The maternal lineages of Jewish populations, studied by looking at
mitochondrial DNA, are generally more heterogeneous.
[27] Scholars such as
Harry Ostrer and
Raphael Falk believe this may indicate that many Jewish males found new mates from European and other communities in the places where they migrated in the diaspora after fleeing ancient Israel.
[28]
Two studies in 2006 and 2008 suggested that about 40% of Ashkenazi Jews originate maternally from just four female founders who were likely of Near-Eastern origin, while the populations of Sephardi and Mizrahi Jewish communities "showed no evidence for a narrow founder effect".
[29][27]
With the exception of Ethiopian Jews and Indian Jews, it has been argued that all of the various Jewish populations have components of mitochondrial genomes that were of Middle Eastern origin.
[30][5]
In 2013, however, Richards et al. published work suggesting that an overwhelming majority of Ashkenazi Jewish maternal ancestry, estimated at "80 percent of Ashkenazi maternal ancestry comes from women indigenous to Europe, and [only] 8 percent from the Near East, with the rest uncertain", suggesting that Jewish males migrated to Europe and took new wives from the local population, and converted them to Judaism, though some geneticists, such as Doron Behar, have expressed disagreement with the study's conclusions.
[31] Another study by Eva Fernandez and her colleagues argues that the K lineages (claimed to be European in origin by Richards et al.) in Ashkenazi Jews might have an ancient Near Eastern source.
[32]
In 1992 G. Lucotte and F. David were the first genetic researchers to have documented a common paternal genetic heritage between
Sephardi and
Ashkenazi Jews.
[33][34] Another study published just a year later suggested the Middle Eastern origin of Jewish paternal lineages.
[35]
In 2000, M. Hammer, et al. conducted a study on 1,371 men and definitively established that part of the
paternal gene pool of Jewish communities in Europe, North Africa and Middle East came from a common Middle East ancestral population. They suggested that most Jewish communities in the
Diasporaremained relatively isolated and
endogamouscompared to non-Jewish neighbor populations.
[13][5][36]
In a study of Israeli Jews and Palestinian Muslim Arabs, more than 70% of the Jewish men and 82% of the Arab men whose DNA was studied, had inherited their Y chromosomes from the same paternal ancestors, who lived in the region within the last few thousand years. "Our recent study of high-resolution microsatellite haplotypes demonstrated that a substantial portion of Y chromosomes of Jews (70%) and of Palestinian Muslim Arabs (82%) belonged to the same chromosome pool."
[37] In relation to the region of the
Fertile Crescent, the same study noted; "In comparison with data available from other relevant populations in the region, Jews were found to be more closely related to groups in the north of the Fertile Crescent (Kurds, Turks, and Armenians) than to their Arab neighbors."
[14]
Approximately 35% to 43% of Jewish men are in the paternal line known as
haplogroup J[Note 1] and its sub-haplogroups. This haplogroup is particularly present in the Middle East and Southern Europe.
[38] 15% to 30% are in haplogroup
E1b1b[Note 2], (or E-M35) and its sub-haplogroups which is common in the
Middle East,
North Africa, and
Southern Europe.
In 1992 G. Lucotte and F. David were the first genetic researchers to have documented a common paternal genetic heritage between
Sephardi and
Ashkenazi Jews.
[33][34] Another study published just a year later suggested the Middle Eastern origin of Jewish paternal lineages.
[35]
In 2000, M. Hammer, et al. conducted a study on 1,371 men and definitively established that part of the
paternal gene pool of Jewish communities in Europe, North Africa and Middle East came from a common Middle East ancestral population. They suggested that most Jewish communities in the
Diasporaremained relatively isolated and
endogamouscompared to non-Jewish neighbor populations.
[13][5][36]
In a study of Israeli Jews and Palestinian Muslim Arabs, more than 70% of the Jewish men and 82% of the Arab men whose DNA was studied, had inherited their Y chromosomes from the same paternal ancestors, who lived in the region within the last few thousand years. "Our recent study of high-resolution microsatellite haplotypes demonstrated that a substantial portion of Y chromosomes of Jews (70%) and of Palestinian Muslim Arabs (82%) belonged to the same chromosome pool."
[37] In relation to the region of the
Fertile Crescent, the same study noted; "In comparison with data available from other relevant populations in the region, Jews were found to be more closely related to groups in the north of the Fertile Crescent (Kurds, Turks, and Armenians) than to their Arab neighbors."
[14]
Approximately 35% to 43% of Jewish men are in the paternal line known as
haplogroup J[Note 1] and its sub-haplogroups. This haplogroup is particularly present in the Middle East and Southern Europe.
[38] 15% to 30% are in haplogroup
E1b1b[Note 2], (or E-M35) and its sub-haplogroups which is common in the
Middle East,
North Africa, and
Southern Europe.
Y-DNA of Ashkenazi JewsEdit
The
Y chromosome of most Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews contains mutations that are common among Middle Eastern peoples, but uncommon in the general European population, according to a study of
haplotypes of the Y chromosome by Michael Hammer,
Harry Ostrerand others, published in 2000.
[13] According to Hammer et al. this suggests that the paternal lineages of Ashkenazi Jews could be traced mostly to the Middle East.
