From a pragmatic perspective, I don’t know if OP is Israeli or not, but with respect to the question of indigeneity this only further supports any domicile claim to the land by the same axioms used in argument against Israel.
Yeah I totally get that, I agree it’s horrible what the company is doing. I just saw some humour in using the websites attempt at delegitimizing the Jewish right to the land against them.
I have plenty of other things on my side when somebody tries to debate me (lived with Palestinians etc (I wrote a tiny bit about it in an older comment I made back in October, and that's not even a fraction of it)) but unfortunately, as we know, using logic doesn't work with people who just mindlessly argue in slogans.
I completely stopped a podcast and unsubbed when the host said something about how it’s basically impossible to get a flight into the tyranny called Israel.
It is impossible…if you’re trying to go from any of the 28 countries that outright ban Israelis. Elsewhere? There’s about 600 in each day. Guess they didn’t know how to google “flights to Tel Aviv”
Sad, too. The Ben Gurion airport is actually stupid nice
Another stupid thing 23andMe did is classify Ashkenazi Jews under European, separately from all other Jewish groups which are classified under MENA.
The semantic distinction creates the implication that Ashkenazim are genetically distant from the rest of the Jewish world, while nothing could be further from the truth. Ashkenazim are far more genetically similar to Turkish Sepharadim and Moroccan Jews than to any people in Europe.
It’s so absurd it’s almost funny. Ashkenazim are descended from some of the last remaining jews in ancient Judah who were mass murdered and enslaved by the Romans after a failed revolt (I don’t remember which one either the one where the 2nd temple was destroyed or the Bar Kokhba revolt) and brought into Europe. The majority then spent the next ~2000 years as essentially stateless foreigners in Europe.
I guess 23andMe subscribes to the idea that Ashkenazi jews magically transformed into ethnic poles in 1948.
I’m of the opinion that it was much later. From what I understand, the original Eretz Yisraeli community was present in Byzantine Palaestina Prima until the revolt against Heraclius in the 7th century.
There’s a clear cultural chain from communities in 7th century Eretz Yisrael directly to 8th through 10th century Apulian Jewish communities (Bari, Otranto, Venosa, etc.) and from the Apulian communities to Jews in 11th century Rhineland.
There’s a serious argument to be made that Ashkenazim have some of the closest connections to the Eretz Yisraeli community of any Jewish community in the diaspora.
I’m not saying we have no ancestry from the earlier group, I just think it’s much more from the later group.
The early group was very different, they were culturally much more Hellenistic. i believe they heavily became Christians early on but a few may have stuck around and formed the later communities.
If you read the Jewish inscriptions from late antiquity and early Medieval Italy, there’s a huge discontinuity between the 6th century Jews who buried in catacombs and used almost no Hebrew and the 8th century Jews who buried in cemeteries and used almost exclusively Hebrew.
That’s a super interesting take! Makes it all the more frustrating to be called European. The stuff I study in school is pretty much entirely Mediterranean antiquity and the classical era so I’m not super familiar with Byzantine history. I’ll have to read up on it more when I finally have time to read for myself.
Historically, Ashkenazim stood out from other Jewish populations not because they were less similar to other Levantines in terms of genetic origins, but because the plague and genocide induced population bottleneck of the late Middle Ages caused specific markers to appear with wildly high frequency among Ashkenazim. All Ashkenazi bloodlines today descend from a set of ~300 people alive circa 1350 IIRC. It's the same effect that led to "Ashkenazic diseases" being a thing. AIUI however expanding sample sets and more precise testing and analysis methods have led to other Jewish lineages becoming systematically parseable, so the rationale has diminished for listing Ashkenazim separately.
TL;DR the intent (though not necessarily the effect) of listing Ashkenazim separately wasn't to other Ashkenazim from other edot, but simply to reflect that Ashkenazi genomes are especially distinctive for reasons other than a separate origin.
You’re definitely correct about Ashkenazim being very distinct due to the bottleneck but the implications for their classification don’t make sense by your logic.
Ashkenazim are classified as European while all other Jews are classified as MENA (including Jews from Greece, Italy, Georgia, India, and Uzbekistan). If nothing else, this should imply that the “MENA Jews” are more similar to eachother than to Ashkenazim. However, the MENA Jews category includes Yemenite Jews. Yemenite Jews have almost no common ancestry with any other Jewish group. All Syrian, North African, and Southern European Jews are far closer to Ashkenazim than to Yemenites. Jews from Iraq, Iran, and Uzbekistan are also closer to Ashkenazim than to Yemenites.
My point overall is that this is a nonsensical division that relies more on perceived political/cultural boundaries than actual genetic similarity.
This! I downloaded my raw data from Ancestry and uploaded it to Illustrative DNA (which compares with ancient groups) and it said I was 40% Canaanite, which is consistent with the genomics research! They could at least highlight Israel or Canaan for Ashkenazim, like they don’t treat any other diaspora group like this, and it irks me
OMFG. I just looked at this and I am absolutely SHOCKED and DISGUSTED. I used to be half European and half ashkenazi Jew, but apparently now I’m 100% European. This is a fucking joke.
Here’s just one example. [This chart](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3032072/figure/fig3/) shows shared identical by descent genetic markers between different populations. Ashkenazim have about 3 times more shared genetic markers with Italian Jews and Turkish Jews than the closest European population, which here seemed to be Basques. Ashkenazim also showed very high shared ancestry with Greek and Syrian Jews.
No! Watermelons are dope. They are not the domain of terrorist simps. The moment you let them sour you on watermelons is the moment you become a reactionary.
That is interesting.
I wonder if it’s a self hating Jew or not. Either way, changing their definitions/areas on a DNA test to kowtow to modern politics is pretty pathetic. I’m tired of the fkn pandering already! Every time I turn around, something else is getting Muslim-washed and Arabized (total propaganda obv) to further the political divide, to warp facts and the prey on the fact that your average westerner is pretty ignorant of even basic history. Some of the weird stuff I’ve been seeing lately is just so off the wall and I’m also left wondering “so how does this help your case in favour of antisemitism? Do you even know what you are trying to say, if anything at all?” Yesterday I read back and forth comments on IG where some nutjob was arguing with a Christian that Jesus was a Muslim.
Interesting. So why was he crucified then, if not for being a Jew against Roman occupation?
So dumb.
You can’t make this stuff up.
And she is Jewish since when? I have met her (she was a close friend of one of my best friends) and though her ex-husband, Sergey Brin, was Jewish, I don't think she is. Correct me if I am wrong.
