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But what is the difference ? I thought they are all Muslims
Muslim doesn't equal Arab, in fact non-Arab Muslims are more than Arab Muslims, Indonesia alone has more Muslims than all the Arabs.
Anyway, today Arabs are identified as any person who speaks Arabic fluently, that is why you see many Arab countries from Morocco to Iraq, however the pure Arabs are in the Arabian Peninsula where KSA, UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, and Yemen is.
UAE, Yemen, Jordania, Irak, Syria, Lebanon, Palestina
Arabs live in the Middle East, Asian Continent.
Arabs do not equate with Muslims since there are Arabs that are Christian.
Arabic = A language spoken from Senegal to Iraq.
Arabian = Of or relating to the Arabian Peninsula, mainly south of a line from Jordan to Kuwait.
Arab = A person whose ancestors come from the Arabian Peninsula.
However, there has been so much historical mixing of true Arabs and other ethnicities, such as Berbers in North Africa, that nearly all who are of mixed ancestry now think of themselves as Arabs.
There are so many immigrants and guest workers in the Persian Gulf states (Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, etc.), that only a small minority of the present population of those countries consider themselves Abab, and most are Filipino, Palestinian, Indian, Pakistani, etc.
Saudi Arabia and Yemen are probably the only countries in which a great majority of the population is fairly pure Arab. Maybe also Jordan.
Arab is a pan cultural term. Arabs can be of any race and/or religion.
Arabic = A language spoken from Senegal to Iraq.
Arabian = Of or relating to the Arabian Peninsula, mainly south of a line from Jordan to Kuwait.
Arab = A person whose ancestors come from the Arabian Peninsula.
However, there has been so much historical mixing of true Arabs and other ethnicities, such as Berbers in North Africa, that nearly all who are of mixed ancestry now think of themselves as Arabs.
There are so many immigrants and guest workers in the Persian Gulf states (Kuwait, Qatar, UAE, etc.), that only a small minority of the present population of those countries consider themselves Abab, and most are Filipino, Palestinian, Indian, Pakistani, etc.
Saudi Arabia and Yemen are probably the only countries in which a great majority of the population is fairly pure Arab. Maybe also Jordan.
What are you talking about? I dealt with this issue in another one of my articles about the so-called Moors of Spain. If they truly were Moors then why are most “criollos” in Mexico today white people with Spanish last names? Also, for there to have been Moors “in the hundreds of thousands” as you say, then that meant that the local whites of Spain would have still outnumbered the Moors and most of the Moroccan/Algerian countryside would have been completely emptied of its human inhabitants. Today we find the main non-Amerindian Y-chromosome gene (haplogroup) in Mexicans to be R1b, the same that modern Spaniards have. If North Africans were the main population in Spain and the colonizers of Mexico, then the dominant gene would be E1b1b1b2 (E-Z827), not R1b. And we would also find E-Z827 to be a major gene in Spaniards yet it is found only in rather small amounts. They also did a genetic study back in the early 2000’s where a Muslim-era cemetery was dug up and several Islamic (not just Arabic) named (“Muhammad”, “Abdullah”, “Ahmad”, etc.) individuals from the cemetery were gene typed. The researchers found E-Z827 to be higher than in today’s Spanish population, and they also found a higher amount of sub-Saharan (black) genes than in modern Spaniards. However, the majority of the genes in the studied individuals was still R1b, the western European gene. So, even the Muslims of Spain were mainly R1b, not E-Z827. What does that say about their ancestry and the real number of Berbers/non-Europeans in Spain?
It is a well known fact that most of today’s Arabic-speaking peoples are predominantly descended from the pre-Islamic populations that lived there. The true original Arabs, the (peninsular) Arabians (Saudis, Yemenis, Omanis, Qataris, Emiratis), mostly carry Y-DNA haplogroup J1. The main haplogroup in Syrians, Iraqis, Palestinians, Lebanese, Bahrainis, and Jordanians is haplogroup J2, not J1. The main haplogroup in Egyptians and Libyans is E1b1b1b1 while most Tunisians, Algerians, Moroccans, and Mauretanians carry E1b1b1b2. Ironically, the only “Arabs” of the Arab world that carry mostly J1 are the Sudanese, who look black. However, the Sudanese carry a different subclade (“subgene”) of the haplogroup (gene) J1 than the peninsular Arabians. So therefore, who is to say that the “Arabs” (aka “Moors”, which is a foreign name that the Muslims of North Africa & Spain never used for themselves) of Spain were also not locals? It seems like they were because there are many descendants of the Spanish Muslims in Morocco and Tunisia, and many of them look European.
Well, first of all, there is no such thing as “Muslim ancestry”. Second of all, most of the Muslims in Spain were neither North Africans nor Middle Easterners. Initially of course, the first Muslim inhabitants of Spain were Arabians and Berbers. Later on, a few Syrians arrived. However, the majority of the Spaniards living within al-Andalus underwent a gradual process of cultural change similar to the cultural change which would impact most of the Amerindians in Latin America. Notice that when I say “cultural change”, that does not mean “genetic change” or “racial change”. It is simply a change in culture.
Most of the Amerindians in Mexico for example, became admixed with Spaniards. However, for those that didn’t and remained “pure”, their culture was still dramatically changed. They adopted the Castillian (“Spanish”) language and the Roman Catholic religion, and alot of them identify as “Hispanics” or “Latinos” (especially in the USA) even though obviously they are neither Spaniards nor Italians.
