Ashkenazi Jews Mizrahi Jews, implies that Ashkenazi Jews make up less than 74% of Jews worldwide. Other estimates place Ashkenazi Jews as making up about 75% of Jews worldwide. Genetic studies on Ashkenazim—researching both their paternal and maternal lineages—suggest a predominant amount of shared Middle Eastern ancestry, complemented by varying percentages of European admixture. These studies have arrived at diverging conclusions regarding both the degree and the sources of their European ancestry, and have generally focused on the extent of the European genetic origin observed in Ashkenazi maternal lineages. Ashkenazi Jews are popularly contrasted with Sephardi Jews (also called Sephardim), who descend
Haredim and Zionism Sephardi or Mizrahi rabbis is far lower than among Ashkenazi rabbis, and these constitute a small minority of the Sephardi Haredi leadership. The Sephardi Haredi political party in the Knesset is Shas, which represents the vast majority of Sephardi Haredim, and is headed by Aryeh Deri. In 2010, Shas joined the World Zionist Organization, and officially became the first Zionist Haredi party. The party's long-time spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, opposed saying Hallel in the Yom HaAtzmaut prayer service, but writes that, "One may say Hallel after the completion of the prayers, without the blessing..." While in the past, when