jews from North Africa are Arab and Berber Jews.

The Jews from Iraq are Arab Jews and look like Arabs.

Jews from Syria are a mixture of Sephardic and Arab Jews.

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all Arab Jews.

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Israelite? he's had a genetic test done?

 

he submitted a sample but nobody is allowed to see the results apparently.

 

well, he does look like what an Israelite might look like.

but that's not 100% evidence.

 

So the title of the thread is "Who do you consider white? Is white a valid race?"
Has it been accepted that White is a valid race and Jews are generally not White?

 

you dont know what an Israelite looks like

 

sure I do.

they looked like the average person in the Middle East.

there is no logical reason to suggest otherwise.

saying that the ancient Israelites were all black, is racist dishonesty.

 

Here are pictures of Israelites drawn by Jews, around the year 150 AD, at the Dura-Europas Synagogue in Syria.

 

I am not an arab jew, mizrahi jews are not arab or berber jews, north african jews are sefaradim and genetically cluster with ashkenazim. The two groups are indistinguishable.

Iraqi Jews cluster close with sefaradi and ashkenazi jews, but closest with Iranian Jews and caucasian jews, not with arabs. Genetic tests have proven we are not arabs. We are yehudim bavlim, babylonian jews. And Cohens are certainly not arabs at all. Such a claim is ridiculous.

I have posted countless genetic studies backing up my claims. If sefaradim are 'arabs' then so are ashkenazim who cluster with sefaradim. The term in most cases is a contradiction anyway, its like saying "arab israelite" or "arab hebrew" or "arab kurd". Its self contradictory. Are Assyrians arabs? Of course not.

The idea that we are arabs has been disproven by history, genealogies, but most importantly science. If we want to discuss stereotypes, it is very stereotypical to say that everyone who comes from a middle eastern or north african country is an arab or berber. There are berber jews, but they live in the mountains, not in sefaradic cities like casablanca or marrakech or meknes.

 

Jews from North Africa, Kurdistan, Persia, and the Middle East are indeed Berber, Kurdish, Persian, and Arabic Jews.

They lived among these people for thousands of years, mixed with them, converted them, and coverted from them.

They are indistinguishable from them. The only thing that seperates them is religion and now politics.

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actually, genetic studies show an extreme similarity between Jews and Muslims in Kurdistan, the Arab areas, Persia, Yemen, and North Africa.

much closer than the genetic similarities between the Jews and Christians of Europe.

 

None of them are arabs, this has been proven by genetics. We are hebrews/israelites. That man comes from tunisian jews who are north african from europe and the middle east. Sefaradim are not arabs, genetic tests prove we cluster closest with other jews which proves we are israelites.

You have not provided any evidence for your claims, I have.

The largest study to date on the Jews of North Africa has been led by Gerard Lucotte et al. in 2003.[32] This study showed that the Jews of North Africa[Note 7] showed frequencies of their paternal haplotypes almost equal to those of the Lebanese and Palestinian non-Jews.

The authors also compared the distribution of haplotypes of Jews from North Africa with Sephardi Jews and Ashkenazi Jews and found a common origin between these groups.[40] The Jewish community of the island of Djerba in Tunisia is of special interest, making the tradition back to the time of the destruction of the First Temple. Two studies have attempted to test this hypothesis first by G. Lucotte et al. from 1993,[41] the second of F. Manni et al. of 2005.[42] They also conclude that the Jews of Djerba's paternal gene pool is different from the Arabs and Berbers of the island. For the first 77.5% of samples tested are of haplotype VIII (probably similar to the J haplogroup according Lucotte), the second shows that 100% of the samples are of Haplogroup J *. The second suggests that it is unlikely that the majority of this community comes from an ancient colonization of the island while for Lucotte it is unclear whether this high frequency is really an ancient relationship.

These studies therefore suggest that the paternal lineage of North African Jews comes predominantly from the Middle East with a minority contribution of African lineages, probably Berbers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_on_Jews#Y-DNA_of_Jews_from_North_Africa

North african Jews are more related to ashkenazi jews and sefaradic portuguese and spanish jews than they are to arabs or berbers.

