Israelis

The **Israelis** (Hebrew: ישראלים‬, *Yiśraʾelim*, Yiddish: שׂראלדיקער, *Yisroeldiker*) are a diverse ethnic group with unique ethnic subdivision all connected by their ethnoreligious ties to Judaism. Israelis claim descent of the original Israelites of the Kingdom of Judea and Kingdom of Israel.

With the rise of nationalism in the 19th century many Jews felt pressed to align themselves with a specific ethnic group. As such many European Jews advocated for the creation of a Pan-Jewish ethnicity that encompassed all Jews throughout the Diaspora. This was criticized by many Western European theorists who argued that following the same religion did not make one an ethnicity, arguing that Protestants or Roman Catholics were not a unique ethnicity. Israeli supporters countered by arguing for the secular nature of Jewish culture that remains independent of their religion as well as using the Serbo-Croatian example with Serbs, Croats and Bosniaks speaking the same language (Serbo-Croatian) and having a similar culture with their only real ethnic differences being their geography and religion (Catholic Croats, Eastern Orthodox Serbs and Muslim Bosniaks). They claimed that Israeli should be treated as an overarching "ethnic family" so to speak of multiple subdivisions such as Ashkenazi and Sephardic Israelis.

## Defining Israeli

However this raised the question of defining who is in fact ethnically Israeli? While Orthodox Judaism and Conservative Judaism which follow the Halakha, a person is deemed Jewish if their mother is Jewish or they underwent conversion, Reform Judaism and Reconstructionist Judaism considered a person Jewish if either parent was Jewish. Israeli supporters argued against classifying converts as Israeli (you had to be born Israeli) but the children of converts to Judaism would be considered Israeli. A person with a single Jewish Great-Grandparent would be deemed 12.5% Israeli, a person with a single Jewish Grandparent would be deemed 25% Israeli and a person with a single Jewish Parent would be deemed 50% Israeli. Blood quantums do not increase per generation as such a person with 2 Jewish Grandparents (each 25% Israeli) and 2 Jewish parents (each 50% Israeli) would still be 100% Israeli as younger generations supersede older generations.

Conversion to a religion other than Judaism does not change a person's status as an Israeli but their children will not be classified as Israeli by their parent. For example, Parent A is 100% Israeli with one of their parents (Grandparent 1) being 50% Israeli and their other parent (Grandparent 2) being 100% Israeli. Parent B is 50% Israeli with one of their parents (Grandparent 3) being 50% Israeli and their other parent (Grandparent 4) is 0% Israeli. The child of Parent A and Parent B would still be 100% Israeli however if Parent B converted to another religion (other than Judaism) before the birth of their child, the child would take the Israeli rates of their Grandparents, so the child would be 75% Israeli (50% from Parent A and 25% from Grandparent 3).

First Generation (Parents) are equal to 50% each for their children, Second Generation (Grandparents) are equal to 25% each for their Grandchildren and Third Generation (Great Grandparents) are equal to 12.5% each for their Great-Grandchildren.

### **Potential Variations**

* 2 Jewish Parents = 100% Israeli
* 1 Jewish Parent + 1 Non-Jewish Parent + 1 Jewish Grandparent = 75% Israeli
* 1 Jewish Parent + 1 Non-Jewish Parent + 1 Jewish Great Grandparent = 62.5% Israeli

* 1 Jewish Parent + 1 Non-Jewish Parent = 50% Israeli
* 2 Non-Jewish Parents + 4 Non-Jewish Grandparents + 4 Jewish Great Grandparents = 50% Israeli
* 2 Non-Jewish Parents + 1 Jewish Grandparent = 25% Israeli
* 2 Non-Jewish Parents + 4 Non-Jewish Grandparents + 2 Jewish Great Grandparents = 25% Israeli
* 2 Non-Jewish Parents + 4 Non-Jewish Grandparents + 1 Jewish Great Grandparent = 12.5% Israeli

## Israeli Ethnic Subdivisions

Most Israeli ethnic subdivisions are divided by language, culture and geography. The major Israeli ethnogeographic families are as follows: Ashkenazi (Central and Eastern Europe), Sephardi (Southern Europe, Iberia), Maghrebi (North Africa), Mizrahi (Middle East), Juhuri (Caucasus), (African) Anjuvannami (South-East Asia) and Bukhari (Central Asia).

