Samaritans
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The Samaritans, also known as Israelite Samaritans, are an ethnoreligious group originating from the Hebrews and Israelites of the ancient Near East. They are indigenous to Samaria, a historical region of ancient Israel and Judah that comprises the northern half of today's West Bank. They are adherents of Samaritanism, an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion that developed alongside Judaism.
Samaritans marking Passover on Mount Gerizim, near modern Nablus and ancient Shechem, 2006
Foreigners eaten by lions in Samaria, illustration by Gustave Doré from the 1866 La Sainte Bible, The Holy Bible
Ancient inscription in Samaritan Hebrew. From a photo c. 1900 by the Palestine Exploration Fund.
Ruins of a 4th-century Samaritan synagogue likely abandoned after the Samaritan Revolts, Khirbet Samara
Israelites
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The Israelites were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan. They were also an ethnoreligious group.
Mid-20th century mosaic of the 12 Tribes of Israel, from the Etz Yosef synagogue wall in Givat Mordechai, Jerusalem
Model of the Tabernacle constructed under the auspices of Moses, in Timna Park, Israel
The Mount Ebal structure, seen by many archeologists as an early Israelite cultic site
Part of the gift-bearing Israelite delegation of King Jehu, Black Obelisk, 841–840 BCE.