Talk:Palestinian refugees

This article is a frequent source of heated debate. Please try to keep a cool head when commenting here.

Previous discussions on the this topic may be found here: Talk:Palestinian refugee/Archive 1

Who Created the 1948 Refugees?

"The Arab armies entered Palestine to protect the Palestinians from the Zionist tyranny but, instead, THEY ABANDONED THEM, FORCED THEM TO EMIGRATE AND TO LEAVE THEIR HOMELAND, imposed upon them a political and ideological blockade and threw them into prisons similar to the ghettos in which the Jews used to live in Eastern Europe, as if we were condemmed to change places with them; they moved out of their ghettos and we occupied similar ones. The Arab States succeeded in scattering the Palestinian people and in destroying their unity. They did not recognize them as a unified people until the States of the world did so, and this is regrettable".

- by Abu Mazen, from the article titled: "What We Have Learned and What We Should Do", published in Falastin el Thawra, the official journal of the PLO, of Beirut, in March 1976 ...

"The Arab streets are curiously deserted and, ardently following the poor example of the more moneyed class there has been an exodus from Jerusalem too, though not to the same extent as in Jaffa and Haifa."

- London Times, May 5, 1948

"The refugees were confident that their absence would not last long, and that they would return within a week or two. Their leaders had promised them that the Arab armies would crush the 'Zionist gangs' very quickly and that there was no need for panic or fear of a long exile."

- Monsignor George Hakim, Greek Catholic Bishop of Galilee, in the Beirut newspaper Sada al Janub, August 16, 1948

"Of the 62,000 Arabs who formerly lived in Haifa not more than 5,000 or 6,000 remained. Various factors influenced their decision to seek safety in flight. There is but little doubt that the most potent of the factors were the announcements made over the air by the -Higher Arab Executive, urging the Arabs to quit.. . . It was clearly intimated that those Arabs who remained in Haifa and accepted Jewish protection would be regarded as renegades."

- The London weekly Economist, October 2, 1948

"It must not be forgotten that the Arab Higher Committee encouraged the refugees' flight from their homes in Jaffa, Haifa, and Jerusalem."

- Near East Arabic Broadcasting Station, Cyprus, April 3, 1949

"This wholesale exodus was due partly to the belief of the Arabs, encouraged by the boasting of an unrealistic Arab press and the irresponsible utterances of some of the Arab leaders that it could be only a matter of some weeks before the Jews were defeated by the armies of the Arab States and the Palestinian Arabs enabled to re-enter and retake possession of their country."

- Edward Atiyah (then Secretary of the Arab League Office in London) in The Arabs (London, 1955), p. 183

"The mass evacuation, prompted partly by fear, partly by order of Arab leaders, left the Arab quarter of Haifa a ghost city...By withdrawing Arab workers their leaders hoped to paralyze Haifa.".

- Time, May 3, 1948, p. 25

The Arab exodus, initially at least, was encouraged by many Arab leaders, such as Haj Amin el Husseini, the exiled pro-Nazi Mufti of Jerusalem, and by the Arab Higher Committee for Palestine. They viewed the first wave of Arab setbacks as merely transitory. Let the Palestine Arabs flee into neighboring countries. It would serve to arouse the other Arab peoples to greater effort, and when the Arab invasion struck, the Palestinians could return to their homes and be compensated with the property of Jews driven into the sea.

- Kenneth Bilby, in New Star in the Near East (New York, 1950), pp. 30-31

I do not want to impugn anybody but only to help the refugees. The fact that there are these refugees is the direct consequence of the action of the Arab States in opposing Partition and the Jewish State. The Arab States agreed upon this policy unanimously and they must share in the solution of the problem, [Daily Telegraph, September 6, 1948

- Emil Ghoury, Secretary of the Arab Higher Committee, the official leadership of the Palestinian Arabs, in the Beirut newspaper, Daily Telegraph, September 6, 1948

The Arab States encouraged the Palestine Arabs to leave their homes temporarily in order to be out of the way of the Arab invasion armies.

- Falastin (Jordanian newspaper), February 19, 1949

We will smash the country with our guns and obliterate every place the Jews seek shelter in. [b]The Arabs should conduct their wives and children to safe areas until the fighting has died down.

- Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Said[/b], quoted in Sir Am Nakbah ("The Secret Behind the Disaster") by Nimr el Hawari, Nazareth, 1952

....

"The Arab governments told us: Get out so that we can get in. So we got out, but they did not get in."

- from the Jordan daily Ad Difaa, September 6, 1954 [/b]

"The Arab civilians panicked and fled ignominiously. Villages were frequently abandoned before they were threatened by the progress of war."

- General Glubb Pasha, in the London Daily Mail on August 12, 1948

"[The Arabs of Haifa] fled in spite of the fact that the Jewish authorities guaranteed their safety and rights as citizens of Israel."

- Monsignor George Hakim, Greek Catholic Bishop of Galilee, according to Rev. Karl Baehr, Executive Secretary of the American Christian Palestine Committee, New York Herald Tribune, June 30, 1949

"The Arabs did not want to submit to a truce they rather preferred to abandon their homes, their belongings and everything they possessed in the world and leave the town. This is in fact what they did."

- Jamal Husseini, Acting Chairman of the Palestine Arab Higher Committee, told to the United Nations Security Council, quoted in the UNSC Official Records (N. 62), April 23, 1948, p. 14

"the military and civil authorities and the Jewish representative expressed their profound regret at this grave decision [to evacuate]. The [Jewish] Mayor of Haifa made a passionate appeal to the delegation to reconsider its decision"

- The Arab National Committee of Haifa, told to the Arab League, quoted in The Refugee in the World, by Joseph B. Schechtman, 1963

.......

"The existence of these refugees is a direct result of the Arab States' opposition to the partition plan and the reconstitution of the State of Israel. The Arab states adopted this policy unanimously, and the responsibility of its results, therefore is theirs. ...The flight of Arabs from the territory allotted by the UN for the Jewish state began immediately after the General Assembly decision at the end of November 1947. This wave of emigration, which lasted several weeks, comprised some thirty thousand people, chiefly well-to-do-families."

- Emil Ghory, secretary of the Arab High Council, Lebanese daily Al-Telegraph, 6 Sept 1948

"Since 1948 we have been demanding the return of the refugees to their homes. But we ourselves are the ones who encouraged them to leave. Only a few months separated our call to them to leave and our appeal to the United Nations to resolve on their return."

- Haled al Azm, the Syrian Prime Minister in 1948-49, The Memoirs of Haled al Azm, (Beirut, 1973), Part 1, pp. 386-387

"Since 1948 it is We who demanded the return of refugees... while it is We who made them to leave... We brought disaster upon... Arab refugees, by inviting them and bringing pressure to bear upon them to leave... We have rendered them dispossessed... We have accustomed them to begging... We have participated in lowering their moral and social level... Then WE exploited them in executing crimes of murder, arson, and throwing bombs upon... men, women and children - all this in service of Political purposes..."

- Khaled al Azm, Syria's Prime Minister after the 1948 war [note: same person as above]

"As early as the first months of 1948 the Arab League issued orders exhorting the people to seek a temporary refuge in neighboring countries, later to return to their abodes in the wake of the victorious Arab armies and obtain their share of abandoned Jewish property."

- bulletin of The Research Group for European Migration Problems, 1957

One morning in April 1948, Dr. Jamal woke us to say that the Arab Higher Committee (AHC), led by the Husseinis, had warned Arab residents of Talbieh to leave immediately. The understanding was that the residents would be able to return as conquerors as soon as the Arab forces had thrown the Jews out. Dr. Jamal made the point repeatedly that he was leaving because of the AHC's threats, not because of the Jews, and that he and his frail wife had no alternative but to go.

Commentary Magazine -- January 2000

Source: Peace Encyclopedia —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.14.185.23 (talk) 23:33, 14 November 2008 (UTC)

Numbers

The Palestinian refugee problem is noted as one of the more pressing refugee problems in the world, due to the tremendous duration of time and the number of people involved. It would be helpful if a table of numbers of current refugees, living in different countries, in the West Bank, Gaza etc, were made so the gravity of the topic can be easily understood.

For instance, in the later part of the article, some numbers are given, such as the 500,000 Palestinians residing in Saudi Arabia. But then in the section under Lebanon, there are no numbers .

If this information is elsewhere, then can a wikilink be placed somewhere?Wilgamesh 05:40, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

Here are two references I was able to find after a little research. I would like to know the origin of the 500,000 figure. The first reference gives the Palestinian population of Saudi Arabia, in 1981, as 136,779. [1] The second reference cites the number 183,000 for the same population as of 1993. [2] That's an increase of about a third in 12 years. So, assuming another increase of a third in the next 12 years, that would make the current population about 245,000. These are only rough estimates, but if the current population really is 500,000, that would be an increase of 273% (vs. 33% in the previous 12 year period). The 500,000 number may still be correct; but if it is, we need a reference.

[1] Smith, Pamela Ann, "The Palestinian Diaspora, 1948-1985," Journal of Palestine Studies, Vol. 15, No. 3. (Spring, 1986), pp. 90-108. [1]

[2] Courbage, Youssef, "The Population of Palestine," Population: An English Selection, Vol. 7. (1995), pp. 210-224. [2]

DRE 05:18, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Refugees versus refugee descendants

Are there any exact figures for how many people are left of the ones who fled six decades ago, and how many people are descended from those who fled?//Big Adamsky 06:23, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Pre-war refugees

As Ilan Pappe writes in A History of Modern Palestine, a third of Palestine's Arabs had been evicted before the Arab states invaded in May 1948. Charles Glass, London Review of Books 24 Jun 04 [3]

Right of Return

Three of the primary reasons that people object to a Palestinian "Right of Return" have not been listed here. Specifically they are

1) The General Assembly resolution says "refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbours" should be allowed back. Returning home is predicated on wishing to live at peace, and Israelis see no evidence that Palestinian refugees wish to live at peace with them. 2) In any event General Assembly resolutions are non-binding. 3) The actual refugees wishing to "return home" number only a small fraction of the total number of Palestinians now classed as refugees, at most 10%; the other over 90% cannot be said to be returning. Jayjg 20:26, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

1) is fine. 2) is not precisely an objection, but may be relevant. 3) strikes me as completely irrelevant, even if reliable statistics could be found on who wants to return and who does not; a right does not have to be exercised by all those who have it (not everybody exercises their right to free speech, or trial by jury, for instance.) - Mustafaa 00:36, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hey Mustafa, where have you been? Regarding three, my point was unclear. Let me put it this way: Only 10% of those Palestinians classed as refugees have actually ever lived in the places they claim to be refugees from; the rest were born elsewhere, so they can't be refugees in the true sense of the word, nor can they return to a place they've never been. Jayjg 01:46, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Hey Jayjg! Just sitting around in Wiki-detox... ;) As for three, that is highly POV - particularly since Israel's claim to the land was itself based originally on people "returning" to a place their extremely distant ancestors had fled from. Other refugees - eg the Chechens and Crimean Tatars - have returned to the areas from which they were expelled a generation later, and I am unaware of any claim that Crimean Tatars born in Kazakhstan should be prevented from returning to what they continue to regard as their native land. - Mustafaa 01:54, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I hope the rest was good. I've made some updates partly based on our exchange above. Jayjg 15:06, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

There is a huge opposition to Tatars returning back to Crimea. Their homes are long as taken, and generations of people were born there. Crimean peninsula is one of the most beautiful vacation spots in the ex-USSR and is heavily populated, e.g. the Politburo dachas were in Crimea. Think real estate. ←Humus sapiens←Talk 10:01, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Of course - same as in this case. But unlike Israel-Palestine, the principle has been accepted, and a substantial number have returned. - Mustafaa 23:22, 4 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Libyan offer

About Libya's offer: Saddam Hussein also made an offer like that. I don't think there were many takers. I can't remember any details so I'm not putting anything into the article. --Zero 04:48, 31 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Interesting - I hadn't heard about that one.

