Neither Ashkenazi nor Sephardi -LRB- the two major groups of Diaspora Jews -RRB- , the Bukharians say that their lineage goes directly back to the Babylonian captivity , before 500 B.C . '' Our people are the ones who did not return to Jerusalem afterward , but remained in Asia , '' said Peter Pinkhasov , a paralegal at a Manhattan law firm who immigrated with his family from Tashkent in 1993 .