Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Israel

Main        Talk Page        Notice Board        Participants        Awards        Article Assessment        Templates        To do        New Articles        Collaboration of the Week       This Talk page is dedicated to matters related to WikiProject Israel. For general discussions, see Wikipedia:Notice board for Israel-related topics (shortcut: WP:WNBI) Overlap of WikiProject Palestine and WikiProject Israel Please discuss here WT:WikiProject Palestine#Overlap of WikiProject Palestine and Wikiproject Israel. -- Avi (talk) 18:44, 31 March 2008 (UTC) Waiting period (Six-Day War) I've posted it at Talk:Six-Day War but got no reply. The article itself has not been edited for two years, so I doubt if anyone watches it, so I thought I'd post it here. Anyway, the article has a lot of problems, and is not referred to in Six-Day War. It has some overlap with the war article, but also some additional info. Any thoughts on what's to be done with it? -- Nudve (talk) 13:38, 6 May 2008 (UTC) I think it is worth having as an article - the Hebrew wiki has one: he:תקופת ההמתנה. However, I would severely cut down the military moves bit (which is covered in the main article) and concentrate on the political stuff. A brief description could be inserted into the "Background" section of the Six-Day War article, possibly between the "Israel and Syria" and "Withdrawal of UN Forces" sections пﮟოьεԻ 57 13:54, 6 May 2008 (UTC) I tend to agree. Do you have any good sources for it? -- Nudve (talk) 14:05, 6 May 2008 (UTC) No - I'd never heard of it until you brought it up. However, the Hebrew article does have two external links to Yediot articles on the topic. пﮟოьεԻ 57 14:12, 6 May 2008 (UTC) Translation of Hebrew source titles User:Ynhockey recently edited an article I created and translated titles from Hebrew newspapers I cited into English. I don't have a problem with that. In fact, I wouldn't mind doing that myself. My question is: Is that our policy? -- Nudve (talk) 04:36, 7 May 2008 (UTC) Not sure if there is a relevant policy, but I tend to do it both for the benefit of readers (so they can see the title of the referenced article/book) and because sometimes the reflist system messes up right-to-left text so that Hebrew/Arabic references don't appear correctly - looking at the original version of the article, the Hebrew text is unreadable in places because the external link overlaps the source name (at least on my non-Hebrew enabled computer). пﮟოьεԻ 57 11:14, 7 May 2008 (UTC) OK. My concern was for the "purity of sources" and of mistranslating them. But if they're unclear, I guess I'll translate them. Thanks. -- Nudve (talk) 11:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC) Like Number 57, I don't think there's a policy or guideline specifically about source titles, but I believe it's in the general spirit of WP:UE (Use English) - except in rare places where the source title's translation can be highly disputed and loaded (esp. in I-P conflict articles), I don't think there's any reason not to translate the titles. -- Ynhockey (Talk) 13:06, 7 May 2008 (UTC) Dolphinarium massacre It appears that a user named Imad marie is unilaterally trying to move Dolphinarium massacre to Dolphinarium bombing. He claims that 'massacre' is a loaded term and it should be changed to something more neutral, similar to the Gaza beach blast (2006). He has not commented on my question of whether he'd also have Deir Yassin massacre renamed to Battle of Deir Yassin for the sake of NPOV. My personal position is of course that we should leave all of these articles as is, and that the Gaza bleach blast was not a massacre (according to the question simple to understand definition of massacre, in my opinion). There is a discussion taking place at Talk:Dolphinarium massacre. -- Ynhockey (Talk) 13:21, 7 May 2008 (UTC) Yeah, we wouldn't want a "loaded term" that suggests that anyone might have died, or anything -- much less a bunch of teenagers out for a night of dancing, who paid with their lives for their crime of being Israelis. Welcome to Wikipedia, where there are no terrorists and no massacres -- at least not where one certain favored group is concerned. 6SJ7 (talk) 21:59, 9 May 2008 (UTC) On Wikipedia the favored group is the group with the best reliable sources. Wikipedia is not supposed to rewrite history, but to document it. I personally agree that the word "massacre" is very appropriate here, but for a stronger "case" for this name an external source calling it a massacre would be helpful. Currently all sources that are cited in the article and available online are Israeli, which makes them biased. Searching google for "Dolphinarium massacre" -site:wikipedia.org also finds mostly Israeli sources. So, again - i agree that it was a massacre, but i am Israeli myself, so i can hardly have a NPOV. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 22:16, 9 May 2008 (UTC) Revisionist Zionism There appears to be a (very badly structured) argument about renaming this article on its talk page. Interested editors might want to join in at the bottom. пﮟოьεԻ 57 16:15, 8 May 2008 (UTC) User:Ludvikus moved it once (to Revisionism (Zionism)), and I moved it back. Now he's trying to argue his case on the Talk page. As you can tell, he's very confused. — [[::User:Malik Shabazz|Malik Shabazz]] ([[::User talk:Malik Shabazz|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Malik Shabazz|contribs]]) 16:41, 8 May 2008 (UTC) I share both your minds on this issue. When there are hundreds of references to Revisionist Zionism in google books, that is not 'enough' for him but it seems there is only 1 web reference to On The Jewish Question (with a T and not t) and that is enough to keep the article that way... I may lack information but that sounds a little bit confused. Ceedjee (talk) 21:36, 9 May 2008 (UTC) Request for help on article I've been working on an