President-elect Barack Obama's historic victory is still been celebrated around the world.
But one Bedouin tribe in northern Israel says it has a special reason to cheer: Obama, claim the tribe elders, is one of theirs.
He is now known in one northern Israeli Bedouin community as "Bedu Obama" and The Times of London has dubbed the 8,000-members "the lost tribe of Obama."
"People are very happy," said Abdul Rahman Sheikh Abdullah, a member of the local town council. "This is the first time that we have had a black and a Bedouin president."
Abdullah claims that he has proof to back up his claim, but that the tribe wants to present it directly to Obama before revealing it to the world.
But even Abdullah's claims to The Times were convoluted.
The local leader told reporter James Hider that a relative of Obama's Kenyan grandmother came to Israel (perhaps as a trader or laborer) and married into the tribe.
But Abdullah later told a videographer for The Times that it was Obama's father, Hussein, who came and married into the tribe.
Hmm...
No matter, though.
The story is already generating plenty of headlines and a stream of well-wishers looking for a direct line to the White House.
The Bedouin members have already named two newborn babies after Obama.
And Abdullah says he plans to hold a huge party where they will slaughter a dozen goats next week to celebrate.
"If we weren't afraid his wife would be upset, we grant the person who we love and the person who is victorious, either a sword, a horse or a bride," Abdullah told The Times. "But we do not want to give him a bride because we do not want to upset his wife."
Smart move.
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