Mizrahi Jews in Israel the Mizrahi Jews. Many more Israeli Jews are second and third generation Mizrahi descendants or have a partial Mizrahi origin. The other dominant sub-groups are the Israeli Ashkenazi Jews and Sephardic Jews. Often Mizrahi and North African Sephardic Jews in Israel are grouped together due to the similarity of their history under Muslim rule and an overwhelming migration out of their countries of residence during the 20th century. If combined, Mizrahi and Sephardic Jews number about one half of Israeli Jews. After the establishment of the State of Israel and subsequent 1948 Arab–Israeli War, most Mizrahi Jews were either expelled
Ashkenazi Hebrew from Spain in 1492 (or before) the Sephardic pronunciation of the vowels became standard in all these countries, ironing out any differences that previously existed. This makes it harder to adjudicate between the different theories on the relationship between today's pronunciation systems and those of ancient times. Leopold Zunz believed that the Ashkenazi pronunciation was derived from that of Palestine in Geonic times (7th–11th centuries CE), while the Sephardi pronunciation was derived from that of Babylonia. This theory was supported by the fact that, in some respects, Ashkenazi Hebrew resembles the western dialect of Syriac while Sephardi Hebrew resembles the