[The Pack Knight]

In a long and rambling at speech in Ramallah at a rare session of the Palestinian National Council, Abbas touched on a number of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories during what he called a “history lesson,” as he sought to prove the 3,000 year-old Jewish connection to the Land of Israel is false. …

Pointing to Arthur Kessler’s book “The Thirteenth Tribe,” which asserts Ashkenazi Jews are descended from Khazars, Abbas said European Jews therefore had “no historical ties” to the Land of Israel.

That old lie has been around for more than a century, has no historical basis, and has been thoroughly debunked by at least one genetic study. But the Arabs will believe anything as long as it gives them an excuse to kill Jews.

[Berosus]

With all the Sephardic Jews living in Israel, whose parents and grandparents were kicked out of the Arab nations in the 1940s, I don’t think it matters much where the Ashkenazi Jews come from.

[Verginius Rufus]

Arthur Koestler was of Jewish descent, at least on his mother's side. Apparently he thought that he was combatting European anti-Semitism by arguing that Ashkenazi Jews are descended from the Khazars rather than from the ancient Israelites. There is some historical evidence for some Khazars converting to Judaism in the Middle Ages.

From what I have read, DNA testing has turned up zero evidence of any Khazar ancestry among modern Ashkenazi Jews, but plenty of evidence connecting them with the southern Levant--the Holy Land.