Posted on 05/04/2006 7:03:48 AM PDT by white trash redneck
I thought the Kurds were the descendants of the ancient Medes and therefore Indo-European. But since the Ten Lost Tribes were initially exiled by the Assyrians (northern Mesopotamia) then I suppose they left some genetic evidence behind. I'm not comfortable with the whole "lost tribes" ideology, however.
Thanks--muy interrasante.
Now that you mention it, that is kinda odd.
Kurds seem to be, relative to the region of course, thriving as well.
Also, interesting sidenote:
The genetic populations that have the highest chance of red hair: Anglo-Saxons (last I heard, it was actually higher than celtic chance), celtic, Western Russians, Ashkenazic Jews and Swedes (but not Norwegians or Finns, particularly).
As far as the lost tribes go, Simha Jacobovici (local Toronto academic & filmaker) had an interesting take on the subject in a two hour documentary called Quest for the lost Tribes. Controversial, but certainly worth a look. Josh Bernstein (digging for the truth show) had a nice presentation in one episode on the Lembe - a bit lightweight, but worthwhile.
This genetic research is very interesting. There are still a lot of discoveries to be made, I think.
The assumption has always been that Jews and Arabs are semitic people, and of course the tradition is that Arabs descend from Ishmael, who is the rejected son of the Bible but the chosen son of the Qran. It's one of the important factual points on which the Qran cannot be reconciled with the Bible. Which is to say that, from both a Christian and a Jewish perspective, Islam is false and heretical.
Ishmael was a wanderer, and the Bedouin are wanderers. But I'll be curious to see the results of further research into these areas.
:-)
"In short, the CMH is a genetic marker from the northern Middle East which is not unique to Jews. However, its existence among many Kurds and Armenians, as well as some Italians and Hungarians, would seem to support the overall contention that Kurds and Armenians are the close relatives of modern Jews and that the majority of today's Jews have paternal ancestry from the northeastern Mediterranean region."
The bible, and later migrations of people, can, together tell us why this is so (Kurds and Jews are closely related).
The Bible identifies the birthplace of Abram (Abraham) as Tell al-Muqayyar (ancient city called Ur). It lies near the city of Nasiriyah in the southwestern floodplain of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, 140 miles south of Babylon.
So, there are two possibilities.
One of those possibilities is that while Abraham went south out of the area (Iraq), the later building and destorying of various empires in the area, led his closest relatives that remained in Ur, to migrate north, into what is now the Kurdish area and Armenia.
The other possibility is that the ancestors of Abraham began in the Kurdish area and migrated down to Ur before he was born.
But, either way, what seems to have allowed the gene pool of Kurds, Jews and Armenians to retain the markers of their closely related ancestry is that all three groups have always, like Abraham's descendents, resisted total assimilation into those around them.
There may even be very ancient and common religious components as to why those three groups have resisted assimilation.
We have Abraham's version that he carried with him, but maybe in the deep recesses of Kurdish and Armenian folk-lore, some spiritual commonality with Abraham can also be found.
I guess that's another discussion.
"This looks ideology-driven to me. The Palestinian Arabs are really the South Syrians. I would like to see data -- which I didn't find even alluded to in the article -- about how different the Palestinian Arabs are from the Syrians from a DNA-analysis perspective."
Why?
If Ishmael was the son of Abraham, and Abraham was the prime paternal ancestor of the Hebrews, and most of Ishmael's descendents form are large part of the paternal gene pool of what are now called Arabs, then surely, the Y choromosome inherited from Abraham should be predominate in both Jews and Arabs.
There is every indication, both in and out of the Bible, that the status of Ishmael's maternity (the non-Hebrew servant of Abraham's wife) lent to a stigma among the Hebrews toward Ishmael and a stigma in Ishmael toward the Hebrews; due to the Hebrews relationship to Issac, Abraham's second son by his wife Sarah.
Although this is ancient history, it would appear that the mutual animosity continues between the descendents of Abraham's sons, Ishmael and Issac.
The only thing that I'm suspecting may be ideologically driven is the statement, not supported in the article, that the Jews' DNA is closer to that of the Palestinian Arabs than it is to the Syrians. This statement supports the ideology that the Palestinian Arabs are a separate people from the Syrians, and that there really is such a thing as an indigenous Palestinian Arab population.
Are you folks suggesting the people of the OT sat sending their Kurds a-whey?
Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on or off the
"Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list or GGG weekly digest
-- Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)
I can't wait until Google spiders that post.
I think YOU are putting too much politics into that distinction, not the writers of the article.
Given Abraham's migration path, his life leading to both Ishmael and Issac, followed centuries later by the empire of the Assyrians (indo-Europeans, closer to Greeks and Persians), north of Israel (souce of what became "Syria"), it is not politics or surprusing to me that people of Israel and Arabs in Palestine would be more closely related than Arabs in Palestine and Syrians.
The "Arab" identity in Syria does not occur, politically or in any other way until the expansion of the Islamic empires. Most of that was conquest and conversion by the sword, more than the Assyrian gene pool being eradicated and displaced by "Arabs".
In international politics the Syrian's like to play the "one great Arab nation card"; and they have been participating in that role since the Ottoman Empire started falling apart. Back home, they know the difference and they know they retain that "Assyrian" distinction that long preceeded Islam and the Arab conquest. They know that long before the Arabs came out of the desert and conquered the land, Damascus was already a city with more wordly renown than Mecca or Medina had ever known.
When people wonder why the true Arabs (Arabia) and the Iraqi's, Syrian's and Egyptians could never, politically put that "one great Arab nation" together, they are missing what all those groups know - they never were "one great 'Arab' nation"; and they know it better than anyone.
That makes a great deal of sense. Thank you for your insights.
The Kurds and the Ottoman Empire -- even if the Kurds and Turks don't get along.
I'm more and more convinced that the problem with Islam isn't Islam, but the Arabs.
Do you think the modern Palestinians realize this?
chas v'chalilah
Bump for later. Looks interesting.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.