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Speaking last month at his Fatah party’s Revolutionary Council, Abbas outlined the baseless theory that Ashkenazi Jews are not descended from ancient Israelites but an ancient Turkish people known as the Khazars, who according to a discredited theory converted to Judaism en masse.

“The truth that we should clarify to the world is that European Jews are not Semites,” Abbas said, according to a translation of his remarks by the Middle East Media Research Institute. “They have nothing to do with Semitism.”

“So when we hear them talk about Semitism and antisemitism, the Ashkenazi Jews, at least, are not Semites,” he added.

Abbas has previously claimed publicly that Ashkenazi Jews are the descendants of Khazars, including a 2018 speech in which he charged that Jews’ “social behavior” caused the Holocaust, another assertion he reiterated in his recent speech.