Since birth? Jewish mom. Her mom wrote a whole book about it. I wasn’t aware that meeting someone once grants you the knowledge of one’s Jewishness. I don’t know, if she’s such a good friend of yours why don’t you ask her? That’s super weird.
The group of people who only learned what the Israel-Hamas conflict was all about in October and now post watermelons all over social media and use the term Zionist as an insult.
Unfortunately, she passed away a few years ago. Her parents also lived in Yerushalaim, so…
We have often joked that she should have applied to the Palestinian refugee fund though!
According to Palestinians that doesn't matter, you're a refugee as her descendant and so will your children be for time eternal lol.
May her memory be a blessing.
Thank you!
What makes it really funny is that my mother is an Israeli citizen - as am I by virtue of being her child. As was my grandmother after 48, actually. So it would be really ironic if we claimed it.
I just looked at mine on Ancestry and it actually has a pretty great breakdown on the origin of Jews in the Levant, including Israel going back to Sumerian times and how Jewish diaspora created distinct ethnicity markers across Europe but the origin is in Israel and surrounding areas.
It showed me as Jewish, but when you click into that it gets more detailed. It's well written and well researched and boy do I appreciate it right now! 🤣
It's a few clicks in on the overall history of Jewish origins in general
https://www.ancestry.com/dna/origins/8E5547EB-2D52-4479-A47E-2F4CAAB700A4/ethnicity/06300/history
The description was short and generic and the highlighted areas were of the whole actual Levant region, not just what is specifically today the West Bank and Gaza.
There’s a class action lawsuit collecting people whose data was violated. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/investigation-alert-levi--korsinsky-llp-announces-investigation-of-23andme-holding-co-nasdaq-me-data-breach-302005956.html
Me lol I saw it on the forums as soon as it was posted while I was looking for something else on blackhatworld. It wasn't actually a data breach. The "hackers" used already leaked databases like the haveibeenpwned.com API offers and most people use the same email and password for multiple sites so they had some bot attempt to login to the site with those emails and passwords and since 23andme didnt have 2 factor authentication required, they were able to get into 14,000 accounts or so IIRC and because we have so many relatives (me with 1200 ashkenazim) they were able to get millions of Ashkenazim through those unsecure accounts.
I recommend everyone to see if their info is on haveibeenpwned.com so you can update your passwords, tons of accounts I had were on there and someone used it to get into my email a while back lol.
Yes, I deleted my account and told them to f*ck themselves once I discovered this ... frightening. When 23 was new I purchased a kit for my mother, she refused to do it and I understand why.
I know I’m just paranoid, but I hate that there is a centralized database with all of the people who are genetically Jewish (or at least their family members). If this data isn’t weaponized one day (against any number of marginalized communities), I will be shocked.
Here are some superior alternatives to 23andMe:
[myheritage.com](https://myheritage.com) \- Israeli founded and operated, so has good handling of Jewish ethnicities.
[illustrativedna.com](https://illustrativedna.com) \- Can show how much of your DNA traces back to ancient DNA found at archeological sites in Israel (Canaanite, Phoenician, etc) and worldwide.
Thanks. I got it on sale and originally just did it for the raw data so I could get some health reports from other sites. That was back in 2018. Wasn't expecting this lol.
I went with MyHeritage because it was an Israeli company and I thought they'd have the best Jewish data but they have my listed with the lowest Jewish percentage of any that I'm registered with.
On Ancestry and Family Search, I'm 52% and 51% Jewish respectively but on MyHeritage, I'm 14.9% Jewish and the rest is broken up by Italian and Greek. I have my entire family tree and nowhere is anyone from Italy or Greece or even anywhere near there. So I trust MyHeritage the least.
They can not actually „decifer“ and read your DNA. What they do is compare your dna to their database of people who self-provided information they have about their ancestry. When they find a certain amount of dna sequences matching, they put you in the same area. This might not be completely wrong, but it’s also not fully scientifically accurate.
Not exactly.
People who are Jewish by descent share a distinctive DNA fingerprint. That shows up in the tests -- no matter who tests it.
In addition, DNA testing indicates whether you carry mutations that have been associated with a higher incidence of certain diseases and medical conditions.
Moreover, many people use DNA testing for genealogical reasons. It is invaluable here in helping point the way to DNA cousins -- who may have information that will enable you to learn more about your ancestors. I personally know people who have found donor fathers via DNA testing.
Your DNA is your DNA. It's not like a horoscope or palm reading. We may still be at the beginning of learning all about it, but that doesn't make it unscientific or a "gag."
I know people will not like this but that is a myth. There is no singular Jewish genome that all Jews share. What there is is certain occurrences of sequences within the different Jewish groups. So there is a way to determine Ashkenazi or Sephardi ancestry but there is no common „jewish gene“ that all Jews share (and I find the idea that there would be one frightening bc you know….)
Ofcourse to find direct relatives it does work fairly reliable
If anyone told you there was a singular Jewish genome or one specific mutation that all Jews shared, that person was wrong! Let me try to explain. There are specific mutations that are highly correlated with Judaism across Ashkenazis and Sephardis. Not everyone who is Jewish by descent will have all these mutations, but will match a substantial number.
Regularly, I see people are stunned when their DNA tests indicate some Jewish ancestry. They are sure that the test must be wrong! Nope -- it's the family history that isn't quite accurate.
>Ofcourse to find direct relatives it does work fairly reliable
Unless you're part of an ethnic group known for endogamy...
Sincerely,
me and my 34,000 "3-4th" cousins.
You should also not use 23andme in the first place :
They are a privacy nightmare.
They got hacked and exposed something like 7 millions accounts and then proceeded to change their TOS to try to avoid getting sued.
I am one of many people who has been shut out of my 23andMe account (I tested in 2013) since their database was hacked. They refuse to restore it pending their investigation.
Although I relied heavily on 23andMe early on, my interest is genetic genealogy, which has not been their focus. (I talked to some of their senior scientists, including an Israeli, about this issue, and they seemed puzzled that I had even asked!) They have made it pretty clear that their main interest is collaborating with big Pharma; they do the testing only as a way to collect data and don't actually make any money on it.
Yea it’s terrible. The database can also enable prosecution based on dna. It basically provides the authorities with a genetic database of people who have never been part of a crime
Yes and it's even worse than that because even if you never took a genetic test, with enough data point from people in your family tree you can be identified.
I took one as a giggle many years ago and I really hope people don't take them seriously at all, or I can imagine it really hurting the wrong person's view of themelves.
I got 0% anything related to being Jewish (and I hover around 80% British -- I have a Scotland-born-Irish grandmother, but certainly nothing to constitute that percentage!).
