2 Kings 17:24
And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.
After Israel was removed, the king of Assyria placed foreign settlers in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel, where they possessed Samaria and dwelt in its cities. The settlers were brought from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim. Israel's transgression in neglecting to obey God's statutes and its sins led the Lord to suffer an idolatrous nation to overcome it. Those settlers mixed with Israelites left in the land through intermarriage and contact, forming the mixed population later known as the Samaritans, whose ancestors had in part belonged to Israel.
The Samaritans were later joined fully by Israelites who had married idolaters and chose exile with them and by those expelled from the congregation for refusing to separate from idolaters, including men who had held high positions in the work of God. The religion of the newcomers gradually contaminated and corrupted the religion of the Israelite element through conquest, contact, and intermarriage. The resulting people claimed to worship the true God and preserved reverence for him, yet represented him by images of wood and stone before which they bowed, saying the idols reminded them of the living God, and came to revere graven images. Their religion continued as a mixture of Judaism and heathenism, retaining the ceremonies and ritual given through Moses without wholly abandoning idolatry.
They built a rival temple on Mount Gerizim in opposition to the house of God at Jerusalem. To strengthen the alliance with the joining Israelites, the Samaritans promised to adopt the Jewish faith and customs more fully, and the apostate Israelites erected the Gerizim temple. After the destruction of that temple they regarded their disasters as God's punishment for apostasy and sought teachers from the Jews, so their views of God and his requirements became clearer and their service resembled that of the Jews, yet they still clung to idolatry to a degree and refused to respect Jerusalem as the true place of worship. Their claim to be the people of God and the continuing division left lasting lack of harmony, schism, emulation, enmity, and bitter animosity between the two peoples from generation to generation.