Mt-DNA of Jews from North Africa

Analysis of mitochondrial DNA of the Jewish populations of North Africa (Morocco, Tunisia, Libya) has been the subject of further detailed study in 2008 by Doron Behar et al.[52] It shows that Jews from this region do not share the haplogroups of the mitochondrial DNA haplogroups (M1 and U6), which are typical of the North African of Berber and Arab populations. Similarly, while the frequency of haplogroups L, associated with sub-Saharan Africa, are around an average of 20–25% at the Berber populations studied, it is only 1.3%, 2.7% and 3.6% respectively among Jews from Morocco, Tunisia and Libya.[10]

Behar et al. conclude that it is unlikely that North African Jews have significant Arab, or Berber admixture, "consistent with social restrictions imposed by religious restrictions," or endogamy. This study also found genetic similarities between the Ashkenazi and North African Jewish mitochondrial DNA pools, but differences between both of these of the diaspora and Jews from the Middle East.[62]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_on_Jews#Mt-DNA_of_Jews_from_North_Africa

 

Kurds, Arabs, Persians, Egyptians, Berbers, Bedouins, all possess the J1 gene constantly associated with the Levites and Cohanim as being the Jewish genetic marker.

That clearly shows that the Jews of North Africa and the Middle East are very close relatives of the people that they came from.

I dont see why a Kurdish, Persian, Iraqi, Syrian, Egyptian, Yemeni, Tunisian Jew would see this as an insult.

if anything, its a compliment.

 

All of the studies I just posted prove that most Jews cluster closest with other Jews, not their host populations. Please provide evidence that Kurdish Jews descend from Kurds, that Tunisian Jews descend from Berbers or Arabs, that Iraqi, Georgian, Armenian, Azeri, Dagestani and Iranian Jews (who cluster together) descend from arabs and that sefaradic jews are not related to ashkenazi jews.

The only jews that mostly resemble their host populations are converts, like the ethiopians, cochin indian jews, chinese jews, etc. This has all been proven genetically. Its science.

We came out of the israelites, not the kurds or arabs.

Cohens also genetically match, but even without the studies on cohens, there are dozens of studies proving that jews are related mostly to other jews than to their host populations.

 

The term "Sephardi" refers to significantly different populations from one study to another. It can have a very restrictive meaning and only referring to people speaking Judeo-Spanish (excluding Moroccan Jews) or at the opposite the term Sephardi may designate all non-Ashkenazi populations (excluding Jews from Ethiopia, Yemen and the Kurdish Jews). Between these two extremes, all kinds of variations exist.

Investigations made by Nebel et al.[7] on the genetic relationships among Ashkenazi Jews, Kurdish and Sephardi (North Africa, Turkey, Iberian Peninsula, Iraq and Syria) indicate that Jews are more genetically similar to groups in northern Fertile Crescent (Kurds, Turks and Armenians) than to Arabs. Considering the timing of this origin, the study found that "the common genetic Middle Eastern background (of Jewish populations ) predates the ethnogenesis in the region and concludes that the Y chromosome pool of Jews is an integral part of the genetic landscape of Middle East

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genetic_studies_on_Jews#Y-DNA_of_Sephardi_Jews

 

Wrong. All of this has been disproven by the genetic studies I posted. Ashkenazi, Sefaradic, North African, and Mizrahi Jews are most closely related to each other than to their host populations. This has been proven by science. The statements you have made have all been countered by dozens of genetic studies.

 

In June 2010, Behar et al. "shows that most Jewish samples form a remarkably tight subcluster with common genetic origin, that overlies Druze and Cypriot samples but not samples from other Levantine populations or paired Diaspora host populations. In contrast, Ethiopian Jews (Beta Israel) and Indian Jews (Bene Israel and Cochini) cluster with neighboring autochthonous populations in Ethiopia and western India, respectively, despite a clear paternal link between the Bene Israel and the Levant.".[5][17] "The most parsimonious explanation for these observations is a common genetic origin, which is consistent with an historical formulation of the Jewish people as descending from ancient Hebrew and Israelite residents of the Levant."[17] The authors say that the genetic results are concordant "with the dispersion of the people of ancient Israel throughout the Old World".[17] Regarding the samples he used, Behar says, "Our conclusion favoring common ancestry (of Jewish people) over recent admixture is further supported by the fact that our sample contains individuals that are known not to be admixed in the most recent one or two generations.

 

As for Ashkenazi Jews, genealogies add to the genetic evidence that they are descended from the middle east, specifically from the hebrews.


