Let me suggest that Ephesians 2 has a different meaning than is usually taught in churches. Lets start with two words.
Gentiles in verse 11
Ethnos is a Koine Greek word that means nation/race. It is where we get the English word ethnicity. It is sometimes translated as heathen. In many places it was “translated” with the Latin word Gentile. The Latin word Gentile means nation/kin. Over many years the meaning of the word was changed to mean non-Jew. However if you want to understand scripture in the manner desired by the author, then when you read Gentile, think nation. Let the context determine who that nation is in the text. In some instances the context demands that the nation is those of the ten tribes who were afar off. Always let the scripture define its own terms for proper understanding.
Aliens found in verse 12.
Apallotrioo is a Greek verb that means to to estrange away. It is a verb that should have been translated as alienated.
There are more clues with the words children, uncircumcision, circumcision, nigh or near and afar off and reconcile. The middle wall of partion is also important. Let scripture define those terms. Christ Himself defined the word children.
When Rehoboam became King of Israel the nation of Israel split into two separate nations, the house of Judah and the house of Israel. Ephesians 2 is about the reunification of the house of Judah, who were those near, with the house of Israel who by this time were those afar off in Europe and Greece. (History and archeology including Asyrian tablets show that the ten tribes escaped from Asyria and moved mostly into Europe as Josephus, Ptolemy and others document.) This reunification was under one head, Christ. So the enmity between them was ended when Christ broke down the middle wall of partition.
God did not cast away those whom He foreknew. To do so would have made God a promise breaker and liar. The book of Hosea does not leave the Northern tribes lost forever, but gives hope to those who were temporarily called “not my people”. The word reconcile is also a clue. One can not reconcile two groups who were never together in the past. Much like the idea of redemption. Only Israel can be redeemed. Scripture makes that very plain.
So it was the house of Israel, the ten northern tribes, who became estranged, Ezekiel 14:5 and lost the right to be called Israel. This is why scripture calls them nations (Gentiles). They became “alienated from the from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world”. That is except for the promises in Hosea.
Hosea 1:10-11 “Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured nor numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God. Then shall the children of Judah and the children of Israel be gathered together, and appoint themselves one head, and they shall come up out of the land: for great shall be the day of Jezreel.”
By the way, there are at least two other Gentile references that by context must be the house of Israel and not some non-Israelites. They are Romans 2:14-15 and Romans 9:24-26. I leave it to you to check those out.
Spiritualizing scripture to make it fit other people destroys the intended meaning.
Amos 9:9 “For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth.”
and
Daniel 2:44 “And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people”.
There are many clues in the following verses, not the least of which is “peculiar people”.
1 Peter 2:9-10 “But ye are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light: Which in time past were not a people, but are now the people of God: which had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.”
As they admit in a growing number of writings, the modern day Jews are not Israelites.