In certain circles, it is believed that the Irish Tuatha (pronounced "to ay") de Danann people and the ancient Israeli tribe of Dan are the same people. Despite superficial resemblances to the name, there is no credible evidence to support the claim.
Although there are variants of the story, the general idea is that a remnant of ancient Israeli emigrants left Israel at the time of the Assyrian or Babylonian invasions, to make a long voyage from Palestine to Ireland, with stops along the way in Carthage and Iberia.
The most important elements of the retinue were two female offspring of the line of David, sometimes led by the prophet Jeremiah to preserve the royal succession, thus fulfilling scriptural prophecy that the Davidic throne would always be occupied. Given the hard times in both the northern and southern kingdoms of Biblical fame, it was time for an escape to safer climates.
The arrival of the royal entourage in Ireland gave rise to the Tuatha de Danann which after time was moved to Scotland and then to England, finally uniting under the Union Jack.
It is an entertaining and fascinating story, but the evidence for it is slim, if for no other reason that an alternate and more plausible explanation of these mythical people exists. Its chief proponents are found in British Israelism and Christian Identity circles.
Anthropologist Robert Sepehr gave airplay to this idea when he included a lecture in his video by someone who glibly asserted that the Tuatha de Danann were from the Israeli tribe of Dan based upon the similarity of names. I suppose one could then contend that Dannon yogurt is based upon a recipe handed down through the millennia from the Tuatha de.
Irish language expert Tomás Ó hAodha explains that Tuatha de Danann are people of the goddess Danu, while the editors of Wikipedia follow a similar though different line of thought by contending that they are deities of the goddess Danu. According to some scholars, Danu may not even represent a person, but may be a geographical or terrestrial reference. In any event, there seems to be no opening in the definition to allow for the insertion of Israeli peoples.
In fact, the myths, legends, and stories of these people are of traditional beliefs regarding the gods and goddesses shared and told by peoples worldwide with distinct coloration and localizations which make them uniquely Irish. These "pagan" stories predate Christianity and have no affinities with either Christian or Hebrew traditions.
hAodha further notes that these people were the final of 5 waves of invaders who invested the land - but again within a prehistoric and most likely mythical sense.
The link between the Tuatha de Danann and the tribe of Dan is a fanciful interpolation which only a drunk leprechaun could concoct.
Reference
Robert Sepehr, Ancient History of Ireland, Tuatha Dé Danann, Scythians, and Phoenicians - ROBERT SEPEHR, Youtube, March 9, 2019, 23:55 min, source((592) Ancient History of Ireland, Tuatha Dé Danann, Scythians, and Phoenicians - ROBERT SEPEHR - YouTube, accessed 5/8/2021)
Wikipedia contributors. "Tuatha Dé Danann." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 19 Apr. 2021. Web. 8 May. 2021.
Tomás Ó hAodha, Celtic Mythology - An Introduction to the Tuatha Dé Danann, Youtube, April 25, 2017, 18:55 min, source((592) Celtic Mythology - An Introduction to the Tuatha Dé Danann - YouTube, accessed 5/8/2021)
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