The first major Ashkenazi literary figure was Rashi (Solomon ben Isaac of Troyes, 1040-1105),

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/Ashkenazim.html





Johanan HaSandlar (lit. "Johanan the Shoemaker" or "Johanan the Sandalmaker", alternatively "Johanan the Alexandrian") (Hebrew: יוחנן הסנדלר&#8206 (c. 100 CE – c. 150 CE) was one of the main students of Rabbi Akiva and a contemporary of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. He is one of the tannaim whose teachings are quoted in the Mishnah. The name "HaSandlar" may imply that Rabbi Yohanan earned his living as a shoemaker, but it could also indicate that he was a native of Alexandria, Egypt.[1]

Rabbi Yochanan was a great-grandson of Rabbi Gamaliel the Elder; he also purportedly traced his ancestry back to King David.[2] Rashi, the great medieval commentator, was a 33rd-generation descendant of Rabbi Yochanan.

He is well known for his saying in the Mishnah of Pirkei Avoth (4:14): "Every assembly that is for the sake of Heaven will survive; but if it is not for the sake of Heaven, it will not survive."

He died on the 29th day of the Hebrew month of Tammuz (the same yahrzeit as that of Rashi), and was buried 200 meters from the tomb of Shimon bar Yochai in Meron, Israel.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yochanan_Hasandlar

 

Two Sefaradi Jews (including one famous Syrian Jew) and an Ashkenazi Jew in the center. Phenotypes are identical. Genealogies trace them directly back to the hebrews of antiquity. Photo taken in Jerusalem in the early 20th century, decades before the modern state of Israel. They are of the same race.

 

The J1 gene, which is associated with Cohanim, is extremely common amoung Bedouins, Kurds, Jordanians, Palestinians, and Yemenites.

In fact this gene, which is used as evidence of Israelite ancestry, is more common amoungst non-Jews in the Middle East than Jews!!!!

 

The other absurdity to the claim that "mizrahi" iraqi jews are "arab jews" (besides the obviously silly self contradiction) is that mizrahim from georgia are also descended from yehudim bavlim (babylonian jews, that is jews whose culture flourished in babylon after remaining in babylon.) Georgian jews and other caucasion mountain jews from dagestan and azerbaijan genetically cluster with us the closest, along with iranian jews. Are georgian jews arab? Are dagestani jews arab? Are iranian jews arab? Are azeri jews arab? Which, pray tell, arab tribe do they descend from? Which arab tribe do we descend from? The hebrew presence in babylon is well attested as is the babylonian jewish diaspora which not only spread to the northern caucasian countries, but also to europe, including spain and germany, helping form medieval ashkenaz and sefarad communities.

It all comes down to history, and thank god we have science to back up history rather than subscribe to these ignorant claims of arab descent. To say that jews simply are 'mass converts to the religion of judaism' from the nation they lived in is completely baseless, both in terms of history and science.

Georgian Jews are not arab and neither are Iraqi jews. We are jews, hebrews, israelites, whatever. Babylon was such an important center for the hebrew exiles of Jerusalem, this is where the babylonian talmud developed along with some of the greatest rabbinical dynasties. There is no historical record of any arab tribes in babylon 'converting to judaism'. It simply isn't there. Its myth and legend. Contrary to this ridiculous claim, my family and many other families descend from famous rabbinical families who trace their lines all the way back to babylonian jews who themselves trace their lines back to king david.

Jews in the ethnic sense are called '3am yisrael', the people of israel, a hebrew term referring to jews/israelites. My ancestors always knew hebrew and aramaic. Speaking arabic or rather judeo-arabic (which is written in aramaic/hebrew characters) doesn't make someone an arab. Kurds speak arabic, and they are not arabs. Iraqi Assyrians and Iraqi Turkmen are not descended from arab tribes either even though they speak arabic.

The only arab tribes that converted to judaism were from arabia, and in one case that stands out, an arabian king in yemen converted to judaism, thus yemenite jews have some arabian ancestry, but also direct hebrew and israelite ancestry. They are not even 'mizrahi' (a modern israeli invention), they are teimanim. They have the oldest pronunciation of hebrew and also know aramaic. They also cluster with other jewish groups, although they have some arab admixture and also cluster with ethiopian converts to judaism.

But georgian, kurdish, iraqi, azeri, georgian, armenian, iranian, bukharim and other caucasian mountain jews all cluster on top of each other, not with arabs. We aren't arabs, but descend from the ancient babylonian jewish and persian jewish communities. The only difference between us and ashkenazi jews genetically speaking is that ashkenazi and sefaradi jews picked up mediterranean blood to varying degrees.