They really aren't very different, genetically.
Really now? How else where the Israelites able to distinguish between them and their own? Did you ever read these other passages?
Ye shall keep my statutes. Thou shalt not let thy cattle gender with a diverse kind: thou shalt not sow thy field with mingled seed: neither shall a garment mingled of linen and woollen come upon thee. Leviticus 19:19
(“Field” is a reference to descended offspring, and “garment mingled of linen of wollen” (other versions say “clothing mixed with two kinds of material”) refers to a person who is a hybrid of two different races.)
But I have said unto you, Ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey: I am the Lord your God, which have separated you from other people. Leviticus 20:24
Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds: lest the fruit of thy seed which thou hast sown, and the fruit of thy vineyard, be defiled. Deuteronomy 22:9
A
******* shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord; even to his tenth generation shall he not enter into the congregation of the Lord. Deuteronomy 23:2
(Where “*******” in the KJV is used in this passage, the Hebrew is מַמְזֵר or “mamzer,” which means “mongrel race” in this context. The Greek Septuagint (LXX) uses “allogenes,” which is a combination of two Greek words, "allos" meaning
other, and "genos" meaning
race.)
Make all the personal interpretations you want. Canaanites were descended form Canaan. Israelites descended from Shem. Do you have any idea of how much of a concentration of genetic information there was between each of Noah's sons and their descendants?