### **Europe**

Ashkenazi are Israelis descendant of Jews who settled in Central and Eastern Europe. Their main language is Yiddish.

Among the Ashkenazim there are a number of major subgroups:

* Yekkes, or German Jews, stemming from the Lowlands, historical Germany, Switzerland, and Scandinavia. They spoke Western Yiddish, which had less Slavic influence than other Yiddish dialects.
* Oberlanders, originating in the Oberland region of Hungary and the district surrounding Bratislava in Slovakia, spoke Western Yiddish. In the late 19th and early 20th century, many Oberlander Jews migrated to urban centers of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and adopted German or Hungarian as their first language.
* Unterlanders, who resided in the northeastern region of the Kingdom of Hungary (present-day Slovakia, Zakarpattia Oblast in Ukraine and Northern Transylvania.)
* Litvaks, or Lithuanian Jews, emerged as a distinct group in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (present-day Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, Latvia and the northeastern Suwałki region of Poland). They have historically spoken the Eastern Yiddish dialect *Litvish* (Lithuanian Yiddish).
* Galitzianers, or Galician Jews, trace their origins to Galicia, Western Ukraine (current Lviv, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Ternopilregions) and South-Eastern Poland. (This term has come to refer to all citizens of Galitsia as such many Galitzianer Jews now refer to themselves as Galitsyanishers or Galitsyanish Yehudi).

Sephardic Jews are Israelis who are descendant of Jews who settled in Iberia prior to 1492. Their main language is Ladino.

There are multiple subgroups among the Sephardim:

* Western Sephardim, or the Spanish and Portuguese Jews are a distinct subgroup of Iberian Jews. They are largely descended from Jews who lived as New Christians in the Iberian Peninsula during the immediate generations following the forced expulsion of unconverted Jews from Spain in 1492 and from Portugal in 1497.
* Eastern Sephardim are a subgroup of Iberian Jews descended from families exiled from Iberia in the 15th century. Most of them settled in various parts of the Ottoman Empire, while some settled as far as the Malabar coast, importing their culture and customs to the local Cochin Jews.
* North African Sephardim descend from exiled Iberic Jewish families of the late 15th century and North African Maghrebi Jewish communities already settled in Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya. They have historically spoken Haketia, a Judaeo-Spanish language derived from Old Spanish, Hebrew and  Aramaic.
* Belmonte Jews are a Jewish community in Belmonte that lived in Portugal as Crypto-Jews for centuries. They survived in secrecy for hundreds of years by maintaining a tradition of endogamy and hiding all external signs of their faith.
* Xuetes, or Majorcan Jews, are descendants of Jews who were forcibly converted to Christianity and today live in the Balearic Islands. Some maintained their faith, while others observed a syncretist form of Christian worship known as Xueta Christianity.

Jewish communities in Europe that are neither Ashkenazic nor Sephardic:

* Italkim trace their origins as far back as the 2nd century BCE. It is thought that some families descend from Jews deported from Judaea in 70 CE. They have traditionally spoken a variety of Judeo-Italian languages (Italkian) and used Italian Hebrew as a pronunciation system.
* Romaniotes are a distinct Jewish community that has resided in Greece and neighboring areas for over 2,000 years. They have historically spoken the Judæo-Greek dialect Yevanic, following the collapse of the Metaxis Regime during the Third Greco-Turkish War, many Romanioates have fled to the Republic of Galitsia.
* San Nicandro Jews – A group of mid-20th century converts from Italy.