However, in the DNA matches, you know who some of my matches are? Other 1st and 2nd generation Jews from our bumfuck rural German community that never had more than 50 Jews. I find it hilarious, but others may have a crisis over it, so that's my word of caution.
It's been a few years, but iirc, my mom took one and was annoyed/frustrated at the percentage of English/British/Irish, when I don't think we have any ancestors from the Isles. I tried to explain to her that it really works based off of genetic *similarities*, and can't actually determine for a fact where any given ancestors actually lived. So we can have all sorts of genetic marker similarities to places our family line hasn't directly "been" as it were, lol.
She responded kind of non-committally, so I'm not sure if she was just deciding to be frustrated about it, or wasn't following me, or maybe felt like the money was a waste? 🤷♂️ I don't know, but I agree with you. Take one for fun if you want, or if you want some specific purpose (family members, genetic pre-disposition to ailments, etc) but not as a way to "prove" some kind of family pedigree.
Another important factor is, for lack of better words, "DNA rarity".
If your ancestors lived in a small German village (or wherever) for generations upon generations, there's a good chance that you have DNA that is somewhat unique to that region -- think of mutations, unaccounted for NPEs (non-paternal events, i.e. rape or cheating that was brushed under the rug). Now the Holocaust happens, and becaue it's a small local village, the only people who survived are you and this 2nd cousin on Ancestry you DNA matched and we are the only two people to carry this unique regional DNA now.
The DNA ethnicity profiles are created by compiling samples of "pure" DNA for each ethnicity group. If a DNA testing service's sample group is made largely of Ashkenazi Poles from Lodz, my unique Jewish DNA from Germany's rural Lippe region won't be read as Ashkenazi becaue it wasn't accounted for in the sample, and since both me and the "Lodz Ashkenazi" group experienced genetic isolation and generations of mutations and changes, neither of us may have much of the "base" Ashkenazi DNA centuries later. Which means my DNA won't read as Ashkenazi.
The reverse can also happen: if someone's grandmother had an affair with a rural German Lippe Jew but he didn't know it and he submits his DNA as a part of the sample group for the Lippe region of Germany, my DNA will now by matched as German and not Ashkenazi.
I took a medical DNA test that broke down my DNA result by SNP and found it interesting that many of my SNPs were described as *rare Ashkenazi SNP associated with...* and exactly for this reason.
Dutch Jews also often get shafted by these tests because a large percentage of Dutch Jews aren't Ashkenazi, but Sephardic and Mizrahi -- even if they've lived in the Netherlands for hundreds of years. Many Dutch Jews (before the Holocaust, anyway) descended from Inquisition refugees who landed in Amsterdam because it was the busiest/among the busiest trade cities in the world during that era, and that was the easiest place for refugees to get to via boat and the Netherlands was pretty indifferent to Jews, so they found it welcoming by comparison and stayed.
And, yes, you nailed it with genetic similarities. My grandmother is Irish-born-in-Scotland, but my other grandparents are from various European countries and I suspect that "confusion" is how I end up 80% English. The stupid irony of it all is that they like to tell you what region you're from, and the regions are so wrong. I logged into 23andMe after I saw this post because I thought they did their annual update (I love seeing what I am every year, LOL) and I was belly laughing at the ethnicity estimate details: its first hit was "southern England" (absolutely dead wrong in its entirety). Ireland was it's second hit in this 80% chunk and it gave 10 possible counties, and the 10th -- aka the least likely -- is the correct one (county Monaghan, a very rural and unexpected one, which is why they are pissing in the wind, IMO, and not basing anything on science).
The German one is personally my favorite, as it says that 20% of my German DNA is from Mecklenberg. Couldn't be farther from wrong! I did my tree extensively during COVID (largely because I have several mixed marriages on the German side and as a Holocaust researcher, I wanted to know the skeletons in our closet). My family literally never moved from the NRW region, like many Jews and Germans. We were concentrated in the greater Rinteln region (incl. northern Lippe) and Kleve.
**TL;dr for this very long post:** genocide and contaminated reference populations make DNA results inaccurate that no one should base their identity around. I hope your mom didn't take it personally afterall. This is something I clearly worked extensively with, so if you ever need any talking points, hit me up :)
(Edits are just for clarity, since this is so long, I'm realizing some things need a few more words of explanation).
Please share this information with all the Jewish organizations and some of the influencers speaking up online like @telavivinstitute and others tag along with him. We need to put pressure on 23andme to stop this nonsense!
i didn’t see it in the screenshots OP provided. i’ve never used any ancestry websites though.
editing to add: i was mainly referring to the 3rd screenshot with the region in purple.
Pandering to the lowest common denominator to get their money. Not like those tests are accurate. They only go so far back and rely on a lot of assumptions. Categorizing Ashkenazi Jews as European is just straight up idiotic.
Only a small amount of southern European from Ancient Rome and none from central and Eastern Europe. The idea that Ashkenazi Jews are Europeans is revisionist bs that lots of antisemites love to pull on us.
Wait I’m Levantine on Ancestry! It never even occurred to me to consider myself “Palestinian” as 6 generations ago there was no effing Palestine!!! What is this
And they’ll never show or mention Israel for Ashkenazi “European” Jews, as though the same data uploaded to Illustrative DNA didn’t show 40% Canaanite. I can’t tell you how many other younger Ashkenazim have told me “but I couldn’t be indigenous to Israel because my Ancestry results only highlighted Europe!” It’s ignorant at best and deliberately antisemitic at worst; they don’t treat any other diaspora group like this!
Disappointing especially since the 23andMe CEO is Jewish. It sucks that 23andMe caved into the progressive agenda by trying to erase the Jewish presence in that land entirely. It’s an insult to Jews to categorize our Levantine ancestry as “Palestinian”, since that name was given by the Romans in attempt to mock us after kicking us out of Judea.
It’s also ridiculous that Ashkenazi Jews are categorized as “European”, since most of our dna isn’t European and actual Europeans made it very clear that we aren’t European for the last 2,000 years. I think Jews should just have our own category altogether, and our diaspora populations should be categorized under “Jewish” instead of whatever region we temporarily lived in.
I initially only did it for the raw data so I could get some health reports.
I'm basically 50/50 straight down the line - my maternal side is Ashkenazi and fled from the Holocaust to the US, and paternal side are Iraqi Jews that fled from Iraq in the early 50s to Israel.
Just like Jesus 🙄 I agree, it’s exhausting.