Can you source "Libyan Jews... point out the lack of human rights, religious freedoms, and democracy in Libya that make such an offer highy unattractive"? I came across no such claims being made by Libyan Jews, though commenting on the lack of democracy in Libya is like commenting about the lack of oxygen on the Moon. - Mustafaa 01:55, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

At the end of the first link:

"We were never at home there," said New Yorker Vivienne Roumani-Denn, an expert on Jewish refugees from Arab lands who was born in Benghazi, the second-largest city in Libya. "Until the Muslim world really makes a commitment to tolerance, to democracy, to let people live with religious freedom, there's no way to return."

As for commenting on the lack of democracy in Libya (or indeed anywhere else in the Arab world) being like commenting on the lack of oxygen on the moon, yes, it goes without saying, but if specious offers of "Jewish return" from Arab dictators like Gaddafi (and Saddam Hussein) need to be mentioned, then apparently many other obvious things need to be mentioned as well. Jayjg 06:04, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Personally I would leave it out altogether. It's relevance to this page is very indirect. --Zero 06:24, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

IMHO, if we talk about Right_of_return#Palestinian here at all, this is much more relevant than Qaddafi's PR tricks: Jews who fled Arab lands now press their cause. Refugees' advocates link issue to Palestinians' claims on Israel ←Humus sapiens←Talk 09:44, 3 Aug 2004 (UTC)

What's so specious about the offer? Everything I know about Qaddafi indicates he means it, just as it indicates that they'd be stupid to accept it. Unlike any other Arab leader, he's quite simple: he almost always means what he says, though what he says is almost always breathtakingly stupid. - Mustafaa 22:23, 4 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I don't think Saddam Hussein's similar offer was specious either. What he was hoping for was a handful of returning Jews who would appear shaking his hand on TV and generally give him a nice propaganda event with minimal cost. The offer would have been quickly modified if a substantial number of Jews wanted to return to Iraq and get their property back. --Zero 08:36, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)

I meant "specious" in the sense that the offers were not made with any real intent of welcoming Jews or improving the Israeli-Palestinian issue; rather they were both ploys by the leaders to create propaganda opportunities to use against Israel, and improve their standing in the Western and Arab worlds. Jayjg 15:03, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)

List

As far as I know, there are many Palestinian refugees (or descendants) with degrees forming part of the liberal professionals in the Persian Gulf and even Europe. Doctors, architects, journalists,... Probably they are those outside refugee camps. However, could you make a list of famous Palestinian refugees?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famous_Palestinians —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.118.94.165 (talk) 16:13, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Later refugees

I assume that neither this nor Palestinian exodus deal with recent Palestine emigrants. I have read that the Catholic church is concerned that the land of Jesus could remain without Christians, since the decreasing Palestine Christians are better received than Muslims in Western countries and feel increasingly uneasy along Muslim Palestinians and Israelis.

Palestinian Christians have been suffering marked at the hands of their Arab brethern who have a saying "first the saturday people, then the sunday people"....when the saturday people are stiff-necked and resist, the sunday people made to suffer by their Arab brethern. [4][5][6] Lance6Wins 18:39, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Palestinian Christians have been resisting Israeli aggression alongside their Muslim brothers and sisters for decades. Israelis discriminate against and oppress all Palestinians, except for the Jewish Palestinians who are now considered Israelis. Zionists like Lance6Wins have been attempting for a long time to drive a wedge and divide Palestinian resistance by setting Christians against Muslims. [7] [8] --Alberuni 19:23, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Some of Lance's links appear to come from Palestinian Christians themselves; why are your links more convincing than his? Jayjg 19:46, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Your contribution in this case seems more than a trifle perverse. Two of those three references from Lance6Wins come from Palestinian Christians - they blame the "Christian Right" of the US and Israel, respectively, for their plight. They're not running from their Muslim neighbours but from occupation and terrorism by brutal soldiers, and ethnic cleansing threats such as these: "House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) was even more forthright: 'I'm content to have Israel grab the entire West Bank… I happen to believe that the Palestinians should leave..

(The third reference is a vicious polemic against Muslims by the author of " Eye to Eye will give you the latest documentation ...... of the consequences suffered by U.S. Presidents, Israeli Prime Ministers, and world leaders when they participate in the dividing of the covenant land of Israel and interfering with God's plan for the nation of Israel".)

PalestineRemembered 16:27, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I suggest you talk to Joseph E. Saad - the only Palestinian Christian on Wikipedia - about this, if he hasn't given up yet. However, if the many Christians fleeing Palestine are added, so should be the many Muslims doing the same. It's not much fun living under occupation, and many people prefer to get out if they get a chance. - Mustafaa 00:20, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

New Material

The issue was a key factor in the collapse of peace talks in 2000. President Bush last April publicly embraced Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's position that refugees be allowed into any new Palestinian state but not into Israel.

"We promise that we will not rest until the right of return of our people is achieved and the tragedy of our diaspora ends," Abbas told a session of parliament held to mourn Arafat, who died of an undisclosed illness in France on Nov. 11. [9]

Please add. Lance6Wins 18:39, 23 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Please provide exact Bush quote. - Mustafaa 14:28, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"It seems clear that an agreed, just, fair and realistic framework for a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue, as part of any final status agreement, will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than Israel." The source seems pretty reliable too ;-) [10] Jayjg

Cool. Sadly, I don't believe Abbas, but I've added a mention of his position in case he does come out on top. The Bush quote probably belongs in one of the more general peace process pages; to put it here would require a whole new section on political participants' views, which would be constantly in need of updating. - Mustafaa 15:57, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Hmm. I'm having difficulty understanding the "policy" on when references to American actions and views are relevant to this conflict, and when they are not. On the one hand, on the Arab-Israeli conflict page we have Alberuni insisting that the 9/11 attacks were part of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Yet, here, when the American President makes a specific statement about the descendants of the refugees emigratiing to Israel, it's not relevant. Jayjg 16:19, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The 911 attacks are not part of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and if that's what Alberuni is saying, he's wrong. Other pages' edit wars have little to do with this page... I'm not dismissing the sentence as irrelevant - merely noting that to make a place for it here would take a significant amount of work (namely, summarizing the positions of at least the major political organizations participating in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.) I'm not averse to that work being done - or, indeed, to doing that work at some point - but it has not yet been done. - Mustafaa 00:01, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The refugees "were not able to return home".

The article says the refugees "were not able to return home". That is true for most, but certainly not all refugees. Israel offered to allow 100,000 to return (including 35,000 that were in the process of returning), but the Arab states refused to negotiate with Israel so as not to give it "legitimacy". Palestine Conciliation Commission, Fourth Progress Report, A/922, 22 September 1949: "Subject to these conditions, the Government of Israel would be prepared to accept the return to Israel in its present limits of 100,000 refugees, in addition to the total Arab population existing at the end of the hostilities (including those who have already returned since then), thus increasing the total number of that Population to a maximum of 250,000. This repatriation would form part of a general plan for resettlement of refugees which would be established by a special organ to be created for the purpose by the United Nations." [11] "This number would have included some 35,000 refugees whose return had already been negotiated and was underway ". [12]. I think this information should be included. Jayjg 16:16, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I agree, but we need to find out more first about these 35,000. What basis were they selected on? Did they actually return or not (the wording seems ambiguous)? - Mustafaa 18:48, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

They were selected on the basis of family re-unification, and the wording is slightly ambiguous, though other sources are more explicit:

In 1949, Israel offered to admit 100,000 Arab refugees, with the understanding that their repatriation would be linked to meaningful peace negotiations. Although 35,000 Arabs eventually returned under a family reunification plan, further implementation of the offer was suspended in the 1950's, after it became clear that the Arab states steadfastly refused to consider Israel's peace overtures, preferring instead to maintain a state of war with and economic boycott against Israel. [13]

Also, from the original link:

Notably, from the early 1950s until 1967, Israel maintained a family reunification program under which it claims that around 40–50,000 refugees returned to Israel; several additional thousands returned between 1967 and 1994. And since the beginning of the Oslo process, Israel has collaborated in the de facto “return” to the Palestinian authority of thousands of 1948 refugees: PLO political figures and security forces, and their families. If return is defined as applying to “mandatory Palestine,” this may enable both Palestinians and Israelis to take satisfaction in the exercise of a return to the eventual Palestinian state alone. But in general, Israel, in keeping with its narrative, has preferred to avoid taking political initiatives in the refugee issue.
The principal known Israeli initiative took place in the summer of 1949. Under pressure from the US, and in view of Arab refusal (at the Lausanne Conference) to discuss agreed borders until the refugee issue had been resolved, the Ben Gurion government agreed to absorb 100,000 refugees. This number would have included some 35,000 refugees whose return had already been negotiated and was underway. Israel’s decision was made conditional upon Arab agreement, at Lausanne, to a comprehensive peace, including resettlement of the remaining refugees in Arab countries. Discussion within the Israeli government at the time also touched upon the possibility of absorbing a larger number of refugees, on condition that the Gaza Strip (with some of its refugee population) would be transferred from Egyptian to Israeli control, thereby improving Israel’s military security situation vis-à-vis Egypt. Ultimately the Arabs rejected the Israeli offer, after which Israel retracted it.

Jayjg 19:13, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

One other point to check: the article currently says "During the period mid-1948-53 between 30,000 and 90,000 refugees made their way from their countries of exile to resettle in their former villages or in other Israeli Arab villages (contrary to Israeli law.)" Was this figure meant to include these family reunifications (in which case the parenthetical remark is partly wrong) or not? - Mustafaa 23:56, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Oh. Never mind - the quote is in Talk archives: "(Morris, p39) During the period mid-1948-53 between 30,000 and 90,000 refugees made their way illegally from their countries of exile to resettle in their former villages or in other Israeli Arab villages." Thank you Zero, as so often. - Mustafaa 23:58, 24 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I propose a slight modification to your text, as follows:

These refugees, the great majority of whom had lived there for generations, were generally not able to return home. In 1950, according to UNRWA, they numbered 914,000. During the period mid-1948-53 between 30,000 and 90,000 refugees (according to Benny Morris) made their way from their countries of exile to resettle in their former villages or in other Israeli Arab villages (contrary to Israeli law); some 35,000 were let in legally under a family reunification agreement. In 1949, Israel offered to let in up to 65,000 more as part of a proposed deal with the surrounding Arab countries, but they rejected it, and Israel withdrew the proposal in 1950.

