Jews Share Common Ancestry Regardless of Differing Backgrounds, Studies Show

[The Mikado]

Not a huge surprise.  People advocating alternate theories like the whole "modern Jews are descended from the Khazars and have nothing to do with the Jews of Roman and pre-Roman times" tend to be motivated by sensationalist contrarianism at best and anti-Semitism at worst.

What is surprising is how close the blood links between the Sephardim and the Ashkenazim are.  500 years is a long time for divergent bloodlines.

[The Mikado]

Hardly the first study to show this.

Al, I know this isn't the first survey to suggest that Jews came out of the Middle East in the time period in question, or that they diverged from Babylonian Jewry in roughly 500 BCE.  However, this is the first study I remember seeing describing an incredibly close blood relationship between modern-day Ashkenazim and Sephardim.  Has that been generally accepted for a while?  There are huge cultural and linguistic differences between the groups, and while it might not be the most surprising thing in the world that they're still closely related, it's certainly interesting.