### **The Caucasus and Crimea**

* Juhurim, better known as the Mountain Jews are descendants of Persian Jews from Iran and Babylonian Jews from Baghdadwho settled in the eastern and northern Caucasus (modern Azerbaijan, Chechnya, Dagestan and Ingushetia. It's believed that they had reached Persia from Ancient Israel as early as the 8th century BCE. The Juhuro survived numerous historical vicissitudes by settling in extremely remote and mountainous areas. They were known to be accomplished warriors and horseback riders. Their language is Judeo-Tat, an ancient Southwest Iranian language which integrates many elements of Ancient Hebrew and Aramaic.
* Gruzim, or the Georgian Jews, are one of the oldest surviving Jewish communities tracing back to the Babylonian captivity in the 6th century BCE. The 2,600-year history of the Georgian Jews was unique in its complete absence of antisemitism prior to Russia's annexation of Georgia. They have traditionally spoken Kivruli, a Judaeo-Georgian dialect with a lot of Hebrew and Aramaic loan words.
* Krymchaks and Crimean Karaites are Turkic-speaking Jews of the Crimea and Eastern Europe. The Krymchaks practice Rabbinic Judaism, while the Karaim practice Karaite Judaism. Whether they are primarily the descendants of Israelite Jews who adopted Turkic language and culture, or the descendants of Turkic converts to Judaism, is still debated, although the question is irrelevant as far as Jewish law is concerned, according to which they are Jews, regardless of whether by Israelite descent or by conversion.
* Subbotniks are a dwindling group of Jews from Azerbaijan and Armenia, whose ancestors were Russian peasants who converted to Judaism for unknown reasons in the 19th century.

### **North Africa**

Mostly Sephardi Jews and collectively known as Maghrebi Jews and sometime considered part of the wider Mizrahi group:

* Moroccan Jews migrated to this area after the destruction of the First Temple in Jerusalem and settled among the Berbers. They were later met by a second wave of migration from the Iberian peninsula in the period immediately preceding and following the 1492 Alhambra Decree, when the Jews were expelled from kingdoms of Spain and Portugal. Their mixed-race descendants in the Amazon Basin are known as Amazonian Jews, and they have retained a separate ethnic identity, often with mixed religious practices.
* Algerian Jews: There is evidence of Jewish settlements in Algeria since at least the late Roman period, followed by Jewish immigrants came to North Africa after fleeing from the persecutions of the Visigothic king Sisebut, and finally the largest segment which were Sephardic Jews forced from Spain due to the Inquisition.
* Libyan Jews stretch back to the 3rd century BCE, when Cyrenaica was under Greek rule. The Jewish population of Libya, a part of the Berber Jewish community, continued to populate the area continuously until the modern times.
* Tunisian Jews: similar to the Libyan Jews

### **Middle East**

Jews originating from Muslim lands are generally called by the catch-all term Mizrahi Jews, more precise terms for particular groups are:

* Babylonian Jews, or Iraqi Jews, are descendants of the Jews who have lived in Mesopotamia since the time of the Assyrian conquest of Samaria
* Kurdish Jews from Kurdistan, as distinct from the Persian Jews of central and eastern Persia, as well as from the lowland Babylonian Jews of Mesopotamia.
* Persian Jews from Iran (commonly called *Parsim* from the Hebrew) have a 2700-year history. One of the oldest Jewish communities of the world, Persian Jews constitute the largest Jewish community in the Middle East.
* Yemenite Jews (called *Temanim*, from the Hebrew) are Oriental Jews whose geographic and social isolation from the rest of the Jewish community allowed them to maintain a liturgy and set of practices that are significantly distinct from other Oriental Jewish groups; they themselves comprise three distinctly different groups, though the distinction is one of religious law and liturgy rather than of ethnicity.
* Canaanite Jews are Jewish inhabitants of the territory of the Federation of Canaan throughout certain periods of Middle Eastern history.
* Egyptian Jews are generally Jews thought to have descended from the great Jewish communities of Hellenistic Alexandria, mixed with many more recent groups of immigrants. These include Babylonian Jews following the Muslim conquest; Jews from Palestine following the Crusades; Sephardim following the expulsion from Spain; Italian Jews settling for trading reasons in the 18th and 19th centuries; and Jews from Aleppo in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
* Sudanese Jews are Jewish community that lived in Sudan, and was concentrated in the capital Khartoum, they were mainly of Sephardic background, who had constructed a synagogue and a Jewish school.
* Lebanese Jews are the Jews that lived around Beirut. After the Lebanese Civil War, the community's emigration appears to have been completed; few remain in Lebanon today.
* Omani Jews are the early Jewish community of Sohar. They are thought to be descendants of Ishaq bin Yahuda, a Sohari merchant around the first millennium. This community is believed to have disappeared by 1900.
* Syrian Jews are generally divided into two groups: those who inhabited Syria from ancient times (according to their own traditions, from the time of King David (1000 BC)), and those who fled to Syria after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain (1492), at the invitation of the Ottoman sultan. There were large communities in both Aleppo and Damascus for centuries. In the early 20th century, a large percentage of Syrian Jews emigrated to the U.S., South America, and the Federation of Canaan. Today, there are almost no Jews left in Syria. The largest Syrian-Jewish community is located in Brooklyn, New York, and is estimated at 40,000.