I think this is more accurate, and slightly better gramatically. Thoughts? Jayjg 17:03, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Looks fine. - Mustafaa 17:16, 25 Nov 2004 (UTC)

A few things are not quite right here. The '100,000 offer' that Israel made at the Lausanne conference was supposed to consist of (1) 25,000 "illegal immigrants", (2) 10,000 persons under the family reunification scheme, (3) 65,000 others. The 25,000 figure was the one being claimed by the Israeli government at that time. It might be correct but there is no way to check it. An Arab who left their village, went to the West Bank, then returned to their village was an illegal immigrant according to Israel, but such people were indistinguishable from those who stayed in their village all along. Unless, of course, their village no longer existed in which case they would have tried to hide with relatives in another place. Anyway, these people would have tried to hide their history and Israel had a good motive to exaggerate their numbers, so the numbers are very uncertain. The figure of 10,000 was a "projected" number that did not correspond to reality. By the middle of 1951 the total number of such people was still less than 2000 (Israeli govt figures quoted by Morris). (And meanwhile Israel was still expelling Arabs, but that's another story.) The "35,000" ascribed to family reunicification in the article is simply wrong - it is 25,000+10,000 misinterpretted. A good source on the 100,000 offer is the last chapter of Morris (Birth...Revisited). --Zero 12:39, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Thanks for responding to my e-mail on this question. Very interesting and informative response, though I'm not sure exactly where this leaves us. Jayjg

Next, it is true that the Arab states rejected the 100,000 offer but there is more to the story. The offer was not made in isolation but had other conditions. For example, it included Israel being allowed to keep all of the land it had occupied in the war. Behind the scenes, the US was trying to press Israel into taking back a much larger number of refugees. There was huge opposition within the Israeli government to taking back any refugees at all (including from Ben Gurion, who for once didn't get is own way). Part of the Israeli preparation for making the offer was to deliberately stir up public opposition to it in Israel; the idea was to impress on the world how difficult it was for Israel to make such an offer and how impossible it would be to offer more. Around this time (I forget the exact chronological order) some of the Arab states were making secret contacts with Israel that offered various deals. For example, in 1949 Syria offered to "immediately sign a peace treaty and not an armistice and immediately exchange ambassadors", and in addition to settle 250,000-500,000 refugees. In return they wanted the international border to run along the Jordan River (note there is only a short stretch relevant to Syria) and through the middle of the Sea of Galilee. According to Israeli documents, Ben Gurion refused to discuss it. This is not necessarily relevant to the current article, but I mention it to show that the Israel-conciliatory, Arab States-intransigent picture of history is largely mythological. --Zero 12:39, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Interesting and informative as well, though considering that the Sea of Galilee is Israel's main freshwater source, I'm not surprised at Israel's reluctance to accept the Syrian offer. Jayjg 18:12, 1 Dec 2004 (UTC)

My thanks, what types of photos are needed?, we were re-registered as refugees with UNRWA

Well I have just read this article through twice, and it seems fine, I am not finding it too biased. A pleasant change, so I wanted to thank those involved, Thank You!

I will seek out some photos as requested. Any ideas on what is needed?

BTW: We were just re-registered as refugees by UNRWA, even though we are Canadian Citizens now. So I guess there is no time limit in terms of length or residency. My children, however, can only be registered by me, when I go back, according to the documents my father obtained when he came back from Jordan last December. Ironically about the same time as when the last revision took place.

Joseph 04:27, May 3, 2005 (UTC)

"or been expelled"

Yes, some were expelled, but the linked article (Palestinian Exodus) only indicates expulsions after the war started, so as far as I can tell the insertion was inaccurate. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:01, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

No, actually - I checked that article first, and during the first stage of the flight, December 1947 - March 1948, "There was also cases of outright explusions such as in Qisarya where roughly 1000 Palestinian Arabs were evicted in February". - Mustafaa 20:46, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, you're right, I missed that when I read through it. Still, it seems to give a false impression, that there were large numbers of expellees at that time. I'll add in the 1000 figure. Jayjg ^(talk) 21:14, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure that isn't misleading too; the wording in Palestinian Exodus suggests that the number would have been at least significantly larger than 1000. An estimate would be ideal, if someone more knowledgeable could provide one. - Mustafaa 22:15, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Well, if we're looking for knowledgeable, Zero's the guy. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:31, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You read my unwritten words. - Mustafaa 22:44, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

What does this mean?

After the UN partition of Palestine, war was declared on both sides. Most supporters of Israel believe that the Arab countries are responsible for the fact that there were refugees on either side, including areas not part of the Jewish state in the partition plan. They believe that the Arab countries should have absorbed the Arab refugees.

What is this point supposed to mean? If it means quid pro quo, then its hould be merged with the next one. Bless sins 11:54, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Useful link? "cause of the refugee problem"

[14]

Treatment by other Arab states...

I added the note that it has been rumoured that states like Saudi Arabia refuse to grant any Palestinian refugees Saudi citizenship in order to artificially prop up the refugee problem. In all other comparable refugee situations the refugees in question have either been resettled in their home land or settled amongst the host population. It's the most likely reason in my book.

I should like to know why this note was deleted from the article.– Mr Bozo, 21 July, 2006

Please check edit history. If you are talking about my edit: [15], as I stated in my edit summary, "some have claimed" is not good enough: WP should not be used to promote rumors. A reputable source would help. Thanks. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 20:20, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

No worries mate! You're on. Byt the way, are blogspots OK so long as it's prefaced by "Mr X claimed/suggested that..."? Mr Bozo, 23 July, 2006

How about this one? [16]

"Not so, the Palestinians: Back in '48, the United Nations took up the task, not of resettling them in other Arab nations, but of maintaining them in refugee camps. For six decades, their "friends" have sacrificed these Palestinians' future in order to keep the grievance alive as a political issue." –Mr Bozo, 23 July, 2006

Intro re-write

Stevertigo, your re-write of the intro of this article was highly problematic, because of its POV inclusions and factual errors. For example, you write that The conflict itself began with the influx of Jewish refugees, seeking refuge from The Holocaust within British Mandate of Palestine.; this is both unsourced and factually incorrect, since the conflict began in at least the 1920s, if not earlier, decades before The Holocaust. Continuing, you state The Levant had once been the homeland of Jewish ancestors, the immediate needs for survival met with the religious-based ethnic cause, which melded to become Zionism. Again, unsourced opinion, difficult to understand, and factually incorrect; there was no "melding", and the claim that the "ethnic cause" was "religion based" is dubious, considering that the main proponents were socialist atheists who rejected religion. You continue Zionism sought to provide a home for Jewish refugees by displacing the resident Arab population,; again, POV and factually incorrect - the goal of Zionism was not to displace the resident Arab population. Continuing, you state and was ultimately successful in building Israel as a nation state with an instituted system for limiting the influence of non-Jews., linking to apartheid - it's hard to imagine a more POV claim than Israel created an institutionalize Apartheid state. It's best to write introductions that conform with policy (WP:NPOV, WP:NOR, WP:V) instead. Jayjg ^(talk) 20:23, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Your criticism is noted, but for the most part the "conflict" before the British left wasnt Arab-Jewish, it was Arab-British, Jewish-British, Arab-Jewish. The Arab-"Israeli" conflict couldnt have happened until roughly the time that Israel was founded, and in that case its too close in time and relevance to the Shoah to ignore. Your nitpickiness doesnt seem to be helping here, but I suppose my point was to make a reference to Jewish immigration not just as land grab, but as a genuine and urgent refugee crisis for whom the/a solution, coincidentally enough, was settlement in a place with some religious cultural significance. Jewish refugees, Palestinian refugees. Same thing, different contexts. "Melding" is of course a reference to the union of urgent need with religious cause and motivation, which again is a common theme among oppressed peoples. Could use some other word though. Oppression typically leads to a societies' refuge in religion. You can call anything I write "unsourced" of course. On apartheid, well we can disagree, but we need to link to the policy which explains Israels exclusive treatment. Certainly we also need to mention the fact that the Arab League has been doing much the same thing, for sake of using the refugees as political pawns. It certainly would balance things out. In any case the current version is inappropriately minimalist, and refers to the Catastrophe as if it were a cause and not merely an event within the conflict. -Ste|vertigo 22:28, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm astounded you would insert your highly flawed version again, even after the issues were explained to you. I'll just refer you to some articles to start with: 1920 Palestine riots, Jaffa riots, 1929 Palestine riots, Great Uprising - fit those into your "the conflict wasn't Arab-Jewish, and it began with an influx of Jewish refugees from the Holocaust" theory. I believe that you're trying to edit in conformance with policies; however, my impression is that your POV is so deeply entrenched that you honestly don't even understand that it is a POV. Regardless of the cause, any proposed changes are going to have to be well cited here, because so far your edits are mostly pov original research. Jayjg ^(talk) 00:20, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, could you please supply references for your edits from now on, as you seem to be adding your own opinions, and they are arguably factually inaccurate, definitely POV, and sometimes hard to understand. For example, what is a "religious-based ethnic cause"? Please bear in mind that we're not here to insert our own views into articles, but to summarize what reliable sources have said. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 00:57, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I should also ignore the fact that, in spite of your pleasant requests for WP:CITE, the very first sentence of the current version itself has a "cite" tag on it. The way you two use it, CITE would appear to be largely an epithet. Jayjg, there is no context established for this article, and thats what is required in a WP:LEDE. Read the policy. Its well written. This topic belongs in the context of the Arab-Israeli conflict, but I could easily focus that to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in which case your stipulations for including pre-Israeli conflicts would be justified. Is this what you were attempting to communicate?