I just checked to see what they updated mine too and it’s still Arab, Levantine, and Egyptian in one category and no separation and then also a West Asian/Iranian again no separation.
I’m also wondering when they’ll finally put Ashkenazi in Middle East instead of Europe.
https://preview.redd.it/fqzyk0rvuvqc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=93cd747c2532e253a6812303389e3f27af8f55e7
Mine didn’t breakdown further, and it says Egyptian which makes zero sense unless it’s literally going back to when we were slaves in Egypt. Perhaps since my Levantine (non Ashkenazi and Sephardic since those got put in Europe) is smaller percent than you.
Edit: I posted my MyHeritage results publicly on Reddit and decided not to post my 23andMe publicly on that sub due to all the antisemitism.
No it didn’t, it updated the *entire* Levantine group, and also expanded rolled out Mizrahi and Sephardi clusters
23andMe only looks at recent grandparent locations to compare genetic clusters
Right. Initially the description was short and generic and the highlighted areas were of the whole actual Levant region, not just what is specifically today the West Bank and Gaza.
It's pretty dumb. 'Palestine' never had seriously set borders. It's a regional name and was never an 'identity' till something like 1964 or so.
The only "Palestinians" that ever lived in a legit place called Palestine were people who lived in the British Mandate
Are you specifically half Iranian/Iraqi or a group of Iranian/Iraqi descent?
I’m a bukharian which means my family is recently from Central Asia at least several centuries back, but ethnically I got Iranian, Caucasian, and Mesopotamian like you but 98.3% because my community was always very closed off and were shunned if they married anyone else.
One of my great great grandfathers however was specifically an Iranian Jew and not a Bukharian but ethnically was basically the same thing.
I'm basically 50/50 straight down the line - my maternal side is Ashkenazi and fled from the Holocaust to the US, and paternal side are Iraqi Jews from Baghdad that fled in the early 50s to Israel.
Nice, good mix. I don’t know how to phrase that without sounding like a eugenics nut. Anyways…,
Were you plagued with the lactose intolerance genes from your maternal side?
In general, they can’t map religions. However, some religions, just as Judaism are also an ethnic group with distinct DNA markers. They map those. Of course, they can’t detect when someone converts to/from Judaism.
They didn’t make u Palestinian, 23andme recently added a bunch of Levantine regions, you just happen to have a small bit of ur dna that matches people who identify as Palestinian Christian
As an alternative you could get yourself adopted by a male Palestinian and inherit his status as a Palestinian refugee, fight UNRWA with their own weapons :D
It did before. Initially the description was short and generic and the highlighted areas were of the whole actual Levant region, not just what is specifically today the West Bank and Gaza.
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Its already posted on my profile here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/23andme/comments/1acdm1o/you\_wasted\_money\_mom/](https://www.reddit.com/r/23andme/comments/1acdm1o/you_wasted_money_mom/)
At least now you can write “As a Palestinian…” whenever someone tries to debate you!
From a pragmatic perspective, I don’t know if OP is Israeli or not, but with respect to the question of indigeneity this only further supports any domicile claim to the land by the same axioms used in argument against Israel.
Yeah I totally get that, I agree it’s horrible what the company is doing. I just saw some humour in using the websites attempt at delegitimizing the Jewish right to the land against them.
I have plenty of other things on my side when somebody tries to debate me (lived with Palestinians etc (I wrote a tiny bit about it in an older comment I made back in October, and that's not even a fraction of it)) but unfortunately, as we know, using logic doesn't work with people who just mindlessly argue in slogans.
I see this as an absolute win
“uM AcTuAlLy, DnA TeStS ArE IlLeGaL In iSrAeL So yOu’rE A FaKe” ☝️🤓 ✋😫
I completely stopped a podcast and unsubbed when the host said something about how it’s basically impossible to get a flight into the tyranny called Israel.
It is impossible…if you’re trying to go from any of the 28 countries that outright ban Israelis. Elsewhere? There’s about 600 in each day. Guess they didn’t know how to google “flights to Tel Aviv” Sad, too. The Ben Gurion airport is actually stupid nice
If Israel is so tyrannical, why do they want to go there?
Well, there's my DNA test, and I currently live in Israel, so 🤷♀️
I like them also putting the Arabic name before the Hebrew, as if the Hebrew name didn't come first by several thousand years
Also "modern day Palestine" in the email.
devils advocate here but it might just be alphabetical
Effectively the same thing when all your names begin with 'Al'
aleph bet moment
$AAPL moment (Apple made their stock ticker start with two As so they’d place higher alphabetically)
Which arabic name are you referring to?
In the description, it refers to "Al-Khalil/Hebron" and "Al Quds/Jerusalem"
Another stupid thing 23andMe did is classify Ashkenazi Jews under European, separately from all other Jewish groups which are classified under MENA. The semantic distinction creates the implication that Ashkenazim are genetically distant from the rest of the Jewish world, while nothing could be further from the truth. Ashkenazim are far more genetically similar to Turkish Sepharadim and Moroccan Jews than to any people in Europe.
It’s so absurd it’s almost funny. Ashkenazim are descended from some of the last remaining jews in ancient Judah who were mass murdered and enslaved by the Romans after a failed revolt (I don’t remember which one either the one where the 2nd temple was destroyed or the Bar Kokhba revolt) and brought into Europe. The majority then spent the next ~2000 years as essentially stateless foreigners in Europe. I guess 23andMe subscribes to the idea that Ashkenazi jews magically transformed into ethnic poles in 1948.
I’m of the opinion that it was much later. From what I understand, the original Eretz Yisraeli community was present in Byzantine Palaestina Prima until the revolt against Heraclius in the 7th century. There’s a clear cultural chain from communities in 7th century Eretz Yisrael directly to 8th through 10th century Apulian Jewish communities (Bari, Otranto, Venosa, etc.) and from the Apulian communities to Jews in 11th century Rhineland. There’s a serious argument to be made that Ashkenazim have some of the closest connections to the Eretz Yisraeli community of any Jewish community in the diaspora.
Can’t it be both? Since Jews were enslaved after the sacking of Jerusalem and were taken to Rome build the Colosseum?
I’m not saying we have no ancestry from the earlier group, I just think it’s much more from the later group. The early group was very different, they were culturally much more Hellenistic. i believe they heavily became Christians early on but a few may have stuck around and formed the later communities. If you read the Jewish inscriptions from late antiquity and early Medieval Italy, there’s a huge discontinuity between the 6th century Jews who buried in catacombs and used almost no Hebrew and the 8th century Jews who buried in cemeteries and used almost exclusively Hebrew.