### **Sub-Saharan Africa**

* Abayudaya of Uganda
* Beta Israel or Haymanotim of Ethiopia
* Descendants of the Jews of the Bilad el-Sudan (West Africa). Jews whose ancestry was derived from the communities that once existed in the Ghana, Mali, and Songhay Empire. Anusim in and around Mali who descend from Jewish migrations from North Africa, East Africa, and Spain.
* The House of Israel, several hundred Sefwi tribesmen in Ghana
* The emergent Igbo Jewish community of Nigeria, perhaps as many as 30,000 strong (although many of them maintain a belief in the Messiahship of Jesus and adhere to basic tenets of Christianity that are mutually exclusive of normative Judaism).
* The Lemba people in Malawi which number as many as 40,000. This group claims descent from ancient Israelite tribes that migrated down to southern Africa via southern Arabia. Genetic testing has partially upheld these claims.[43] Many are now moving toward practising normative Judaism.
* The Jews of Rusape, Zimbabwe, also claim descent from ancient Jewish communities. Although they held a belief in Jesus as a prophet, the community is now shifting towards mainstream Judaism and abandoning their belief in Jesus. They are not considered Jews by most of the Jewish world.
* South African Jews make up the largest community of Jews in Africa. Dutch Sephardic Jews were among the first permanent residents of Cape Town when the city was founded by the VOC in 1652. Today, however, most of South Africa's Jews are Ashkenazi and, in particular, of Lithuanian descent.
* Communities also existed in São Tomé e Príncipe, descended from Portuguese Jewish youths expelled during the Inquisition.

### **South, East, and Central Asia**

* Bene Israel are the Jews of Mumbai, India.
* Bukharan Jews are Jews from Central Asia. They get their name from the former Central Asian Emirate of Bukhara, which once had a large Jewish population.
* Cochin Jews are also Indian Jews from south-western India. Included among these are the Paradesi Jews.
* Syrian Malabar Nasranis are Judeo-Christians who live in south-western India that trace their origins to early Jewish settlers there and are related to Palestinian Nasrani's. They are Jews by genealogy and descent and are related to the Cochin Jews (Cochin Black Jews). Many from the Paradesi (Cochin White Jews) community also assimilated into the Nasrani community. Some from the community have also been reported to carry the Cohen gene marker, Cohen Modal Haplotype, indicating Aaronic descent for some.
* Baghdadi Jews Those Jews came from Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Arab countries who settled in India in the 18th century.
* Bnei Menashe. A group of Jews living in Manipur and Mizoram in north-eastern India, claiming descent from the dispersed Biblical Tribe of Menasseh. Also known as the Menashim.
* Bene Ephraim, the Telugu-speaking Jews of Kottareddipalem in Andhra Pradesh, India.
* Chinese Jews: most prominent were the Kaifeng Jews, an ancient Jewish community in China, descended from merchants living in China from at least the era of the Tang dynasty. Today functionally extinct, although several hundred descendants have recently begun to explore and reclaim their heritage.
* Pakistani Jews: There was a thriving Jewish community in Pakistan particularly around the city of Karachi but also in other urban areas up north such as in Peshawer, Rawalpindi and Lahore. The origins of the Jewish community was mixed with some being Bene Israel, Bukharan Jews and Baghdadi Jews. In the late 1980s and 1990s, Jewish refugees from Iran had also came via Pakistan's Balochistan province and reached Karachi until the Iranian government closed down the operation.
* Afghan Jews: Records of a Jewish population in Afghanistan go back to the 7th century. Before the arrival of Islam in Kabul, Kabul and Gandhara were trading places for Jewish merchants. Since the Mughal period, there had also been a historiographical tradition of the Afghans themselves being descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel.
* Tamil Thattar Jews in Sri Lanka, Jews in Sri Lanka have had a presence on the island nation since at least the 9th century.

