A Jewish wedding ceremony
The Jews are an ethnoreligious group descended from the Israelites of the Ancient Levant. Most Jews adhere to the religion of Judaism, but many were forced to convert to other religions during their long history of persecution and calamities, with many Jews in Spain, Portugal, and other countries in Western Europe being converted to Catholicism and other Jews in the Middle East being converted to Islam. The Jews have historically been a diasporic community ever since their homeland of Israel was conquered by Babylon, the Assyrian Empire, and other empires, with the Jewish diaspora marrying people in their new homelands and creating distinct groups of Jews such as Ashkenazim (in Europe), Sephardim (in the Iberian Peninsula, Southern Europe, and North Africa), Hasidim (in Russia), Bukharan Jews (in Central Asia), and Beta Israel (in Ethiopia), among others. Today, there are around 14,500,000 Jews living in various countries, with the majority residing in either their homeland of Israel or the United States.
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