When geneticists set out to solve the Palestinian-Israel conflict and think they understand history and the Bible
And their research paper keeps getting cited by others even though the journal it was published in retracted it
After having proven, in an earlier study, that Ashkenazi and non-Ashkenazi Jews share Middle Eastern origins, a group of 7 Spanish researchers exchanged the Israeli scientist in that study team for two Gazans to work on a paper about the origin of the Palestinians, aiming to prove that they have been living in the Land of Israel at least as long as the Jews.
It important to look at this paper because it is a perfect example of what happens when scientists think that their scientific skills give them license to pretend to also be historians, only slightly hiding their use of science to push a political agenda. Published in 2001, I discovered it in 2021. By that time, it had been cited 60 times and since then and now it was cited an additional 21 times, making it still relevant today.
The stated purpose of their research was:
. . . to examine the genetic relationships of Palestinians with their neighbours (particularly the Jews) and other Mediterranean populations in order to: (1) discover the Palestinian origins, and (2) explain the historic basis of the present day Middle East conflict between Palestinians and other Muslim countries with Israelite Jews. [page 892]
Now, purpose number (2) is a tall order for geneticists, is it not?
When Scientists Think They Understand Biblical History
There was no indication of an anti-Zionist or antisemitic agenda. In fact, they dedicated the article to all Jews and Palestinians who are suffering from war. Bothsidesism at its best. In spite of that, the published work aroused a lot of noise among the authors’ colleagues.
The article was retracted from the journal, librarians were requested to rip the pages from the physical copies and readers were asked to ignore the article in ecopies they had already received!
The original paper is still available online and I was able to find it easily.
Does the Paper Further the “Palestinian” Arab Cause?
The Arabs who now call themselves Palestinians can not be happy with the conclusions of this paper. In fact, it puts in a bind any Arab who wants to claim that the origin of the Palestinians can be found in Canaanite roots. Therefore, I find it hard to understand how two Gazans (researchers at el-Shifa Hospital) would put their names on this paper, taking credit for having had a part in its creation.
The authors recklessly trod on history
They invented their own unique version of history, consistently referring to Israel as “Palestine” as if the latter was a country that actually existed at any time. I give you snippets here and I am sure you would be amused if you read their entire historical recap.
Most ancient recorded inhabitants of Palestine are named Canaanites (3rd millennium BC or more ancient). They became urbanized and lived in city-states, one of which was Jericho. [page 889]
The authors go on to say that the
Israelites, a confederation of Hebrew tribes, finally defeated most of the Canaanites (1125 BC) but found the struggle with the Philistines (Palestinians) more difficult. Philistines had established an independent state on the southern coast of Palestine and also controlled the Canaanite town of Jerusalem. [page 889-890]
And then:
The Philistines have been included among the “sea people” invaders. However, it is doubtful that big amounts of people entered nowadays Anatolia and Palestine; . . . In fact, the Palestinians are nowadays thought to come from the Egyptian garrisons that were abandoned to their own fate on the Canaan land by 1200 years BC . . . Otherwise, the ancient Palestinians might have come from Crete or its empire. Israelites could also stem from autochthonous Canaanite tribes that were agglutinated by a group of people led by Moses to fight against other Canaanites, including Philistines and finally set up ancient Israel. [page 890]
The authors suggest that Palestine was converted to Islam by Arabic troops and priests by 700 AD.
According to them, Israel
self-proclaimed independence in 1948 and then started a war against Muslim Palestinians and other Muslim neighbouring countries. After several regional wars, Israel has taken more space and s[e[ized Jerusalem. . . The present situation (April 2001) is unstable. [page 891]
All this was preamble, an introduction to the subject at hand. It seems that they had their theory ready and they set out to prove it. Nothing was going to distract them from the truth as they predetermined it to have been: both the Israelites and the “Palestinians” were ancient Canaanites!
I don’t think that this, nor what follows in the article, is what Saeb Erekat had in mind when he claimed to be descended from the Canaanites in Jericho.
Do the Genetics Data Support Their Thesis?
I was told that the science was sound by someone who understands genetic research, so I proceeded to see what the results were. Not surprisingly, they found that the Palestinians are not at all close to the Greeks (from among whom the Philistines are theorized to have come). Unwilling to discard the Biblical explanation of the sea people, however, the authors suggest that perhaps
. . . an “elite” group could have joined to Canaanite proto-Palestinian tribes and made themselves noticeable; this is supported by the ancient Palestinians high war technology and the many confrontations with the Jews after 1500 BC. [page 898]
Totally unsurprisingly, they found that:
Both Jews and Palestinians share a very similar HLA genetic pool . . . [page 897]
However their conclusion is astounding! They say their data:
. . . support a common ancient Canaanite origin. Therefore, the origin of the long-lasting Jewish-Palestinian hostility is the fight for land in ancient times. [page 897]
But they say that Palestinians are not Arabs!
While I can see the Arabs who now call themselves Palestinians gloating with pleasure as they are given quasi scientific support for their claims of being indigenous to the area, they would have a very bitter pill to swallow were they actually to use this piece of research to bolster they argument. The authors actually claim that the Palestinians are not Arabs!
The Eurocentric confusion “Arab = Muslim” has also lowered the Palestinian identity by identifying the country where Mohammed was born (Saudi Arabia) with the Muslim religion; it also has artificially divided peoples both coming from ancient Canaanites (Jews and Palestinians). [page 897]
Well, if we Jews and “Palestinians” are cousins, the descendants of Isaac and Ishmael, then obviously we must have come from the same place, right? Canaan? Well, not really. Ur, where Abraham was born and raised, was in what is now Iraq.
I wonder if Arnaiz-Villena and colleagues even considered the possibility of including samples of DNA from Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, etc. in addition to their Lebanese, Egyptian, Turkish and Armenian data. It is hard for me to understand how the Gazan scientists on the research team did not insist on it and, failing that, leave the study.
My Analysis
Research in population genetics is important for medical research, and that appears to comprise the bulk of the literature on this topic; it is also important for the study of human migrations which enable us to understand global history.
But if they want to venture beyond merely describing the pure data that emerges from their empirical studies into history, they must partner with professional historians. When the topic is one of the most attention-grabbing conflicts in the world and people are still being killed in war and acts of terror, the responsibility is tremendous.
Moreover, it becomes ridiculous when the science is okay but the historical context into which they are trying to set it is all wrong and yet they go on and on about it, getting wronger and wronger. They even “adjust” the Bible to fit their agenda.
The problem is, some people make use of the parts that suit their own agenda, thinking that nobody will read the original paper and find out how baseless that is. In fact, as I noted above, this particular paper was cited 60 times when I found it in 2021 and another 21 times since then. I find that remarkable for a paper that was retracted from the journal with the request that people discard of it entirely.
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When fiction becomes “truth “. And, as you point out, the internet is an independent agent. It recycles a story until truth and fiction merge. This article took a lot of research, which most of us don’t bother to do. Thanks for your energy in presenting the perversions.
So glad you covered this ‘research’ paper. My own sister has been beguiled by it for a long time. There is no end to historical revisionism (Hitler and his geneticist goons) when it comes to war. Whole nations and ‘kingdoms’ magically appeared after WW1…