Hammer et al. add that "Diaspora Jews from Europe, Northwest Africa, and the Near East resemble each other more closely than they resemble their non-Jewish neighbors." In addition, the authors have found that the "Jewish cluster was interspersed with the Palestinian and Syrian populations, whereas the other Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations (Saudi Arabians, Lebanese, and Druze) closely surrounded it. Of the Jewish populations in this cluster, the Ashkenazim were closest to South European populations (specifically the Greeks) and also to the Turks." The study estimated that Ashkenazi Jews are descended on their paternal side from a core population of approximately 20,000 Jews that migrated from Italy into the rest of Europe over the course of the first millennium, and that "All European Jews seem connected on the order of fourth or fifth cousins."
[13]
The estimated cumulative total male
genetic admixture amongst Ashkenazim was, according to Hammer et al., "very similar to
Motulsky's average estimate of 12.5%. This could be the result, for example, of "as little as 0.5% per generation, over an estimated 80 generations", according to Hammer et al. Such figures indicated that there had been a "relatively minor contribution" to Ashkenazi paternal lineages by converts to Judaism and non-Jews. These figures, however, were based on a limited range of paternal haplogroups assumed to have originated in Europe. When potentially European haplogroups were included in the analysis, the estimated admixture increased to 23 per cent (±7%).
[Note 3]
The frequency of
haplogroup R1b in the Ashkenazim population is similar to the frequency of R1b in Middle Eastern populations.[
citation needed] This is significant, because R1b is also the most common haplogroup amongst non-Jewish males in Western Europe.
[40] That is, the commonness of nominally Middle Eastern subclades of R1b amongst Ashkenazim tends to minimize the Western European contribution to the ~10% of R1b found amongst Ashkenazim. A large study by Behar et al. (2004) of Ashkenazi Jews records a percentage of 5–8% European contribution to the Ashkenazi paternal gene pool.
[Note 4] In the words of Behar:
Because haplogroups R-M17 (R1a) and R-P25 (R1b) are present in non-Ashkenazi Jewish populations (e.g., at 4% and 10%, respectively) and in non-Jewish Near Eastern populations (e.g., at 7% and 11%, respectively; Hammer et al. 2000; Nebel et al. 2001), it is likely that they were also present at low frequency in the AJ (Ashkenazi Jewish) founding population. The admixture analysis shown in Table 6 suggests that 5%–8% of the Ashkenazi gene pool is, indeed, comprised of Y chromosomes that may have introgressed from non-Jewish European populations.
For G. Lucotte et al.,
[41] the R1b frequency is about 11%.
[Note 5] In 2004, When the calculation is made excluding Jews from Netherlands the R1b rate is 5% ± 11.6%.
[40]
Two studies by Nebel et al. in 2001 and 2005, based on Y chromosome polymorphic markers, suggested that Ashkenazi Jews are more closely related to other Jewish and Middle Eastern groups than to their host populations in Europe (defined in the using Eastern European, German, and French Rhine Valley populations).
[14][37] Ashkenazi, Sephardic, and Kurdish Jews were all very closely related to the populations of the
Fertile Crescent, even closer than to Arabs. The study speculated that the ancestors of the Arab populations of the Levant might have diverged due to mixing with migrants from the Arabian Peninsula.
[14]However, 11.5% of male Ashkenazim, and more specifically 50% of the Levites while 1.7% of the
Cohanim,
[42] were found to belong to
R1a1a(R-M17), the dominant Y chromosome haplogroup in Eastern European populations. They hypothesized that these chromosomes could reflect low-level gene flow from surrounding Eastern European populations, or, alternatively, that both the Ashkenazi Jews with R1a1a (R-M17), and to a much greater extent Eastern European populations in general, might partly be descendants of
Khazars. They concluded "However, if the R1a1a (R-M17) chromosomes in Ashkenazi Jews do indeed represent the vestiges of the mysterious Khazars then, according to our data, this contribution was limited to either a single founder or a few closely related men, and does not exceed ~12% of the present-day Ashkenazim.".
[14][43] This hypothesis is also supported by the D. Goldstein in his book Jacob's legacy: A genetic view of Jewish history.
[44] However, Faerman (2008) states that "External low-level gene flow of possible Eastern European origin has been shown in Ashkenazim but no evidence of a hypothetical Khazars' contribution to the Ashkenazi gene pool has ever been found.".
[45] A 2017 study, concentrating on the Ashkenazi Levites where the proportion reaches 50%, while signalling that there's a "rich variation of haplogroup R1a outside of Europe which is phylogenetically separate from the typically European R1a branches", precises that the particular R1a-Y2619 sub-clade testifies for a local origin, and that the "Middle Eastern origin of the Ashkenazi Levite lineage based on what was previously a relatively limited number of reported samples, can now be considered firmly validated."
[46]
Furthermore, 7%
[40][47] of Ashkenazi Jews have the haplogroup
G2c, which is found mainly among the
Pashtuns and on a lower scale among all major Jewish groups, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese. Behar et al. suggest that those haplogroups are minor Ashkenazi founding lineages.
[40]
Among Ashkenazi Jews, Jews of
Netherlandsseem to have a particular haplogroups distribution since nearly one quarter of them have the Haplogroup R1b1 (R-P25), in particular sub-haplogroup R1b1b2 (R-M269), which is characteristic of Western European populations.
[40]
Ashkenazi men show low Y-DNA diversity within each major haplogroup, meaning that compared to the size of the modern population, it seems there were once a relatively small number of men having children. This possibly results from a series of
founder events and high rates of
endogamy within Europe. Despite Ashkenazi Jews representing a recently founded population in Europe, founding effects suggest that they probably derived from a large and diverse ancestral source population in the
Middle East, who may have been larger than the source population from which the indigenous Europeans derived.
[40]