Virgin, "religious-based ethnic cause" may be wordy, but no doubt a reference to Zionism would have been called "POV" as well. Immigration was motivated by both necessity and ideology, which varied according to time period, but theres nothing controversial about that basic fact. The resulting conflict is one best defined (within Israel anyway) as one of competing nationalisms, albeit the regional politics plays a huge part. I dislike this method you two have for making personal attacks and ganging up on an article, as if you were wikistalking or else coordinating some kind of opposition to any edits people make. It may be understandable, but its at the very least improper to begin an engagement by reverting. Id hate to think how much you two bite the newbies. -Ste|vertigo 16:01, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

All right, Ill admit my earlier version was pretty awful. Such happens when one tries to keep objectivity, and edits on the quick, only to have to deal with a revert. Ive made changes. Comment is more than welcome. -Ste|vertigo 16:25, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't see anyone making personal attacks on you, but you're making them on us, so please stop. Rather than continuing to insert contentious material, could you please discuss on talk first? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 09:12, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

As you complained about the need for a citation for figures in the intro, I've taken the figures from elsewhere in the text and referenced them, and inserted a quote from the UN giving their definition of "Palestinian refugee." SlimVirgin ^(talk) 09:26, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I did not "complain," and your usage of that term is an obvious epithet. I merely noted a small discrepancy between what you say and what you do. -Ste|vertigo 22:19, 1 August 2006 (UTC) PS: I perhap should have used the past tense article instead: [what you] say/said do/did. Everybody makes mistakes. -SV

It astonishes me that you would admit your first attempt at a re-write was "pretty awful", but then still attempt to make huge changes without discussion here first. Let's work on this together, Stevertigo. Jayjg ^(talk) 16:51, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

And it never ceases to amaze me how you can consistently pass off your clinically ambiguous minimalism as neutral or "more factual," and reflexively debase any attempt at explanation or overview as POV. WP is not served by such emphasis on clinical technocrat definitionism, and the nominally surgical decimation of history and current reality it represents. I agree: lets work on this together. (Below). -Ste|vertigo 22:19, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Side by side

SlimVirgin's version

Stevertigo's version

In the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, a Palestinian refugee is a refugee from Palestine created by the Palestinian Exodus, which Palestinians call the Nakba (Arabic: النكبة, meaning "disaster" or "catastrophe"). The United Nations definition of a "Palestinian refugee" is a person whose "normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict," and their descendants, regardless of whether they reside in areas designated as "refugee camps" or in established, permanent communities. The number of Palestinian refugees has grown from 711,000 in 1950 to over four million registered with the UN in 2002.

Palestinian refugee is a non-Jewish Arab or Arabic language-speaking refugee from the Palestine region, who, due to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is living in military-occupied territories without officially recognized state citizenship. The conflict is one driven by the competing nationalist movements of Jewish and Arab peoples, which has left the nation state of Israel in control of a state-less and largely ungoverned population of Palestinian Arab Muslims posessing no official citizenship. The Levant region had been the religious-ancestral homeland of the Jews, and the modern ideology of Zionism promoted the establishment of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. During World War II, Zionism offered an answer to the growing refugee crisis for Jews seeking refuge from persecution in Europe. Under the British Mandate of Palestine, Palestinian Arabs and Jews had certain equality in terms of citizenship. This changed over time as ethnic tensions surged, the British relinquished their occupation, and the Jewish state of Israel was established. After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War Arab Palestinans were forced to relocate in an event referred to as the Nakba (Arabic: النكبة, meaning "disaster" or "catastrophe".) ЪBoth Israel and most of the Arab League states maintained policies of denying citizenship to the Palestinian refugees or their decendants —Israel due to its desire to maintain ethnic dominance within its small state, and the Arab League as a form of protest against the establishment of Israel. The United Nations definition of a "Palestinian refugee" includes all their descendants, now numbering over 4 million people (see UNRWA), regardless of whether they reside in state-less areas designated as "refugee camps" or in established, permanent communities.

Comment

• Thanks for providing both the SV and the SV version like this -- helps to see what's happening. To start with, though: Both Israel and most of the Arab League states maintained policies of denying citizenship to the Palestinian refugees or their decendants —Israel due to its desire to maintain ethnic dominance within its small state... We'll need some sort of cite for this assertion, whether or not it is valid. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 22:29, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, you have to start using sources and stop making it up e.g. "Palestinian refugee is a non-Jewish Arab ... who ... is living in military-occupied territories ..." So you can't be a Palestinian refugee if you're living in London, Damascus, or Amman? SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:37, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

It bewilders me that you have the UN definition right next to your version, yet you define it differently. You are saying you know better than the United Nations what a Palestinian refugee is. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 22:39, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

That one caught my eye as well, jpgordon. Again, an astonishing display of one-sided POV so deeply entrenched that it doesn't even recognize it is a POV. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:48, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Methinks thou dost protest much too protestingly. -Ste|vertigo 06:50, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Side by side 2

Stevertigo's POV	alternative POV
Both Israel and most of the Arab League states maintained policies of denying citizenship to the Palestinian refugees or their decendants —Israel due to its desire to maintain ethnic dominance within its small state, and the Arab League as a form of protest against the establishment of Israel.	Both Israel and most of the Arab League states maintained policies of denying citizenship to the Palestinian refugees or their descendants —Israel due to its concerns about hosting a large population of citizens hostile to its existence, and the Arab League so they could use the refugees as a pawn in their efforts to destroy Israel.

Stevertigo, while I have my opinions about which statement is more accurate, at least I recognize that both statements are POVs. However, I'm getting the strong impression that you don't; rather, you see the left-hand side as "objective truth", and the right-hand side never even occurs to you as an alternative explanation for events. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:55, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Jaygjg, I dont think either version is particularly POV as they are both have the basic truths in them: Israel desires ethnic dominance (ie. "Jewish state"), and likewise has a justified fear of hostile reprisals. The Arab League states deny Palestinians citizenship both as a way to protest against the hostile establishment of a foreign state, and as a petty and despicable way to use human beings for a political purpose. With all of that true, I dont see what your point is. I suggest all of that characterization can fit. -Ste|vertigo 06:47, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

They're both POVs, but the point is, you consistently choose to put one particular POV into this article, and an unsourced POV at that. That's bad editing on a number of grounds. Jayjg ^(talk) 14:32, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Thats your POV regarding my editing. In matter of fact, my single-handed efforts to write an encyclopedia have not been as successful as collaborating with others. I dont have all the pieces, after all. You were missing piece. -Ste|vertigo 15:06, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Here are the pieces you are missing: WP:V, WP:NOR, WP:NPOV. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:25, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Dont bicker with me. People might not be able to tell the difference. -Ste|vertigo 18:51, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

---

Stevertigo's definition

United Nations definition

Palestinian refugee is a non-Jewish Arab or Arabic language-speaking refugee from the Palestine region, who due to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is living in military-occupied territories ..." (no source, my emphasis).

A "Palestinian refugee" is a person whose "normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict," and their descendants, regardless of whether they reside in areas designated as "refugee camps" or in permanent communities. Around 1.7 million live in Jordan; 400,000 in Lebanon; 400,000 in Syria; 600,000 in the West Bank; and 900,000 in Gaza. [17] (my emphasis) SlimVirgin (talk) 23:32, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

---

SBS 3

Stevertigo's definition

United Nations definition

In common usage, a "Palestinian refugee" is a non-Jewish Arab or Arabic language-speaking refugee from the Palestine region, who, as a result of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, is living without citizenship in designated military-occupied reservations, as well as within neighboring states.[emf.] The technical definition varies but the one accepted by the United Nations is a person whose "normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict," and their descendants, regardless of whether they reside in areas designated as "refugee camps" or in permanent communities. Around 1.7 million live in Jordan; 400,000 in Lebanon; 400,000 in Syria; 600,000 in the West Bank; and 900,000 in Gaza. Jordan allows citizenship to about half of its 3 million Palestinian residents, and general reference to "refugee" tends to omit this usage. [18] (my emphasis)

A "Palestinian refugee" is a person whose "normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict," and their descendants, regardless of whether they reside in areas designated as "refugee camps" or in permanent communities. Around 1.7 million live in Jordan; 400,000 in Lebanon; 400,000 in Syria; 600,000 in the West Bank; and 900,000 in Gaza. [19]

OK. Why do we need any definition in the header other than the UNRWA's? --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 16:26, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Because technical definitions are never the colloquial definitions and so we never rely on them exclusively. They generally dont explain important factors which are found in the colloquial association with the name, which at least have to be clarified. This technical definition fails to such important factors as nationality, religion, language, etc. It may help to understand that any definition drawn up by the UN faces a US veto, though Im not certain if that had bearing in this particular case. The point is that there is a political environment within which this concept has been batted about and debated. Hence a reliance on a technical definition is only supportable by technocrats, and this deference to minimalism and clinicism isnt the MO on WP. WP requires that we use reason to craft a description of the topic which is sharp, clear, and to the point. IOW, its best just to say what (in this case who) the term is referring to, and then back that up with the various technical definitions, beginning with the most prominent. -Ste|vertigo 16:41, 2 August 2006 (UTC) PS: all of this reminds me of the old Irish Potato Famine debate from a few years ago - an early version had pissed me off due to its emphasis on the technical "causes" while altogether avoiding any language which would actually humanise the subject. Same thing, different context. -SV

Given that your personal opinion on who is a Palestinian refugee has already been shown to be wrong, I'm surprised you would continue to insist that we need some other definition besides the official one. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:24, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Just noting a couple errors in your statement Jay: For one, there is no "given." Two, my personal opinion "is not the issue here." Three, there is no issue of "wrong," with regard to a political definition: there are only explanations, of the various points of view. Four, nothing I do fails to "surprise" you, and I wont comment on what that must mean. Five, I am not "insisting," on anything, merely editing an article and debating with partisanos about its content. Six, we dont "need" anything here on Wikipedia; information is not essential to survival, and in fact often only fuels phenomena of excessive fearfulness and reactionism. Seven, there is no "one" "official" definition for an ethnic group; particularly one which is displaced, multicultural, and at the center of partisan political bickering over the question of its existence. -Ste|vertigo 18:48, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, so what's the source of your definition as opposed to the UNRWA one? --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 19:15, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, your personal opinion is the big issue here, since you insist on putting it into articles, rather than simply quoting reliable sources. And, by the way, the article isn't defining an "ethnic group", it's defining a type of refugee. Jayjg ^(talk) 21:40, 2 August 2006 (UTC)

Refugees, who form the basis of an ethnic group - distinct from Arabs - who were entirely displaced by a deliberate politically motivated colonization orchestrated by the British (as a result of British anti-Semitism, ironically). Calling people refugees and not Palestinians is another example of this clinical language which disguises itself as neutral - the UN version uses the term "a resident," which is equally clinical. Thats not my opinion, but this distinctionism is nevertheless a fact of clinical language. -Ste|vertigo 12:18, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

The U.N. defines what a Palestinian refugee is, and the British did their best to stop Jews from returning to their ancient homeland. Given your extreme views in relation to this topic, there's little more to say on this matter except WP:V, WP:NOR, WP:NPOV. Jayjg ^(talk) 02:25, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

The U.N. provides one official defintion, and perhaps the most technically neutral one. They do not however "[define] what a Palestinian refugee is" - only people themselves can determine their ethnicity. As far as what the British were up to, either you dont know what youre talking about, or are else being disingenously selective about the context. My "views" arent "views" nor are they "extreme:" Britain provided the foundation and supported initial migrations, even though it opposed later migrations which exceeded its mandate (from the Mandate of Palestine article):

As early as 1840, Lord Palmerston (later to become Prime Minister) wrote: "There exists at the present time among the Jews dispersed over Europe a strong notion that the time is approaching when their nation is to return to Palestine. It would be of manifest importance to the Sultan to encourage the Jews to return and settle in Palestine because the wealth that they would bring with them would increase the resources of the Sultan's dominions, and the Jewish people if returning under the sanction and protection at the invitation of the Sultan would be a check upon any future evil designs of Egypt or its neighbours. I wish to instruct your Excellency strongly to recommend to the Turkish government to hold out every just encouragement to the Jews of Europe to return to Palestine." The document defining Britain's obligations as Mandate power copied the text of the Balfour Declaration concerning the establishment of a Jewish homeland: "His Majesty's Government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country."