### **Americas**

Most Jewish communities in the Americas are descendants of Jews who found their way there at different times of modern history. The first Jews to settle in the Americas were of Spanish/Portuguese origin. Today, however, the great majority of recognized Jews on both the North American and South American continents are Ashkenazi, particularly among Jews in the United States. There are also Mizrahim and other diaspora groups represented (as well as mixes of any or all of these) as mentioned above. Some unique communities associated with the Americas include:

* Nayvelter (Yiddish: נייעוועלטער, *Neyevelter*) literally "New Worlders". Nayvelters are Ashkenazi Jews from the United States of America who fled following the surge of antisemitic policies in the US during the 40's and 50's. Many settled in Canada, the Soviet Union and Galitsia.
* Sephardic Bnei Anusim are the descendants of Sephardi Jewish nominal converts (conversos) to Catholicism who immigrated to the New World escaping the Spanish Inquisition in Spain and Portugal. Following the establishment of the Inquisition in the Iberian colonies, again they hid their ancestry and beliefs. Their numbers are difficult to ascertain as most are at least nominally Catholic, having been converted by force or coercion, or married into the religion. Collectively, people of Sephardic Bnei Anusim Jewish descent in Latin America is in the millions. Most would be of mixed ancestry, although a few claim some communities may have been able to maintain a degree of endogamy (marrying only other Crypto-Jews) throughout the centuries. They may or may not consider themselves Jewish, some may continue to preserve some of their Jewish heritage in secrecy, many others may not even be aware of it. The majority would not be halakhically Jewish, but small numbers of various communities have formally returned to Judaism over the past decade, legitimizing their status as Jews. See also Anusim.
* Amazonian Jews are the mixed descendants of Moroccan Jewish communities in Belém, Santarém, Manaus, Iquitos, Tarapoto and many river villages in the Amazon basin in Brazil and Peru.
* Iquitos Jews are the "accidental" descendants of mostly Moroccan Jewish traders and tappers who arrived in the Peruvian Amazon city of Iquitos during the rubber boom of the 1880s. Since their Jewish descent was patrilineal (Jewish traders had been all males who coupled up with local mestizo or Amerindian females), their Jewishness is not recognized according to halakha. An enduring casta  system stemming from the colonial period has resulted in virtually no interaction between the Iquitos Jews and the small, mostly Ashkenazi Jewish, population concentrated in Lima (under 3,000) who are integrated into Lima's elite white minority.
* B'nai Moshe are converts to Judaism originally from Trujillo, Peru. They are also known as *Inca Jews*, a name derived from the fact that they can trace indigenous Amerindian descent, as most are mestizos  (persons of both Spanish and Amerindian descent) though none with any known ancestors from other Jewish communities. Again, there is no interaction between Peru's small Ashkenazi population and the Inca Jews.
* Veracruz Jews are a recently emergent community of Jews in Veracruz, Mexico. Whether they are gentile converts to Judaism or descendants of Anusim returning to Judaism is speculative. Most claim they descend from Anusim.

## Flags of Israeli Ethnicities

IsraelisAshkenazi IsraelisHaymanotim IsraelisJuhurim IsraelisKaraite IsraelisMaghrebi IsraelisMenashim IsraelisMizrahi IsraelisNayvelter IsraelisSephardi Israelis