[jjotto]

Saladin, who wiped out the Christian Crusaders, was a Kurd. The Muslim Kurd Ayyubid dynasty ruled most of the Middle East for a few hundred years.

Kurds are genetically related to Jews, and probably are actually descended from the ‘lost’ tribes.

[Verginius Rufus]

The Kurds are probably descendants of the Kardouchoi (Carduchi) who were in the same area when Xenophon and the 10,000 Greek mercenaries went through there in 400 B.C.

I don't know how close their connection to the Jews might be--if distant might go back to before Abraham, the "wandering Aramean" (the Arameans were in the same region).

Nikos Kazantzakis in one of his books talks about going to rescue Greeks who were being massacred by Kurds (these probably would have been the Kurds in eastern Turkey).