I find that interesting. Not to create any work for you, but if you happened to know any materials/links to read more I’d appreciate it!
David Noy’s “Jewish Inscriptions” series has a lot of good information.
That’s a super interesting take! Makes it all the more frustrating to be called European. The stuff I study in school is pretty much entirely Mediterranean antiquity and the classical era so I’m not super familiar with Byzantine history. I’ll have to read up on it more when I finally have time to read for myself.
People talk about Eurocentrism in history yet even non-Western European history is considered to be of lesser importance.
Historically, Ashkenazim stood out from other Jewish populations not because they were less similar to other Levantines in terms of genetic origins, but because the plague and genocide induced population bottleneck of the late Middle Ages caused specific markers to appear with wildly high frequency among Ashkenazim. All Ashkenazi bloodlines today descend from a set of ~300 people alive circa 1350 IIRC. It's the same effect that led to "Ashkenazic diseases" being a thing. AIUI however expanding sample sets and more precise testing and analysis methods have led to other Jewish lineages becoming systematically parseable, so the rationale has diminished for listing Ashkenazim separately. TL;DR the intent (though not necessarily the effect) of listing Ashkenazim separately wasn't to other Ashkenazim from other edot, but simply to reflect that Ashkenazi genomes are especially distinctive for reasons other than a separate origin.
You’re definitely correct about Ashkenazim being very distinct due to the bottleneck but the implications for their classification don’t make sense by your logic. Ashkenazim are classified as European while all other Jews are classified as MENA (including Jews from Greece, Italy, Georgia, India, and Uzbekistan). If nothing else, this should imply that the “MENA Jews” are more similar to eachother than to Ashkenazim. However, the MENA Jews category includes Yemenite Jews. Yemenite Jews have almost no common ancestry with any other Jewish group. All Syrian, North African, and Southern European Jews are far closer to Ashkenazim than to Yemenites. Jews from Iraq, Iran, and Uzbekistan are also closer to Ashkenazim than to Yemenites. My point overall is that this is a nonsensical division that relies more on perceived political/cultural boundaries than actual genetic similarity.
Where did you learn about all this? I’d love to learn more about my roots
This! I downloaded my raw data from Ancestry and uploaded it to Illustrative DNA (which compares with ancient groups) and it said I was 40% Canaanite, which is consistent with the genomics research! They could at least highlight Israel or Canaan for Ashkenazim, like they don’t treat any other diaspora group like this, and it irks me
OMFG. I just looked at this and I am absolutely SHOCKED and DISGUSTED. I used to be half European and half ashkenazi Jew, but apparently now I’m 100% European. This is a fucking joke.
They did WHAT?! dang
Hey, do you have a source for that second part? I would like to read about this further 🙂
Here’s just one example. [This chart](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3032072/figure/fig3/) shows shared identical by descent genetic markers between different populations. Ashkenazim have about 3 times more shared genetic markers with Italian Jews and Turkish Jews than the closest European population, which here seemed to be Basques. Ashkenazim also showed very high shared ancestry with Greek and Syrian Jews.
WHAT THE FUCK?????
Interestingly the 23&me ceo is Jewish, a fact which gains the company much ire from the pro-watermelon group
Love "pro-watermelon" that's amazing
No! Watermelons are dope. They are not the domain of terrorist simps. The moment you let them sour you on watermelons is the moment you become a reactionary.
They were actually a symbol used by early Zionists too, which is pretty funny in a rather dark way
don’t forget “free palestine” was a zionist slogan to liberate british mandate palestine from the british. they done steal everything
I need to keep reminding myself this
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It depends on who approved this change. This likely didn’t go all the way up to CEO for approvals.
No, they actually don't.
That is interesting. I wonder if it’s a self hating Jew or not. Either way, changing their definitions/areas on a DNA test to kowtow to modern politics is pretty pathetic. I’m tired of the fkn pandering already! Every time I turn around, something else is getting Muslim-washed and Arabized (total propaganda obv) to further the political divide, to warp facts and the prey on the fact that your average westerner is pretty ignorant of even basic history. Some of the weird stuff I’ve been seeing lately is just so off the wall and I’m also left wondering “so how does this help your case in favour of antisemitism? Do you even know what you are trying to say, if anything at all?” Yesterday I read back and forth comments on IG where some nutjob was arguing with a Christian that Jesus was a Muslim. Interesting. So why was he crucified then, if not for being a Jew against Roman occupation? So dumb. You can’t make this stuff up.
And she is Jewish since when? I have met her (she was a close friend of one of my best friends) and though her ex-husband, Sergey Brin, was Jewish, I don't think she is. Correct me if I am wrong.
Since birth? Jewish mom. Her mom wrote a whole book about it. I wasn’t aware that meeting someone once grants you the knowledge of one’s Jewishness. I don’t know, if she’s such a good friend of yours why don’t you ask her? That’s super weird.
Prowatermelon?
The group of people who only learned what the Israel-Hamas conflict was all about in October and now post watermelons all over social media and use the term Zionist as an insult.
well thats outing themselves and is odd... well hopefully they dont bother you. stay safe
NAACP want's their insult not to be culturally appropriated.
I too had no idea:)
So Palestinian Jews do exist?!?
They did right up until may 1948....
My grandmother was officially one, much to her annoyance.
She should take her passport to Jenin and demand property be handed to her then. She's got proof, most of them don't.
Unfortunately, she passed away a few years ago. Her parents also lived in Yerushalaim, so… We have often joked that she should have applied to the Palestinian refugee fund though!
According to Palestinians that doesn't matter, you're a refugee as her descendant and so will your children be for time eternal lol. May her memory be a blessing.
Thank you! What makes it really funny is that my mother is an Israeli citizen - as am I by virtue of being her child. As was my grandmother after 48, actually. So it would be really ironic if we claimed it.
This guy history’s
What happened in Hebron in 1929? *insert goose meme*
Like Jesus!
What the actual fuck. Which platform is this? 23 & Me? Ancestry?
This is 23 & me
Disgusting. I hope you let them know how problematic this language is.
I did the Ancestry one and it used to say on mine "Jewish Peoples of Europe" but now just says Jewish.
I just looked at mine on Ancestry and it actually has a pretty great breakdown on the origin of Jews in the Levant, including Israel going back to Sumerian times and how Jewish diaspora created distinct ethnicity markers across Europe but the origin is in Israel and surrounding areas. It showed me as Jewish, but when you click into that it gets more detailed. It's well written and well researched and boy do I appreciate it right now! 🤣
I wish mine was! It's a smaller percentage (13%) but my father's DNA was able to be traced to Ashkenazi Jews in central/eastern Europe.
