Dienekes reviews The American Society of Human Genetics 2009 Abstract. There is a preliminary overview of genetic study of seven Jewish subgroups: Eastern European Ashkenazim; Italian, Greek and Turkish Sephardim; Iranian, Iraqi, and Syrian Mizrahim (Middle Easterners). All Jewish groups appear genetically distinct but closest to Southern Europeans, Druze, Bedouins and Palestinians. With exception of Iraqis and Iranians only European “Ladino” Sephardim and Syrians were part of this study. So it’s not a surprise that European admixture with admittedly wide range of 30-60% includes Greek and Turkish Sephardim and Syrian Mizrahim (Aleppo was nearest to Europe Silk Road stopover).
“STRUCTURE results show that the Jewish Diaspora groups all demonstrated Middle Eastern ancestry, but varied significantly in the extent of European admixture. There is almost no European ancestry in Iranian and Iraqi Jews, whereas Syrian, Sephardic, and Ashkenazi Jews have European admixture ranging from 30%~60%. Analysis of identity-by-descent provides further insight on recent and distinct history of such populations. These results demonstrate the shared and distinctive genetic heritage of Jewish Diaspora groups.
So, it seems that there will soon be real genomic data on the source and extent of admixture in Jews. The absence of Greek and Anatolian samples may be problematic in finding the sources of such admixture, but the presence of Tuscans, who are reasonably close to them in a pan-European context, should do well to serve as a substitute. In a recent sutdy (in which Anatolians were not included), the closest populations to Ashkenazi Jews were Italians of mostly southern provenance (Fst=0.0040) and Greeks (Fst=0.0042) and fairly close to Tuscans (Fst=0.0066).”
Further Reading:
Political Affiliations of the Orthodox Jews in America
Why Judaism is bad for the Jews
The Derivative Trifecta – Internet, Jews, Wall St.
