@BrokenSword @Mark @Ash_Kvetchum >Tolkien himself stated in a 1955 letter to Naomi Mitchinson: “I do think of the ‘Dwarves’ like Jews: at once native and alien in their habitations, speaking the languages of the country, but with an accent due to their own private tongue.” In a 1971 BBC interview, he said: “The dwarves of course are quite obviously—wouldn’t you say that in many ways they remind you of the Jews? Their words are Semitic, obviously, constructed to be Semitic.”

To be fair, he explicitly says Dwarves aren’t Jews at some point, but it seems to be more of an Inspiration for it.