A Hint of Qumran in a Targum?

Fourty years ago, Steven Bowman published an article discussing the possibly meaning of the name of Khirbet Qumran, which gave its name to the famous scrolls found in its vicinity. In the article he raised the likelihood of the word 'qumran' having Syriac-Aramaic origins and coming from the word 'Kumri(a)' (כומרי, כומריא), which means 'priest(s)' (although in Hebrew this root is usually associated with priests of idolatrous religions, and at some point after the rise of Christianity became the common word for Christian priests, Komer (כומר)). He suggested connecting this with a commonly-accepted notion (although I have some doubts) that the ancient Qumran sect(s) was(/were?) a group of priests or had an association with a priestly sect.

The exact identification of the ancient settlement that was located at Qumran is debated. Many have suggested Tanachic Sechachah (סככה), others have suggested Tanachic Ir Ha'melach (עיר המלח) as Iron Age remnants were found at the site (including a Hebron LMLK seal!). However, it's not beyond the realm of possibility that Qumran had an entirely different name during the Second Temple period.

Not long ago, this question was posted on Mi Yodeya. It asked about a discrepancy in Onkelos's targum of several verses in Bamidbar 32, where in verse 3 the names of Transjordanian towns were translated into Aramaic, while in verses 34-38 the names were left in the original Hebrew. This is a very fair question. I did some digging earlier and according to Rabbi Binyamin Posen, author of Parshegen (פרשגן), a commentary on Onkelos, it seems that the best Onkelos manuscripts do not include the Aramaic translations of the site names but leave it in the original Hebrew, as in the case of verses 34-38. What seems to have happened is that some scribes of lower-quality manuscripts mixed in a targumic tradition from Targum Yerushalmi, an anonymous Eretz-Yisraeli targum of questionable/debatable origins. This distorted manuscript branch was used for the editio princeps of Mikraot Gedolot's Onkelos, and that's what led to this distortion being popularized. It should be noted that other manuscripts of Targum Yerushalmi on this verse contain variants, sometime significant ones.

Targum Yerushalmi is considered a strange targum. It goes far beyond the literal or minimalistic translations the like of Onkelos on the Torah and Targum Yonatan on the Navi, and includes many strange and fascinating traditions and midrashim on the verses. This list seems to be one of those strange traditions. Some commentators have suggested that all or most of the names in the list are literal translations of the Hebrew names (e.g., one version of Targum Yerushalmi calls Ya'azer "Si'an" (סיען), which has a root of the same meaning of Ya'azer: Ya'azer, יעזר, comes from עזר, and Si'an, סיען, comes from סיע, both meaning help/assistance). In some cases, however, it's clear that there's simply a proposed site identification. For example, Nimrah is identified with Beit Nimrin, which is also the Yerushalmi's identification for the site.

Going back to Qumran, one version of the Targum Yerushalmi's list, the one featured today in the popular print version of Onkelos, translates Ya'azer as כומרין (Kumrin). This caught my eye because of its phonetic similarity to Qumran, as well as having a potential shared etymological origin - כומרין means "priests" in Aramaic.

The general area of Ya'azer is far away from Qumran, not to mention that they're situated on different sides of the Jordan River. However, given that at least a few of the Targum site names are actual identifications (and not simply literal translations), and the phonetic and potential etymological connection, it seems not outside of the realm of possibility that the Targum may be preserving here a real place-name, either in the vicinity of Ya'azer, or, possibly, Qumran itself, but the author of the Targum, or a later scribe, misunderstood the location of the site.

This possibility is quite enamoring, though probably hasn't any other basis at the moment. I'll leave this as food for thought for right now.

Edit:

As mentioned by Anonymous in the comments, Ya'azer is also identified in some sources with Machvar, the Greco-Chashmonian fortress of Machaerus (which means "sword" or "war" in Greek). Machaerus, unlike Tanachic Ya'azer, is just across the Dead Sea and a little to the south of Qumran. This location might better explain a potential geographic shift in the name of Qumran/Kumrin.