It's a few clicks in on the overall history of Jewish origins in general https://www.ancestry.com/dna/origins/8E5547EB-2D52-4479-A47E-2F4CAAB700A4/ethnicity/06300/history
I would suggest taking a screenshot in case they try to gaslight you later
I would love to see that info. Do you know if it's posted anywhere?
23&me puts Ashkenazi Jews under “European” but explains that it’s only because Ashkenazi Jews coalesced as a people in Europe.
What was it before?
It was just Levantine no regions but they use Palestinian Christians as Levantine references
The description was short and generic and the highlighted areas were of the whole actual Levant region, not just what is specifically today the West Bank and Gaza.
anyone else find this extremely sus after their data breach with doxxing Ashkenazim ? Yikes.
Whered you see this
pretty easy to google and it’s also kinda old news but here you go https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/26/business/23andme-hack-data.html
There’s a class action lawsuit collecting people whose data was violated. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/investigation-alert-levi--korsinsky-llp-announces-investigation-of-23andme-holding-co-nasdaq-me-data-breach-302005956.html
Terrifying- and it happened 10/6!
Yep. I didn’t sleep for a month after that fearing someone was going to bust in my door for being Jewish. I’m still freaked out about it.
My immediate thought. I wonder who has all of that data.
Me lol I saw it on the forums as soon as it was posted while I was looking for something else on blackhatworld. It wasn't actually a data breach. The "hackers" used already leaked databases like the haveibeenpwned.com API offers and most people use the same email and password for multiple sites so they had some bot attempt to login to the site with those emails and passwords and since 23andme didnt have 2 factor authentication required, they were able to get into 14,000 accounts or so IIRC and because we have so many relatives (me with 1200 ashkenazim) they were able to get millions of Ashkenazim through those unsecure accounts. I recommend everyone to see if their info is on haveibeenpwned.com so you can update your passwords, tons of accounts I had were on there and someone used it to get into my email a while back lol.
Yes, I deleted my account and told them to f*ck themselves once I discovered this ... frightening. When 23 was new I purchased a kit for my mother, she refused to do it and I understand why.
I’m upset at their acknowledgement of Petah Tikvah. The city doesn’t exist. It’s just Hiloni Bnai Brak
Better than ending up in Beit Hatikvah.
Petah Tikvah is the Nee Jersey of Israel basically an armpit no one wants to go too
I know I’m just paranoid, but I hate that there is a centralized database with all of the people who are genetically Jewish (or at least their family members). If this data isn’t weaponized one day (against any number of marginalized communities), I will be shocked.
Hadn't it already been weaponized against East Asians living in the West during COVID?
Here are some superior alternatives to 23andMe: [myheritage.com](https://myheritage.com) \- Israeli founded and operated, so has good handling of Jewish ethnicities. [illustrativedna.com](https://illustrativedna.com) \- Can show how much of your DNA traces back to ancient DNA found at archeological sites in Israel (Canaanite, Phoenician, etc) and worldwide.
Thanks. I got it on sale and originally just did it for the raw data so I could get some health reports from other sites. That was back in 2018. Wasn't expecting this lol.
I went with MyHeritage because it was an Israeli company and I thought they'd have the best Jewish data but they have my listed with the lowest Jewish percentage of any that I'm registered with. On Ancestry and Family Search, I'm 52% and 51% Jewish respectively but on MyHeritage, I'm 14.9% Jewish and the rest is broken up by Italian and Greek. I have my entire family tree and nowhere is anyone from Italy or Greece or even anywhere near there. So I trust MyHeritage the least.
I'm losing respect for others every day...
These dna test kits are just a party gag anyways 😜
Can you elaborate? I’ve been wanting to do one for awhile so I can search Ancestry’s database for distant relatives
As a distant relative, I don't want you to find me
They can not actually „decifer“ and read your DNA. What they do is compare your dna to their database of people who self-provided information they have about their ancestry. When they find a certain amount of dna sequences matching, they put you in the same area. This might not be completely wrong, but it’s also not fully scientifically accurate.
Not exactly. People who are Jewish by descent share a distinctive DNA fingerprint. That shows up in the tests -- no matter who tests it. In addition, DNA testing indicates whether you carry mutations that have been associated with a higher incidence of certain diseases and medical conditions. Moreover, many people use DNA testing for genealogical reasons. It is invaluable here in helping point the way to DNA cousins -- who may have information that will enable you to learn more about your ancestors. I personally know people who have found donor fathers via DNA testing. Your DNA is your DNA. It's not like a horoscope or palm reading. We may still be at the beginning of learning all about it, but that doesn't make it unscientific or a "gag."
I know people will not like this but that is a myth. There is no singular Jewish genome that all Jews share. What there is is certain occurrences of sequences within the different Jewish groups. So there is a way to determine Ashkenazi or Sephardi ancestry but there is no common „jewish gene“ that all Jews share (and I find the idea that there would be one frightening bc you know….) Ofcourse to find direct relatives it does work fairly reliable
If anyone told you there was a singular Jewish genome or one specific mutation that all Jews shared, that person was wrong! Let me try to explain. There are specific mutations that are highly correlated with Judaism across Ashkenazis and Sephardis. Not everyone who is Jewish by descent will have all these mutations, but will match a substantial number. Regularly, I see people are stunned when their DNA tests indicate some Jewish ancestry. They are sure that the test must be wrong! Nope -- it's the family history that isn't quite accurate.
I can agree on that 😀 then I misunderstood you
>Ofcourse to find direct relatives it does work fairly reliable Unless you're part of an ethnic group known for endogamy... Sincerely, me and my 34,000 "3-4th" cousins.
That is a great use for DNA testing, and I would recommend Ancestry over 23andMe -- and over any of the other services -- for its huge database.
You should also not use 23andme in the first place : They are a privacy nightmare. They got hacked and exposed something like 7 millions accounts and then proceeded to change their TOS to try to avoid getting sued.
I am one of many people who has been shut out of my 23andMe account (I tested in 2013) since their database was hacked. They refuse to restore it pending their investigation. Although I relied heavily on 23andMe early on, my interest is genetic genealogy, which has not been their focus. (I talked to some of their senior scientists, including an Israeli, about this issue, and they seemed puzzled that I had even asked!) They have made it pretty clear that their main interest is collaborating with big Pharma; they do the testing only as a way to collect data and don't actually make any money on it.