-Ste|vertigo 19:52, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, "refugee" is not an ethnicity, and you certainly cannot define what a Palestinian refugee is. Your extreme views are indeed that, and they often contradict the plain facts. As for the British, they were big on making noble statements, but in practice discouraged Jewish immigration which in no way "exceeded its mandate" - see, for example, the White Paper of 1939. The fact that you would justify the British actions on these grounds is just another example of your extreme views. Please stick to WP:NPOV, WP:V, and WP:NOR. Jayjg ^(talk) 03:30, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Again your tenacity for academic dishonesty rears its ugly head. Most "Palestinians" are by definition "refugees", just as all Palestinian Jews are by definition "Israelis" since 1948. The White Papers were simply corrections in the policy which began under British control and support, and were defined within to have "with over 450,000 Jews having now settled in the mandate, the Balfour Declaration about "a national home for the Jewish people" had been met..." That means that numbers over are exceeding thereof. Note again that my version does take into account both the legitimacy of the plight of Holocaust refugees, and the persecution of Jews by Arabs, and vice-versa. What could be more neutral than that? This article should perhaps be merged with Palestinian people and use a subsection to define the refugee concept. -Ste|vertigo 15:45, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Jews born in Israel are not "refugees", nor are the descendants of Holocaust refugees who now are citizens of the United States, France, Germany, Australia, and various other countries around the world, nor are the descendants of Palestinians who are now citizens of Jordan, France, the United States, and various other countries around the world. Please respect WP:CIVIL, WP:NOR, WP:V, and WP:NPOV. Jayjg ^(talk) 17:39, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Dont change the subject. Most people regarded as Palestinians are refugees, including those who reside in other countries without citizenship. This includes most Palestinians within Israeli control, and about half of Jordan's Palestinian population. Dont abuse my own WP tags to quote policy to me when youre not even addressing the point. The point is that this article needs to be merged into Palestinian people. -Ste|vertigo

You said before that they had to be living in "military-occupied territories" before they counted as refugees. Please stick to using good sources, rather than expressing personal opinion. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 02:28, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

If you could cite the actual source for that (claimed) quote I'd appreciate it. -Ste|vertigo 18:33, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

You wrote it, and you didn't supply a source. It was your opinion and it was factually inaccurate, which is why I'm asking that you stick to reporting what reliable sources have published.-SlimVirgin ^(talk) 06:30, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Thats my point: I didnt "write it" in the context and meaning you characterise, or else I would have remembered writing it. Could you please show me where that was written as you claim I wrote? -Ste|vertigo 02:47, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Of course you wrote it, and inserted it into the lead of the article; here's the evidence. The context and meaning couldn't be clearer. Jayjg ^(talk) 14:51, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

You continually change the point, the subject, and your own definition of what a Palestinian refugee is - now it's apparently about merging articles, rather than the dozen other issues you insisted were "the point" before. "Palestinian" and "Palestinian refugee" are not the same thing, any more than "Afghan" and "Afghan refugee" are. Please do not assert ownership over WP:CIVIL, WP:NOR, WP:V, and WP:NPOV - instead, just abide by them. Jayjg ^(talk) 15:22, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Its hard to tell what youre doing Jay. It looks like youre just copying your old responses and changing a few words around. Id prefer to talk more with the intelligent human being in you rather than with the reflexive machine in you. Note also that your'e quoting policy which I had no small part in formulating. The proper heirarchical order, by the way, is NPOV first, then CIVIL, then V, then NOR, then OWN (the positives tend to precede the negatives). You got it all backwards as usual. ;) -Ste|vertigo 18:33, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

PS: Your comparison to Afghans would be correct if it was in proportion. Because most Palestinians are refugees, the distinction is conceptual rather than material. Thus there is a substantial reason to integrate these. -Ste|vertigo 18:39, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, please stop making personal attacks. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 06:30, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Im not making personal attacks: I'm criticising yours. See the difference? -Ste|vertigo 15:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, I'm not going to be drawn further into this. The bottom line is that you must comply with policy. That includes, but is not limited to, WP:CIVIL, which you continue to violate. Jayjg ^(talk) 22:46, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Again your accusations citing WP:CIVIL (which I personally codified, no less) avoid directly answering my statements, and conform to a non-responsive and therefore incivil mode. As is your repetition that I am not complying with "policy" in general. I will proceed with editing this article according to standard norms. If you have anything new or interesting to say, I will of course listen. -Ste|vertigo 23:39, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

It's amazing you could claim ownership of WP:CIVIL, yet not understand how, for example, saying someone has a "tenacity for academic dishonest" is uncivil. As for proceeding, I will proceed with editing this article according to policy, and will remove any uncited biased original research on sight. Jayjg ^(talk) 14:51, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Confused

I'm now kinda confused, perhaps, by all this interpersonal bickering, none of which seems to address the actual questions raised by the various edits. In particular, I haven't received an answer to my question to Steve of last week: [W]hat's the source of your definition as opposed to the UNRWA one? Perhaps you guys should take your disagreement over the precise meaning and hierarchy of our guidelines to some more suitable forum so the rest of us could actually work out whether or not the changes to the definition are appropriate. (And, Steve, it doesn't matter at all who first formulated the policy; you can be proud of having done so, but it doesn't give you more authority regarding its current interpretation.) --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 16:11, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Indeed, whats "confusing" is that the "bickering" amounts to essentially a personal attack on me, for attempting —albeit not with the instant perfection that Slim and Jayjg no doubt make all their edits —to take a clinical UN definition and translate that into something which people can actually read, within some basic lede requirements such as place names, ethnic concepts, historical context, and current situation.

No, to them that's just "unsourced" "personal opinon." Instead, what Slim and Jayjg appear to be saying is that on the basis of one in-progress working edit that they instantly reverted before I could make corrections, that all future edits to this article be me will likewise be prejudiced as invalid. That indeed is "confusing," as it leads the reader to wonder what their real argument is. It's obviously not any specific problem with any one particular edit, as they have chosen to revert all of my edits to this article wholesale, on the claimed basis of a couple spelling errors or flaws in a particular statement. And then they call me "incivil." And then people wonder why I appear "aggressive." To say the least I'm truly dissappointed.-Ste|vertigo 20:56, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

• • Stevevertigo, sentences like Again your tenacity for academic dishonesty rears its ugly head are purely incivil. Is that hard to see? Besides which, you never did answer my question, not now and not then. From what I understand of WP:V and WP:NOR, it's actually an important question; we don't get to synthesize ideas here, even if we're correct. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 01:19, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, the many problems with your edits were explained at length Talk:Palestinian_refugee#Intro_re-write; it's rather disappointing that you pretend that didn't happen. If your edits aren't quite ready for the encyclopedia, why not work on them here instead, suggesting various changes to the intro in concert with other editors? Jayjg ^(talk) 21:09, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I remember there were a couple points in need of correction. Upon correcting these I was reverted. Certainly you remember that happened, dont you?-Ste|vertigo 21:16, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

There were many things that needed correction, and you didn't really fix any of them. Certainly you remember that happened, don't you? Jayjg ^(talk) 21:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Should we take this to Arbcom? The issue now is the integration of this article into Palestinian people, given the substantial proportions. I dont know of any other ethnic group with half its population designated as refugees. -Ste|vertigo 05:09, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, since when did ArbCom deal with content disputes, and when did it become the first resort in dispute resolution? I'm not even sure what you think the dispute is any more. Jayjg ^(talk) 05:18, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Hence the title of this thread. What is this dispute about Jayjg? -Ste|vertigo 23:49, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

You appear to have a dispute with three editors, and more basically with the fundamental content policies. What do you think the dispute is about? Jayjg ^(talk) 00:28, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Stevertigo, please supply sources for your edits. If you do that, and stick closely to what the sources say, there will be no problems. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 09:25, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

definition of a "Palestinian refugee"

I recently initiated the renaming of a section into 'UNRWA definition of a "Palestinian refugee" '. Then I noticed the phrase " evolved independently of the UNHCR definition". This leads to two questions:

• What is the "UNHCR definition"?
• Which one should be in the intro? (now the quote in intro is from UNRWA).

Will it make sense to make a separate section for the discussion of the definition(s)? `'mikka (t) 21:27, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

UNRWA was formed before UNHCR and formulated its own definitions before there were any UNHCR definitions. When UNHCR was formed later, its charter explicitly excluded some groups of people such as people being cared for already by UNRWA. That's why the UNRWA definitions continued to be used. The intro should focus on UNRWA since that is the definition that actually applies. Comparison with UNHCR can go later as it is a secondary issue. --Zero^talk 00:13, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

Important to note that UNWRA accepted as "palestinian" anyone who has been in Palestine only two years . Many so-called "palestinians" (not all but some) actually are egyptians, Syrians etc... who arrived into Israel in the 1930s and 40s as a result of labor demand that came after Zionist immigration caused economic boom. Zeq 05:45, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

You know my opinion on that. By the way, the "two year" restriction is more strict than the UNWRA definition that has no time limit at all (provided the place they left was their established place of living). --Zero^talk 16:21, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

It is not an issue of a POV, it is the UNWRA definition:

1. "anyone that have been in Palestine two years before 1948 is considered a 'Palestinian refugee'" (even if they have just moved from Egypt or Syria or Jordan).
2. The "refugee status" pass to all children and their children to eternity. Zeq 18:40, 17 August 2006 (UTC)

One can make lots of criticisms of societies that are so divided and inward-looking that they cannot accomodate and settle people who are made homeless elsewhere. However, it's a bit much if you simultaneously believe the same people and societies actually flowed easily into Palestine (and seriously self-deceiving if you think the Zionists created the conditions for them to do so). PalestineRemembered 20:07, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

You're in danger of recycling a nasty piece of Zionist propaganda. With a few honourable exceptions, the immigrants refused to do any business with locals, and only employed them while waiting for fresh arrivals to take the jobs. (Lots of references for that if you're interested). It seems likely there was some immigration, but the British can be the only ones to claim credit for it. The claims of Peters and Katz are simply denial, an attempt to cover for an atrocity.

PalestineRemembered 20:07, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I think the "UNRWA definition of a 'Palestinian refugee'" is pretty neutral and NPOV. It displays the facts, the supporters, and the critics. What more can you ask for? --GHcool 22:44, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

the cites calling for destruction of Israel

• resolution of the Refugee Conference held at Homs, Syria, in 1957
• Gamal Abdel Nasser , interview in Zibicher Woche, September 1, 1961.

