Their movement contributed to further instability, which contributed to further displacement, in the kind of cascading pattern that is recognizable from modern refugee crises.

The historical record of how the Bronze Age world responded to the Sea Peoples — Egypt repulsed them militarily, the Levantine cities fell, some of the migrants were settled and integrated — is not a simple template for modern policy.

But the recognition that the Sea Peoples were not simply destroyers but often displaced people themselves is an important humanizing insight that complicates the “them vs. us” framing of the Egyptian records.

The Living Descendants: What The Genetics Reveals About Continuity