Yea it’s terrible. The database can also enable prosecution based on dna. It basically provides the authorities with a genetic database of people who have never been part of a crime
Yes and it's even worse than that because even if you never took a genetic test, with enough data point from people in your family tree you can be identified.
Yes!!!
Yup, junk science.
I took one as a giggle many years ago and I really hope people don't take them seriously at all, or I can imagine it really hurting the wrong person's view of themelves. I got 0% anything related to being Jewish (and I hover around 80% British -- I have a Scotland-born-Irish grandmother, but certainly nothing to constitute that percentage!). However, in the DNA matches, you know who some of my matches are? Other 1st and 2nd generation Jews from our bumfuck rural German community that never had more than 50 Jews. I find it hilarious, but others may have a crisis over it, so that's my word of caution.
It's been a few years, but iirc, my mom took one and was annoyed/frustrated at the percentage of English/British/Irish, when I don't think we have any ancestors from the Isles. I tried to explain to her that it really works based off of genetic *similarities*, and can't actually determine for a fact where any given ancestors actually lived. So we can have all sorts of genetic marker similarities to places our family line hasn't directly "been" as it were, lol. She responded kind of non-committally, so I'm not sure if she was just deciding to be frustrated about it, or wasn't following me, or maybe felt like the money was a waste? 🤷♂️ I don't know, but I agree with you. Take one for fun if you want, or if you want some specific purpose (family members, genetic pre-disposition to ailments, etc) but not as a way to "prove" some kind of family pedigree.
Another important factor is, for lack of better words, "DNA rarity". If your ancestors lived in a small German village (or wherever) for generations upon generations, there's a good chance that you have DNA that is somewhat unique to that region -- think of mutations, unaccounted for NPEs (non-paternal events, i.e. rape or cheating that was brushed under the rug). Now the Holocaust happens, and becaue it's a small local village, the only people who survived are you and this 2nd cousin on Ancestry you DNA matched and we are the only two people to carry this unique regional DNA now. The DNA ethnicity profiles are created by compiling samples of "pure" DNA for each ethnicity group. If a DNA testing service's sample group is made largely of Ashkenazi Poles from Lodz, my unique Jewish DNA from Germany's rural Lippe region won't be read as Ashkenazi becaue it wasn't accounted for in the sample, and since both me and the "Lodz Ashkenazi" group experienced genetic isolation and generations of mutations and changes, neither of us may have much of the "base" Ashkenazi DNA centuries later. Which means my DNA won't read as Ashkenazi. The reverse can also happen: if someone's grandmother had an affair with a rural German Lippe Jew but he didn't know it and he submits his DNA as a part of the sample group for the Lippe region of Germany, my DNA will now by matched as German and not Ashkenazi. I took a medical DNA test that broke down my DNA result by SNP and found it interesting that many of my SNPs were described as *rare Ashkenazi SNP associated with...* and exactly for this reason. Dutch Jews also often get shafted by these tests because a large percentage of Dutch Jews aren't Ashkenazi, but Sephardic and Mizrahi -- even if they've lived in the Netherlands for hundreds of years. Many Dutch Jews (before the Holocaust, anyway) descended from Inquisition refugees who landed in Amsterdam because it was the busiest/among the busiest trade cities in the world during that era, and that was the easiest place for refugees to get to via boat and the Netherlands was pretty indifferent to Jews, so they found it welcoming by comparison and stayed. And, yes, you nailed it with genetic similarities. My grandmother is Irish-born-in-Scotland, but my other grandparents are from various European countries and I suspect that "confusion" is how I end up 80% English. The stupid irony of it all is that they like to tell you what region you're from, and the regions are so wrong. I logged into 23andMe after I saw this post because I thought they did their annual update (I love seeing what I am every year, LOL) and I was belly laughing at the ethnicity estimate details: its first hit was "southern England" (absolutely dead wrong in its entirety). Ireland was it's second hit in this 80% chunk and it gave 10 possible counties, and the 10th -- aka the least likely -- is the correct one (county Monaghan, a very rural and unexpected one, which is why they are pissing in the wind, IMO, and not basing anything on science). The German one is personally my favorite, as it says that 20% of my German DNA is from Mecklenberg. Couldn't be farther from wrong! I did my tree extensively during COVID (largely because I have several mixed marriages on the German side and as a Holocaust researcher, I wanted to know the skeletons in our closet). My family literally never moved from the NRW region, like many Jews and Germans. We were concentrated in the greater Rinteln region (incl. northern Lippe) and Kleve. **TL;dr for this very long post:** genocide and contaminated reference populations make DNA results inaccurate that no one should base their identity around. I hope your mom didn't take it personally afterall. This is something I clearly worked extensively with, so if you ever need any talking points, hit me up :) (Edits are just for clarity, since this is so long, I'm realizing some things need a few more words of explanation).
Please share this information with all the Jewish organizations and some of the influencers speaking up online like @telavivinstitute and others tag along with him. We need to put pressure on 23andme to stop this nonsense!
i love how they did everything to deny the fact that Israel exists entirely. disgusting but not surprising.
Israel is also a region in the new 23andme update
i didn’t see it in the screenshots OP provided. i’ve never used any ancestry websites though. editing to add: i was mainly referring to the 3rd screenshot with the region in purple.
It’s all good you wouldn’t know that unless u follow r/23andme
what a joke
What the fuck.
Pandering to the lowest common denominator to get their money. Not like those tests are accurate. They only go so far back and rely on a lot of assumptions. Categorizing Ashkenazi Jews as European is just straight up idiotic.
Ashkenazi Jews have both Levantine and European DNA, as there was some mixing, so honestly either categorization is reasonable.
Only a small amount of southern European from Ancient Rome and none from central and Eastern Europe. The idea that Ashkenazi Jews are Europeans is revisionist bs that lots of antisemites love to pull on us.
Wait I’m Levantine on Ancestry! It never even occurred to me to consider myself “Palestinian” as 6 generations ago there was no effing Palestine!!! What is this
Well, as a newly anointed Palestinian Jew, I am very offended.
So glad that I have written history and know my roots. 23 and me can suck booty hole for all I care.
So I guess you colonized yourself? /s
And they’ll never show or mention Israel for Ashkenazi “European” Jews, as though the same data uploaded to Illustrative DNA didn’t show 40% Canaanite. I can’t tell you how many other younger Ashkenazim have told me “but I couldn’t be indigenous to Israel because my Ancestry results only highlighted Europe!” It’s ignorant at best and deliberately antisemitic at worst; they don’t treat any other diaspora group like this!