article about a ship, USS Princess Matoika (ID-2290), a World War I-era U.S. Navy transport ship that was later purchased by the American Palestine Line. They briefly ran service from New York–Haifa on this ship—under the name of SS President Arthur—in the mid 1920s. The company officials were all reported as supporters of Zionism, and the ship itself flew the Zionist Flag (which, as far as I can determine, is essentially the Flag of Israel) while at sea. Not being Jewish, I'd like to make sure the article is WP:NPOV in regards to present-day names and/or terminology, since most of my sources were contemporary news accounts of the send-off for its maiden voyage and its other two voyages. The specific section of the article is entitled American Palestine Line. I posted this same message at WikiProject Jewish History and it was recommended that I post this here as well. Thanks in advance. — Bellhalla (talk) 20:07, 9 May 2008 (UTC) Dear Bellhalla, Thanks for consulting us! Here are a few small notes: "reportedly the first ever Jewish steamship company" — "steamship company owned and operated by Jews" might be better. This remove any ambiguity (the steamship company does not practice the Judaism). The title of "rabbi" ought to be capitalized in proper names (such as "Rabbi Stephen S. Wise" and "Rabbi David de Sola Pool"). "American Palestine Line president Jacob S. Strahl in his remarks made the dubious claim that the sailing of President Arthur marked the first appearance 'in more than 2,000 years of the flag of Judea on the high seas'." — I'm not sure if this claim is dubious. Is this original research? Ask the Wikiproject Jewish History people about this, but it seems like a credible claim to me. "comprised of delegations from many of the Jewish colonies in Palestine" — There were no Jewish colonies in Palestine. There were some areas/cities/villages with larger Jewish populations than others. Referring to the Jewish halutzim as "colonists" and speaking about Israel/Palestine as though it were a "colony" in the Western European mold is highly controversial. Excellent work. I look forward to when this becomes a featured article! --GHcool (talk) 20:37, 9 May 2008 (UTC) The original source, The New York Times, uses the term Jewish colonies. ("Welcome committees from Jerusalem, Jaffa, Tel Aviv and from every Jewish colony in Palestine.") They may have been referring to kibbutzim and moshavim, agricultural settlements, but reading something into an 80-year-old newspaper article might be WP:OR. — [[::User:Malik Shabazz|Malik Shabazz]] ([[::User talk:Malik Shabazz|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Malik Shabazz|contribs]]) 20:55, 9 May 2008 (UTC) Jewish towns and villages in Palestine were often referred to as colonies before the 1940s, so I can see why such an old article uses the term. I agree with GHcool that today, this term is highly loaded (especially in the Israeli context), and should be avoided at all costs. -- Ynhockey (Talk) 21:06, 9 May 2008 (UTC) Per the suggestion above, I've made these changes: I capitalized rabbi used as a title. I changed "reportedly the first ever Jewish steamship company" to "reportedly the first ever steamship company owned and operated by Jews" per recommendation I changed the phrase from "comprised of delegations from many of the Jewish colonies in Palestine" to "comprised of delegations from Jerusalem, Jaffa, Tel Aviv" I had a source for the "dubious" characterization of the claim, but can't lay my hands on it right this minute, so I've removed "dubious" from the sentence. Thanks for the comments. One reason I brought it to attention here was to not have any controversy (as potentially with the "colony" thing). Any other suggestions are quite welcome. — Bellhalla (talk) 22:31, 9 May 2008 (UTC) If you want to mention the large number of delegations, "Jewish communities" may be a good synonym. — [[::User:Malik Shabazz|Malik Shabazz]] ([[::User talk:Malik Shabazz|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Malik Shabazz|contribs]]) 22:38, 9 May 2008 (UTC) Great job, Bellhalla, and thanks again for contacting us! --GHcool (talk) 23:08, 9 May 2008 (UTC) RfC on Yerida User:PalestineRemembered is asking for an request for comments on whether it the yerida article ought to include Jewish history denial. I welcome anybody here to comment, and perhaps add the mainstream account of Jewish history into the article. --GHcool (talk) 17:19, 12 May 2008 (UTC) Dispute on Israel Defense Forces article A user named PalestineRemembered is trying to insert a broad elaboration of Breaking The Silence's (a semi-notable Israeli NGO which consists of some anti-war former soldiers) criticism of the IDF into Israel Defense Forces. I am arguing that the elaboration does not satisfy WP:UNDUE (although I don't mind if the NGO is mentioned briefly, like the other organizations in that article that criticize the IDF). I think, just like in the main Israel article, this article is also not about criticism, and criticism should make up a small part of it, except possibly some extremely notable events (although those should have main articles). Information about Breaking The Silence's criticism can be put into Breaking The Silence, which is 100% appropriate because the organization deals only with criticism against the IDF. I made a few more arguments on the talk page, and would appreciate your comments: Talk:Israel Defense Forces#Undue weight in 'controversies'. -- Ynhockey (Talk) 18:03, 14 May 2008 (UTC) September 11th reactions Someone is trying to add a clumsily worded statement made by Benjamin Netanyahu in 2008 that makes it look like he believes that the 9/11 attacks were good for Israel in the Reactions to the September 11, 2001 attacks article. All of the other incidents quoted in the article occurred immediately following the attacks. I invite anyone who is so inclined to join the discussion here. --GHcool (talk) 19:35, 15 May 2008 (UTC)