Amoruso 19:08, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks mate! --AlmostFree 19:16, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

The claim for "Right of return"

It is purely witten from an Israeli point of view. "The claim" says it all.Gerash77 08:02, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

People that fled in 1967

according to the article: "The UNRWA also registers as refugees... persons in need of support who first became refugees as a result of the 1967 conflict"

According to a study by Oxfam "Coping Mechanisms: Palestinians in camps in Lebanon Preliminary Field Study Report" refugees that fled the West Bank and Gaza Strip after the 1967 war are not registered with the UNRWA and therefore do not qualify for assistance, even though they live in refugee camps and share the same legal status as those that fled the war in 1948.

Also according to the UNRWA definition of Palestinian refugees:

"Palestine refugees are persons whose normal place of residence was Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948, who lost both their homes and means of livelihood as a result of the 1948 Arab-Israeli conflict... UNRWA's definition of a refugee also covers the descendants of persons who became refugees in 1948..."

There is no mention of status of those that fled the 1967 war as being registered by the UNRWA.

You will notice that the number of refugees from 1948 is "accurately" known.

But the number from 1967 is not. That's because there was no effort made by the International Community to succour (or indeed count) those who'd been de-housed this time round.

PalestineRemembered 19:39, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Persecution?

In the first sentence "a Palestinian refugee is a refugee" and on the refugee page I find the definition: "A refugee is a person seeking asylum in a foreign country in order to escape persecution, war, terrorism, extreme poverty, famines, or natural disaster." Is it persecution these refugees are escaping? What is the nature of the persecution? What happens to those who return or attempt to return? It seems a bit unreal to have this lengthy article without mentioning what they are escaping. And BTW, wouldn't it be helpful to the uninformed reader (our target audience) to say at the beginning that this is about Jews cleansing Palestine of non-Jews in order to set up a Jewish dominated regime? As it is you have to wade through most of the article to find this out. Fourtildas 22:32, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's helpful to label the gunmen as "The Jews". The Zionists want you to do so, in order that they can silence you with their nasty smears. But there's no good reason to fall into their trap.

The refugees definitely fled persecution (or, in some cases, fear of persecution).

You are quite right that this article needs a lot of work doing. The implication that they'd only been there 2 years, as made in the opening paragraph, is just another piece of denial to justify the theft of their homes, lands and businesses.

PalestineRemembered 19:43, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Of the options, it would be war (regardless of what you two want to propagandize). --Shamir1 05:26, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Shmuel Katz's work is not well-sourced, nor is it relevant

Material like this is not particularily relevant to an article on Palestinian refugee (in fact, it might look like nasty denial as doesn't belong anywhere on these pages).

Nor is it well sourced - Shmuel Katz is a propagandist first, his credibility as a historian is negligible. He has no qualifications and his work shows no evidence of any historical research. The clip from him that's appeared in this article amply demonstrates why his words don't belong in here, it's a polemic, entirely fact-free:

"The result has been the creation of a large, amorphous mass of names, some of them relating to real people, some of them purely fictitious or relating to persons, long since dead, a minority relating to people without a home as a result of their or their parents' leaving Palestine in 1948, the majority relating to people who, whatever their origins, are now living and working as ordinary citizens but continuing to draw rations and obtaining medical attention at the expense of the world's taxpayers -- all of them comfortably lumped together in official United Nations lists as Arab refugees and vehemently described as "victims of Jewish aggression."

you're welcome to your POV of Katz. The material is obviously very relevant to the topic at hand, and removing it just because you think it is "nasty denial" is simply a POV edit. If you have sources showing that Katz's "credibility as a historian is negligible" - go ahead and provide them. Otherwise, keep your personal POV and OR out of the article. Isarig 21:59, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

Katz is a propagandist and he is not neutral. --Nielswik_(talk) 11:40, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

You're welcome to that POV. There is no requirements that sources be "neutral" - if there was - most of this article would have to be removed. Morris is not neutral. Porath is not neutral. Lapidoth is not neutral. You don't like Katz or his views - that's fine. But you have no business going around removing his comments just becuase you don't like them. Isarig 19:38, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps; but regardless, you need to gain consensus to include this, rather than edit warring. In fact, you just earned a 24 hour 3RR block. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 19:41, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

To Nielswik; I notice you have not addressed my comment here. Please do so instead of continuing to blank well sourced, relevant text. Isarig 04:19, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

But propaganda doenst belong to an encyclopedia --Nielswik_(talk) 04:29, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

But you have not shown that Katz's work is propaganda. This is merely your claim. The quote is taken from a scholarly book of history, Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine, authored by Katz, which received favorable reviews from historians. On what grounds are you disqualifying it as propaganda? Isarig 04:32, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

nice Nielswik, "propaganda doenst belong to an encyclopedia" and that is why you had added a link to the Israel-Gaza conflict from a neo-Nazi? LOL. So a Nazi source is okay but not Katz? --Shamir1 05:30, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Please get real. Katz is not a scholar (no relevant qualifications), his book is obviously propagandistic, and it did not receive favourable reviews from historians. It was ignored. --Zero^talk 12:34, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

This allegation of yours was refuted in the past. Katz is well sourced relevant and informative source used by all historians. See google scholar. Amoruso 12:39, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Telling an editor to "get real" is a violation of [[WP:CIVIL]. Please refrain from addressing me that way. I find it highly unusual to hear you say "Katz is not a scholar (no relevant qualifications), his book is obviously propagandistic", when in the past you had said this about him: "There is no formal definition of "historian" so the fact that he wrote a few books that have the form of history and one (the last one on Jabotinsky) that has received some favorable notice from historians means that I don't object to him being called a historian". Perhaps there is another user impersonating you, I don't know how else to reconcile these contradictory positions. Isarig 22:13, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Katz's book on Jabotinsky is of some interest because Katz was a close associate of Jabotinsky and can write as an approving eye-witness. So if you want to quote him on Jabotinsky's beliefs, go ahead. Quote him on the Irgun's opinion if you want too; he was the Irgun's chief propagandist so few people know about that better than he does. However, quoting the Irgun's opinion out of his mouth in the pretense that it is the opinion of an independent scholar is an unacceptable distortion. Stop it. --Zero^talk 09:46, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

No scholar is "netural" in the sense that he starts writing without knowing what his conclusion would be. Obviously, anti zionist or post zionist books were written after formulating the conclusion. Katz has opinions, but his research is flawless - he doesn't say anything not based on outside sources. Nobody ever said his use of sources is fraudulent in any way. That's why he's a very good source since his research on the conflict is extensive and informative. Blanking him out since you don't like his biography is not acceptable. Amoruso 11:26, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

• Time to stop edit-warring, people. I have no idea whether its a good quote or not, and don't care; work this out here on the talk page or I'll just protect the page until an obvious consensus has developed. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 14:30, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know why any person would willingly wade into the middle of this, but at any rate... :)

Leaving aside the question of Katz's credentials, I've not seen any discussion of the question of proportion. This section in its current form runs to about 960 words, of which 528 (or 55%) are taken up by a single quotation from a controversial source which, I'm sure most will agree, lies at one end of the spectrum of points of view on this topic. If we include the paragraph which introduces the quote, over 60% of the section (590 words) is given over to describing this single point of view. In order to comply with WP:NPOV an article must "clearly, accurately, and fairly describe all the major points of view" on a given topic; it must "represent... fairly and without bias all significant views that have been published by a reliable source."

Now, the earlier part of the section is a mostly uncontentious review of the the origins of the term Palestinian refugee and a brief history of the changes in its application. Toward the end it raises to issue of the possible inflations of the numbers, but, that aside, we can probably agree that the portion of the section up to the paragraph that introduces the Katz quotation is not dedicated to describing any point of view.

What does this mean? It means that over 60% of the section -- not just the part of the section that describes the variety of points of view on this contentious topic, but of the entire section -- is taken up with describing a single point of view, and no other points of view are described. I cannot see any way in which that can be said to meet the requirement of "clearly, accurately, and fairly describ[ing] all the major points of view" or "representing fairly and without bias all significant views that have been published by a reliable source."

Next comes the question of what the topic of this section actually is. The heading reads "UNRWA definition of a 'Palestinian refugee'". This is a section dedicated to summarizing the origins and evolution of the UNRWA definition .To me it appears that the Katz quote is on a different subject: not the UNRWA definition of a Palestinian refugee, but whether the number of people on the rolls is grossly inflated by fraud, irrespective of how UNRWA defines Palestinian refugee. That being the case, the Katz quote, if it belongs anywhere, belongs elsewhere, because currently it occupies more than half the space in a section devoted to a different topic.

To sum up: a quotation this long, included to illustrate a single point of view in a section which describes no other points of view on a topic on which several points of view exist, wouldn't belong in this section even if were on topic, which it isn't.

So, what to do? Well, to begin with, one of the following has to happen: a) the quotation has to be removed from the article altogether; b) the section has to be retitled; or, c) the quotation has to be moved to a new section on the controversies surrounding the numbers and entitlement to refugee status.

If the quotation is to be kept, in order to meet WP:NPOV, it will have to be complemented with descriptions of the competing points of view, "in proportion to the prominence of each", so as not to violate the principle of undue weight.

Since the article is currently protected from editing, this might be a suitable interlude in which to try to come to some workable consensus on: a) what the competing points of view are; b) what the prominence of each is; and c)how each can be "clearly, accurately, and fairly describe[d]".

Another matter to consider is how much space editors think this topic deserves in proportion to the rest of the article: there are far too many articles in Wikipedia in which a subsection on a controversial subject balloons so as to overwhelm the rest of the article of which it is but one part. The motives are often good -- to include all significant points of view -- but the result is often that the article as a whole becomes unbalanced and the subtopic acquires undue prominence.

My candid opinion is that few article subsections could bear the sheer weight of a 500-word quotation illustrating a single point of view -- especially when you consider that such an addition necessitates the further addition of proportional counterweights.