Likewise, a similar thing happened in the Muslim-ruled areas of Iberia/Spain itself from the 8th century to the 15th century. The original Muslim conquerors and settlers were mainly Berbers with a minority of Arabian (Bedouin, Yemeni, “Saudi”) settlers and later by a few Syrians who followed the Umayyad caliph ‘Abd ar-Rahman who fled Syria. Add to this a small number of enslaved peoples brought to al-Andalus (mainly blacks and eastern Europeans). Gradually however, the Arabic language and the religion of Islam took hold in the Andalusian society. Notice that at no point in the history of Andalusia were Spaniards ever reduced to a minority. (I use the word Andalusia to refer to all al-Andalus, not just today’s “Andalusia” province of the Kingdom of Spain.) The majority of Spaniards up until the middle of the 10th century were Christians who spoke in a form of Latin. Their form of Latin increasingly adopted Arabic words, phrases, and general lexicon and grammar. Around the middle of the 10th century, the majority of Spaniards living within Andalusia had converted to Islam. The Arabic language was then fully adopted by the 12th century, and it had supplanted the Arabized-Latin dialect (“Mozarabic”) that was spoken in Andalusia. So yes, Muslims did make the majority of Andalusia at one period in history, however, those Muslims were not North Africans or Middle Easterners, those Muslims were Spaniards. By the time of the Fall of Granada, the Muslim Spaniards had assimilated the minorities (MidEasterners, NorthAfricans, Visigoths, blacks, east Europeans) and the whole nation had become an “Arab” Andalusian society. That is to say, they identified as “Arabs” and these are the people who are ignorantly called “Moors” in the West. The only real Moors are Moroccans and North Africans.
That may seem far fetched, but consider that the Egyptians, Syrians, Iraqis, Moroccans, Libyans, Sudanese, and Mauritanians all identify as “Arab” even though they are of diverse origins and DNA studies have shown none of these people originate from Arabia. The only real Arabs are the Yemenis, Omanis, Saudis, Qataris, Emiratis, and probably Kuwaitis (maybe Jordanians too). Egyptians, Syrians, Iraqis, Lebanese, Palestinians, Bahrainis, Sudanese, Mauritanians, Moroccans, Libyans, Tunisians, Algerians, and the “Arabs” of the Sahara and Iran are not truly Arabs at all. They are just descendants of pre-Islamic peoples who converted to Islam, adopted the Arabic language, and eventually became called as “Arabs”. It’s quite obvious that the Sudanese, for example, are not Arabs but it is harder for people to tell that Syrians, Egyptians, etc. are not Arabs either due to their Middle Eastern looks. So the Andalusian “Arabs” were not Arabs (nor Berbers nor blacks), they were just Arabic-speaking Muslim indigenous Iberians. This is similar to how the “Turks” of Turkey speak Turkish and are Muslims, yet they are obviously not Central Asian or Mongolic; they are Anatolians (plus some Greeks, Caucasians, Slavs, Albanians, etc.) who adopted the Turkish language and the Islamic religion. Spaniards, Portuguese, French, Moldovans, Romanians, and alot of Belgians and Swiss all speak in Romance/Latin languages, though that does not make them Romans or Italians right? This is all proved and backed up by multiple genetic studies. To deny this is to deny scientific evidence and believe in the old ignorance of medieval times.
I also have found that most of the people who claim the Spanish are mixed with Arabs/North Africans/blacks tend to be north Europeans and Americans (especially blacks), not Muslims.
Of course, today’s Spaniards are not Muslim nor Arabic-speaking because the Christian Spanairds from up north drove the Muslims away or converted them to Christianity and imposed the Romance (mostly Castillian) language upon them. Some of the descendants of the Andalusian Muslims live today in villages in Morocco and Tunisia. You’ll find that most of them look European, not North African. In fact, I covered this topic in one of my articles here, you should check it out.
Oh really? In the Y-chromosome, the haplogroup R1b (west European gene) is prevalent and is carried by over 50% of Mexican men. Haplogroups J1/J2 (Middle Eastern) and E1b1b (North African) combined show up in less than 20% of Mexican men. Haplogroups G, I, and R1a (Caucasus, Scandinavian/Balkans, and east Europeean, respectively) show up at around a combined 12% of Mexican males. Haplogroup Q (Amerindian/Native American) is carried by around 16% of Mexican males. Other haplogroups are also present in much smaller amounts. So yes, North Africans, Arabs, and Jews are ancestors of some Mexicans, but most of Mexicans’ male ancestors are Europeans (predominantly western Europeans) as shown by the high percentage of R1b and relatively high combined percentage of R1a, G, and I.
However, the percentage of J1, J2, and E1b1b is similar in Mexicans as it is in Spaniards. So this suggests that most Mexicans did not get this ancestry from North Africans and Middle Easterners directly, but rather they mostly got it from Spanish men who carried these lineages.
Berbers remain very distinct. No mixing there. The Arabic population TRIED to assimilate them, but recently with everyone else exerting their rights to be acknowledged everywhere else in the world, they're getting recognized as well as a separate distinct people with different customs, habits, etc. Definitely not mixed into the Arabic population.
Also, the many filipino, pakistani, and other guest workers. They come in on very limited contracts. No Arabic person would ever consider them as part of their nation. They are simply there to perform generally low-paid and demeaning work, and treated accordingly, almost worst than dirt. Usually they take their passports from them upon arrival, and just not a pretty picture. Basically no rights whatsoever. The Philippines in particular is really trying to educate their populace and create much stricter international agreements, as too many of their women go home in bodybags, from physical abuse, sexual abuse, and everything else. Not all have terrible stories happen to them, but enough do, that it's a major concern.
But how do you describe Berber Jews? Many Berbers are Jewish?
Berbers did have mixing with other groups.
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