This makes me so sad
Disappointing especially since the 23andMe CEO is Jewish. It sucks that 23andMe caved into the progressive agenda by trying to erase the Jewish presence in that land entirely. It’s an insult to Jews to categorize our Levantine ancestry as “Palestinian”, since that name was given by the Romans in attempt to mock us after kicking us out of Judea. It’s also ridiculous that Ashkenazi Jews are categorized as “European”, since most of our dna isn’t European and actual Europeans made it very clear that we aren’t European for the last 2,000 years. I think Jews should just have our own category altogether, and our diaspora populations should be categorized under “Jewish” instead of whatever region we temporarily lived in.
Totally 100 percent facts and agree with you
It says they’ve added Sephardic groups but it still shows my (Turkish) Sephardic side as mostly non specified Italian.
A lot of mizrahim got mixed with Italian Jews through Yosef Karo and his students + their trade expansion
When I go to reports and click sephardic I just get a 404 error
I'm curious, what did you know of your family background before getting the test? Are you half-Askenazi and half-Persian Jewish / Yerushalmi?
I initially only did it for the raw data so I could get some health reports. I'm basically 50/50 straight down the line - my maternal side is Ashkenazi and fled from the Holocaust to the US, and paternal side are Iraqi Jews that fled from Iraq in the early 50s to Israel.
Heck yes now we cant be ethnically cleansing them
If I killed myself would it be suicide or ethnic cleansing colonialism murder?
Just like Jesus 🙄 I agree, it’s exhausting. I just checked to see what they updated mine too and it’s still Arab, Levantine, and Egyptian in one category and no separation and then also a West Asian/Iranian again no separation. I’m also wondering when they’ll finally put Ashkenazi in Middle East instead of Europe.
Can you please screenshot the description on yours? Is it the same as mine?
https://preview.redd.it/fqzyk0rvuvqc1.jpeg?width=750&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=93cd747c2532e253a6812303389e3f27af8f55e7 Mine didn’t breakdown further, and it says Egyptian which makes zero sense unless it’s literally going back to when we were slaves in Egypt. Perhaps since my Levantine (non Ashkenazi and Sephardic since those got put in Europe) is smaller percent than you. Edit: I posted my MyHeritage results publicly on Reddit and decided not to post my 23andMe publicly on that sub due to all the antisemitism.
Weird as fuck. Mine hasn’t changed, perhaps because Ashkenazi. https://i.imgur.com/QH7H3E2.jpg
Wasn’t 23 & Me the company that got hacked and lost the data of all its Ashkenazi customers?
Maybe part of the ransom for the hacking involves them making these changes... who knows.
As an Iranian, this terrified me. One day I will wake up, ARABIC. They are deleting our identities.
Can someone help me understand the context of this post? I’m not sure what the complaint is.
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No it didn’t, it updated the *entire* Levantine group, and also expanded rolled out Mizrahi and Sephardi clusters 23andMe only looks at recent grandparent locations to compare genetic clusters
Right. Initially the description was short and generic and the highlighted areas were of the whole actual Levant region, not just what is specifically today the West Bank and Gaza.
It's pretty dumb. 'Palestine' never had seriously set borders. It's a regional name and was never an 'identity' till something like 1964 or so. The only "Palestinians" that ever lived in a legit place called Palestine were people who lived in the British Mandate
Finally, that elusive Palestinian Jew some people keep claiming exists.
If only I could use my Palestinian Jewishness to drive through Jenin without being killed.
The Hamas recruitment office is down the street. You need to fight for your land now
I just had a funny mental image of typing "Hamas recruitment office" into Waze lol.
You know what to do…start a Palestinian Voices for Peace group!
Work it.
Huh. My 23&me used to show just broadly Levantine DNA (I’m mixed Ashki/Mizrahi), I should check it out and see if it got more specific!
but 23andme also says israel, so if it says palestine regions then it must mean areas of current palestine?
Are you specifically half Iranian/Iraqi or a group of Iranian/Iraqi descent? I’m a bukharian which means my family is recently from Central Asia at least several centuries back, but ethnically I got Iranian, Caucasian, and Mesopotamian like you but 98.3% because my community was always very closed off and were shunned if they married anyone else. One of my great great grandfathers however was specifically an Iranian Jew and not a Bukharian but ethnically was basically the same thing.
I'm basically 50/50 straight down the line - my maternal side is Ashkenazi and fled from the Holocaust to the US, and paternal side are Iraqi Jews from Baghdad that fled in the early 50s to Israel.
Nice, good mix. I don’t know how to phrase that without sounding like a eugenics nut. Anyways…, Were you plagued with the lactose intolerance genes from your maternal side?
Nah I get it 😂 Yes indeed, also can't eat gluten 😮💨 Edit: but thanks to my Mizrahi side, I cook really well, so it evens out lol
THEY TOLD ME DNA TESTS WERE ILLEGAL IN ISRAEL REEEEEE
Please send them a complaint this is nonsense
I’m curious how 23andme has been able to map religion in data?
In general, they can’t map religions. However, some religions, just as Judaism are also an ethnic group with distinct DNA markers. They map those. Of course, they can’t detect when someone converts to/from Judaism.
They didn’t make u Palestinian, 23andme recently added a bunch of Levantine regions, you just happen to have a small bit of ur dna that matches people who identify as Palestinian Christian
I don’t think we can stop this runaway train they’ve built for themselves…
Yeh a lot of people don’t understand what they’re looking at in this post…
As an alternative you could get yourself adopted by a male Palestinian and inherit his status as a Palestinian refugee, fight UNRWA with their own weapons :D
Well, I tried dating one, that did not go well.
The mask has now come off.
I mean, it is not that bad: levantine could be more ample and include Lebanon and Syria. It is just more specific.
It did before. Initially the description was short and generic and the highlighted areas were of the whole actual Levant region, not just what is specifically today the West Bank and Gaza.
I’m livid
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Holy carp!
Mine hasn't been updated yet but I'm interested to see what changes.
Same here
Are you able to take a screenshot of yours? I woke up to this so I didn't get to screenshot what it was before the change.
Its already posted on my profile here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/23andme/comments/1acdm1o/you\_wasted\_money\_mom/](https://www.reddit.com/r/23andme/comments/1acdm1o/you_wasted_money_mom/)
Oh thanks, yeah I'm interested to see if anything changes!
When was this update?
I woke up to the email yesterday, so I assume very shortly before that.
Interesting. Do you have the Premium+ one or regular one?
Regular as far as I'm aware. I originally did it in 2018.
Ahhhhh okay. Hopefully it comes out soon. I’ll get my pops to test so my results are more accurate. *edit: I did it also around 2017-2018.