--Rrburke 19:33, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

I'd support option C- move the quote to a new section labeled "Controversy over actual number of refugees" or something similar. Katz's view that the UNRWA numbers are inflated is not uncommon, and in fact admitted to by none other than UNRWA themsleves. See [20] Isarig 00:29, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

If, as you say, evidence of inflated numbers can be cited from less controversial sources, what additional reason makes the Katz quote indispensable? --Rrburke 02:10, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I have no objection to providing other sources that say this. I object to removal of well sourced material based on false pretexts. Isarig 16:03, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Naturally, so do I. As for your offer to provide other sources, that might go a long way to removing the roadblock over this issue. Obviously, the view that the numbers are inflated qualifies as a "major point of view" by any measure, and so must be included. The question is how best to include it. Speaking personally, I'm disinclined to remove something simply because it's controversial. On the other hand, if other, uncontroversial sources offer the same information, it's less likely to be discounted because the reader assumes the source is biased. There's also a question of vintage: the Katz book is over thirty years old: a great deal has changed since 1973, both in the situation on the ground and in the understanding of past events. --Rrburke 19:44, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Katz's words are particularly well articulated after a very good respected historical research. I also support providing even more sources showing the quite undeniable fact that the numbers are inflated. Katz's original book is from that time but his recent edition of the book is from the 1990's so it's not outdated. Amoruso 09:29, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm confused by this. You advocate the inclusion of even more material that would make essentially the same point, in a section that is already dominated by that point of view, both in terms of the weight of material dedicated to it, and in the fact that no other point of view on this topic is included, even though WP:NPOV explicitly requires it: an article must "clearly, accurately, and fairly describe all the major points of view" on a given topic; it must "represent... fairly and without bias all significant views that have been published by a reliable source." Further, it must include differing points of view "in proportion to the prominence of each" in the scholarly literature, in order not violate the policy on undue weight. How would adding even more material from the only point of view the section now includes help bring the section into compliance with WP:NPOV? What is your proposal for meeting the requirement of including alternative points of view?

As for the vintage of Katz, the editions from 1986 from Shapolsky and from 2002 from Taylor Productions, if these are what you're referring to, are simply reprints from different publishers, not new editions. As far as I know, the book has not been updated since the revised edition of 1978, which included a foreword by Menachem Begin. In scholarship, 1978 is a lifetime ago. Works this old are chiefly treated by scholars as objects of historical interest -- to see what people thought about a topic back then -- and are rarely cited as "live" scholarship.

As well, irrespective of whether Katz' work merits inclusion as WP:RS, there is the question of why one might choose this particular passage, which is a summary with no cited sources. For example, the passage reads in part that, of the names inscribed in the refugee rolls, "a minority relat[e] to people without a home as a result of their or their parents' leaving Palestine in 1948, [while] the majority relat[e] to people who, whatever their origins, are now living and working as ordinary citizens" elsewhere. This assertion about numbers is a claim of fact, but the basis for the claim is not included in the rest of this long quotation, but presumably elsewhere, where primary sources are cited. If the quotation is being included for its informational rather than rhetorical value, why not quote the part where the relevant information is contained rather than one that summarizes findings but cites no primary sources? Likewise the portion which reads, "A strict examination of the reports of UNRWA itself will show that the facts of the fraud are essentially not concealed." Why is the portion of the work that demonstrates with reference to primary sources included in preference to a summarizing passage whose tone is highly polemical? In point of fact, this a requirement of the policy on verifiability.

As it is, quoting a long summarizing passage from a work whose engagement with primary sources lies elsewhere offer readers no opportunity to verify the claims therein contained. Instead, we have a Wikipedia editor quoting Katz summarizing his review of primary sources. This cannot meet WP:VER, as no attempt to cite a verifiable source for the claims has been included. And as WP:RS makes clear, "the burden of evidence lies with the editor who has made the edit in question." It is not, in other words, up to other editors to justify their deletion of a unverifiable claim for which no citation has been provided. The onus falls solely on the editor advocating inclusion, and that editor is just as responsible for unverifiable claims in the secondary sources he cites as he is when he fails to cite primary sources. Otherwise editors could simply smuggle in specious claims by asserting that they're merely quoting a secondary source. --Rrburke 16:21, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

As for the new version, I have a Hebrew version from the 1990's it adds a lot more info and it's updated. I'm not sure if it also was translated to English, probably not, but he upgraded the whole book and in fact has two more forewards after the one of Begin and new chapters (essentially there are 3 versions and 2 updates). As for what you're worried if I understand correctly, Katz has references in his book for everything he says from distinguished historians actually many of Arab origin and others. What he said about UNRWA is backed by numerous sources of course. It's always possible to quote the original soruces but notice that if we do we'll make the criticism much more broader... in fact, I only scratched the surface with this quote. Your allegations of undue weight don't hold water here because if it bothers you we can make a new article aboutt UNRWA controversies and link there - as it is, others can add information about UNRWA but their refugee scam is well documnted and the criticism is much broader and holds many statisitical facts about this. Rather than censoring the information, we should look on how to improve it, something which is very difficult since there are people with interest who like to keep the myth of UNRWA untouched and revert any facts presented. They therefore choose the lame excuse of trying to attack the source even though like explained here by Isarig and others the facts aren't disputed by so many primary sources that are in fact the basis for what Katz simply retold. Trying to attack Katz is just worthless since it's the material he collected that's the issue, not him. Amoruso 19:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that it's disproprtionate. Actually, the criticism is much broader and this is a short summary of one of the main points concerning UNRWA. It's perfectly fine as it is. Amoruso 10:59, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm equally confused by this. By what measure can a 528-word quotation in a 960-word section be considered "short"? Also, as I've tried to point out previously, the topic of the section is not the UNRWA; it's the UNRWA definition of a Palestinian refugee -- a subject on which the Katz quote is silent. Up until the sentence that begins "Writers and historians...," the section remains focused on the question of definition. The first two sentences of the paragraph that begins "Critics of the UNRWA say..." (a claim that needs sourcing, but the point is sound enough) remains on topic by opening up criticism of the UNRWA definition, and then suddenly the paragraph abandons the topic in favour of general criticism the UNRWA. It's an abrupt and jarring shift as open to criticism on stylistic grounds as much as anything else. --Rrburke 16:21, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I see Katz being referenced as if he was a regular historian - yet no evidence for it is ever presented. He appears to claim that all the Palestinian refugees left because their own told them to. That's patently untrue, and looks a lot like nasty denial that has no place in here. Furthermore, it's backing for a meaningless propaganda claim, that because some Palestinians left because they were "told to" (5 or 10% by other accounts), therefore they're not entitled to return. The other major contribution I've seen from him is that the Palestinians were "all" (?) recent immigrants, a claim that is both highly unlikely and irrelevant and unpleasant. And it gets worse - when I see portions of his work, it's almost completely fact-free (like the paragraph I quoted above). I've never participated in any form of edit war, and I don't intend to start. But I'm greatly saddened to see tat being published as if it was history. PalestineRemembered 17:51, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

we get your pov on this, we really do. Amoruso 09:26, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

You've provided nothing to indicate that Shmuel Katz's publications are fit to be considered WP:RS. I've provided some significant clips which make it seem he's very far from RS.

And in the meantime, I see you reverting much, much more soundly referenced material. Perhaps you'd like to consider your position on providing NPOV contributions.

PalestineRemembered 00:39, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

• OK, stepping back from the personal a bit...I've finally gotten around to actually looking at the material under dispute here; previously, I was deliberately ignoring the content and just dealing with the ongoing edit war. I think we can start by putting the dispute over the number of refugees into a separate section; it deserves it, it's an interesting topics, and there are plentiful good sources. Rrburke makes very good points regarding the quality and the quantity of the Katz quote; if the same information is available from other sources, it would be far preferable to the less verifiable assertions of the quote. (I'm sure the assertions in the quote can be supported by data from somewhere; but we can do better than that.) I'm willing to unprotect the article so people can work on other aspects of it, if the principles (you know who you are) will agree to work out a consensus here rather than edit warring. Let's all assume good faith here -- especially of those with strong opinions we disagree with. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 16:00, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Also, it's pretty bad faith to do the same edit war on multiple pages. Perhaps don't do that. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 17:24, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Shmuel Katz is WP:RS and WP:V per google scholar and the fact his book is published on Bantam Books and very popular and respected. Nobody showed anything to contradict that except their own POV and political interests. Amoruso 09:00, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Amoruso, you are so entertaining that it will be a pity when you are banned. (It has to be done though, Wikipedia comes first.) I didn't realise that being published by Bantam Books was a stamp of correctness until now, thanks for putting me onto that. I'll start quoting from Karl Korff's "THE ROSWELL UFO CRASH" (Bantam Books, 2000) immediately. --Zero^talk 09:50, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Who will ban me ? Wikipedia does come first, which is why they'll strip you of your adminstatorship status which is ridicilous, and then ban you for your consistent vandalism of well sourced respected scholar materials like Shmuel Katz. Stop disrupting wikipedia. Google scholar of battleground: [21] and google: [22] end of story. Amoruso 12:52, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

A plea, all around, please, to observe WP:CIVIL. --Rrburke 13:01, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

• Amoruso, I clicked on the Google Scholar link you provided, but it returns only six citations of the book, and none, so far as I can tell, is from a scholarly publication. The link you provided was kind of miscellaneous: here is the link to the hits in the actual citation index. As a basis for comparison, here and here are the citation hits, a total of 105, for the two editions of Morris' Birth of the Palestian Refugee problem, and they appear almost all to be hits on articles from scholarly journals. Additionally, Google Scholar is still very beta. I don't know what the standard resource historians for tracking citations is because this is not my field, but I presume it's the Social Sciences Citation Index. There may also be relevant citations in the Arts and Humanities Citation Index, which is the most commonly-used tool in my field. I don't think either database is available online, but the next time I make a trip to the university library I'd be glad to check each as a neutral way to measure the relative scholarly profiles of sources editors wish to include. If someone would provide a list (brief, because I have a life outside of WP) of the works they want checked in the citation indexes, I'll volunteer to do the legwork. --Rrburke 14:17, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Rrburke. Btw, you should cite Kal Korff's book. I'd assume you didn't just google to try to find a Bantam book that sounds ridicilous (WP:AGF) but you were terribly mistaken. It's a very good research and one of its conclusion actually is that there were no UFO's in that incident. You cited a good example of a book that did research on this subject and therefore on subjects relating to Roswell he's an excellent source. On subjects relating to the Arab Israeli conflict, Katz is an excellent source. Quite simple. In fact, Kal IS indeed cited quite largely in wikipedia here Roswell UFO incident, feel free to add more citations although it seems his book was published by Prometheus Books and not Bantam books. Amoruso 13:08, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I made a mistake in choosing Korff's book as an example. I should have chosen "NEW MOON ASTROLOGY: Using New Moon Power Days To Change and Revitalize Your Life" (Bantam, 2001), "Channeling, How to Reach Out to Your Spirit Guides" (Bantam, 1988), or something like that. But anyway, it would be more appropriate to see what type of book Bantam was publishing in the early 1970s when they published Katz's book. How about Chariots of the Gods by Erich von Däniken? That and other similar von Däniken rubbish was published by Bantam at the same time as they published Katz. And, yes, they also published lots of UFO books, astrology, pyramidology, Bermuda triangle, nonsense of all sorts. You claim that being published by Bantam indicates the quality of the book; I disagree, but have it your way. --Zero^talk 14:38, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Bantam books publishes both fiction and non fiction. Katz's work is classed as non fiction. Bantam is one of the most successful publishers of the U.S. It also is the largest mass market paperback publisher in the U.S. It doesn't mean every book is quality but it does mean that they won't be publishing books of notorious people as in Nazis, terrorists etc. If they published his book under so much prestige then they double checked his references and credentials, just an example. There's no difference between books about UFO's, Astrology etc and books about Arab Israeli conflict. Each book deals with its own expertise. Amoruso 07:21, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

"they double checked his references and credentials" - that shows you don't know anything about publishing. Only a small number of publishers like university presses appoint experts to report on the academic quality of their books, and even those experts don't go through the book checking all the citations. General publishers like Bantam appoint someone to work with the author on the writing standard (grammar etc) and someone to check for legal problems; apart from that, and most importantly, they care about sales. Btw, most of the junk books I mentioned were published as non-fiction. The publishers' definition of "non-fiction" is that the book claims to be true. --Zero^talk 13:12, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

No you're wrong. Nazi symphatizers for example won't be able to publish in Bantam books, they have their own dubious publications, as well as people with notorious credibility that make outlandish claims as in the Iraqi Jews conspiracy. Bantam books is the most mainstream publication. This book is one of the most cited in arab israeli conflict issues by many scholars. it's cited by so many respected sources that it's a non issue really.

