Boyd’s Bible Dictionary:
(dirt thrower). No ground-moles in Palestine. Chameleon or lizard (Lev. 11:30); and rat or weasel (Isa. 2:20).
Concise Bible Dictionary:
1. tinshemeth. An animal classed among the unclean, but it is not known definitely what animal is meant by the Hebrew word. It is probably the chameleon, which is adopted in the RV. It is placed with the lizard and the snail (Lev. 11:30). In two places the same word is translated “swan” (Lev. 11:18; Deut. 14:16).
Chameleon
2. chapharperah. This is by most identified with the mole-rat, the spalax typhlus. It is very like a mole: it burrows under the earth and turns up mounds, but it is of a different order from the true mole. These mole-rats have been found in Palestine; they inhabit ruins and stone-heaps, and come out in the night. They may be well classed with the bats to which the idols will be cast in a future day (Isa. 2:20).
Spalax microphthalmus
Strong’s Dictionary of Hebrew Words:
Meaning:
from 6331; a hole (as broken, i.e. dug)