Example: Christopher Barder gained a Foundation Scholarship in History at Pembroke College, Cambridge, and has for some years been both head of history and politics at an Oxford Tutorial college, as well as a tutor for the University of Bath. It's one of the first hits he used battleground as reference. [23] (564 hits for the english version's book) [24]. Really . Amoruso 05:39, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Those 564 are raw Google search hits, not Google Scholar citation hits. The citation hits in Google Scholar are here. There are a total of six, and none appear to be from scholarly journals. --Rrburke 07:17, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Have you read what I wrote here? Example- Christopher Barder gained a Foundation Scholarship in History at Pembroke College, Cambridge, and has for some years been both head of history and politics at an Oxford Tutorial college, as well as a tutor for the University of Bath. It's one of the first hits he used battleground as reference. [25] (564 hits for the english version's book) [26]. Really . Amoruso 05:39, 20 November 2006 (UTC) Google scholar only gives partial results you can see the many articles of scholars who quoted him - google scholar gives 6 for the book which is quite a lot btw compared to many history books. Amoruso 18:39, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

One of them is from the journal "Women in Judaism", which is scholarly as far as I know. However, its citation is not to Katz as a source of facts, but just as an example of the type of literature that a certain right-wing woman was reading (along with Arafat's interview in Playboy). There's nothing here in support of Katz as a source. --Zero^talk 12:38, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Why is this such a dilemma? Why don't we just say "Katz found that..." or "Katz says that..." and have it over with. --Shamir1 05:31, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Because we are supposed to use "reliable sources". Since there are a large number of serious scholars in this field, with all shades of political opinion, we can cover the subject perfectly well with quality citations and not bother about all the activists and propagandists. --Zero^talk 12:38, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Zero, could I ask you to ask you to enumerate what you see as the "major points of view" (to quote WP:NPOV) on this topic, identify one or two representative scholars or works for each view and offer an opinion about the relative scholarly profiles of each view so as to judge the relative prominence they ought to be accorded in the article? --Rrburke^(talk) 15:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

So your judgement on Katz is better than the one of Christopher Barder ? Did you also "gain a Foundation Scholarship in History at Pembroke College, Cambridge, and were you also for some years both head of history and politics at an Oxford Tutorial college, as well as a tutor for the University of Bath." (example) Amoruso 18:44, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Could we: a) thread discussions; b) add comments to the bottom and not interpose and displace others' earlier comments, which may be awaiting a reply; c) stick to the topic of improving the article? --Rrburke^(talk) 19:05, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

(a)+(b): sure (it didn't displace anything but sorry if it bothered you it was put on top accidentally). (c) of course. Like I showed you here, which you didn't address, no problem to cite Katz as persons like Christopher Barder cite him. Cheers. Amoruso 19:08, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I think you may have partly misunderstood Mr. Barder's bio. The statement that he was "head of history and politics at a tutorial college in Oxford" doesn't mean that he was on the faculty at Oxford University; it means he was a schoolteacher in Oxford, the city. A tutorial college -- perhaps he worked at this one -- is a kind of high school that typically prepares students for their A-levels or GCSE in preparation for university. This is honest work, but it hardly qualifies one as an expert on the Middle East. "A tutorial college in Oxford" does not imply an affiliation with the university. I note that Mr. Barder's only other academic employment seems to have been as a part time tutor at Bath University. He has also authored some articles.

More importantly, though, this is just not the way to go about measuring academic profile anyway. One neutral way to do it would be, as I've suggested more than once to no reply, to compare how frequently sources are cited in the relevant citation indexes. I've offered to go and look up citations on whatever sources other people propose. As I mentioned in two earlier posts, Google Scholar, a beta resource not yet widely used by scholars, returns six hits on the Katz book, with few from scholarly journals, compared with well over a hundred for Morris' Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, to use a familiar example. --Rrburke^(talk) 19:48, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Dear Burke, please have a look out for "Ya'ir", a "Biographical Novel" about the leader of the Stern Gang (Abraham ("Yair") Stern), and tell us whether it's fit to be used as WP:RS. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Lehi#Book_of_Moshe_Shamir for background.

PalestineRemembered 07:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Rrburke, if you check many other books they sometimes have very few hits, it's not a proof of anything - search the google link and see many articles by differnet professors etc. I don't know if Barder is an expert but he's certainly a distinguished figure and a scholar. Regardless, Everything Katz says is backed by references, so you realise why it doesn't matter. His book is really a secondary source. Palestineremembered, please stop ruining talk pages and changing discussions. That book is RS of course but it's not used directly it's used as a secondary source and everything cited from there has an additional source from a different RS. Amoruso 19:23, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Again, we can just write "Katz says this..." or "Katz says that...", I don't see it as a big deal. His work is widely-read scholarly material. --Shamir1 03:45, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

If there was any decent scholarship in Katz, then I'm sure you'd provide evidence of it.

In the meantime, we only have clips such as the one at the beginning of this section, which don't look much like reputable evidence of anything.

PalestineRemembered 23:14, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

He's quoted in google scholar [27] this link from there says scholar journals which quotes from The Johns Hopkins University Press... I don't know of any binding definition of scholar though nor is it any requirement for him to be for WP:RS which he is, while he has full references for anything. Amoruso 23:41, 23 November 2006 (UTC) ... I found more links to journals who cite Katz [28][29]: Journal of Palestine Studies, Indiana University Press, Jewish History Amoruso 23:50, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Syria

Why isn't Syria included in the "Treatment in Arab countries" section? --GHcool 22:51, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't know, possibly because it doesn't conform to the "look how nasty the Arabs are to the Palestinians" model? But perhaps I'm just being paranoid. It should be included. It's easy to find data on it (the basic situation is that Palestinians have exactly the same rights as Syrian citizens except the right to own land and other citizenship-related rights such as voting in elections. Obviously the latter is a major issue for people living in Syria.) While I'm at it, surely a distinction should be drawn between areas hosting Palestinian refugees as such (West Bank and Gaza, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt pre-1967) and states into which refugees have later immigrated such as Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states? Palmiro | Talk 16:16, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Recent editiing

A column editiorial from Jewishworldreview is obviously POV and not a scholarly source. Neither is geocities. IF the statements can be cited to scholarly books, works or sites then they can be posted.

Amuroso, I'm sorry I removed the material[30] you reposted. You can clealry see that it was a mistake since i wrote "front page mag not scholarly source". I mean to remove something else, and will do so soon.Bless sins 03:35, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

irrelevant/pov info

i've deleted the following text from the history section. i suspect someone will put it back, but at least i'm registering my views that all of this stuff is irrelevant (and rather pov as well). the vicissitudes of unrwa refugee counts from 50 years ago are simply not encyclopedic. quotes from israeli scholars that unrwa figures are exaggerated don't belong here either. that's what references are for. it's enough to just list the range of quoted figures (400,000 - 900,000 or whatever), with references. Benwing 07:30, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

deleted text:

---

By 1950, according to United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the number of registered refugees was 914,000.. The U.N. Conciliation Commission attributed this discrepancy to, among other things, "duplication of ration cards, addition of persons who have been displaced from area other than Israel-held areas and of persons who, although not displaced, are destitute", and the UNWRA additionally attributed it to the fact that "all births are eagerly announced, the deaths wherever possible are passed over in silence", as well as the fact that "the birthrate is high in any case, a net addition of 30,000 names a year" (the UNWRA figures included descendants of the Palestinian refugees born after the Palestinian exodus up to June, 1951). By June, 1951 the UNWRA had reduced the number of registered refugees to 876,000 after "many false and duplicate registrations weeded out." .

However, this number is held to be exaggerated. Yehoshua Porath, a prominent Israeli scholar in the field of Palestinian history wrote in 1986:

"Most serious students of the history of Palestine would accept that the number of Arab refugees from Israel during and after 1948 claimed by Arab and UN sources—some 600,000 to 750,000—was exaggerated. It is very easy to refute that estimate and many have already done it." [31]

---

Infobox

I have removed {{infobox ethnic group}} from this article because, as the name suggests, it's only supposed to be used for ethnic group articles. There's also already an infobox at the Palestinian people article. Khoikhoi 21:05, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

Nothing on the template page mentions strictly defining it's scope in what it may or may not be used. Mathmo ^Talk 16:07, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

It's pretty obvious based on the title that's for ethnic group articles. It's inappropriate to use it here. Khoikhoi 19:12, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

I concur. The Palestinians already have an article and an ethnic group infobox. Using one for the refugees is redundant and pointless. We can keep a tally of information about them on the Palestinian people page which makes more sense. The refugees aren't an ethnic group as they are Palestinians and also Levatine Arabs. Tombseye 07:00, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't even matter if they are an ethnic group or not, rather the question is if this is the best way to display a summary of a few of the important statistics relevant to the article. To which the answer is obviously yes, an infobox is very handy way for well using a box to display info. d'oh.Mathmo ^Talk 08:30, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Then use an infobox with a different title. You don't see us using it for the Family Guy article because it is a "handy way for well using a box to display info". Khoikhoi 15:35, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh for goodness sake, how can you not see that the title of a template is not automatically it's strict definition of what it may or may not be used for?? Please please, try to be constructive rather than destructive by suggesting here in talk an alternative instead of constantly deleting content from the article. That is how you should deal with this, if for some reason you don't like the current infobox. Mathmo ^Talk 23:07, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Here's a constructive idea; use a more relevant infobox to display the information, if it must be displayed that way. Mind you, there's no reason it actually needs to be displayed that way, but if you feel it must, go for it. Perhaps you can create a refugee infobox. In the meanwhile, it's not appropriate here; please don't abuse infoboxes. Thanks. Jayjg ^(talk) 23:38, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

That is what I was saying before. If you don't like it then either find a better one or even create your. But don't just delete it away without an appropriate replacement. Mathmo ^Talk 01:12, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

Ok, a few things though. This article seems to just mirror what Palestinian people relates, so having the same information stated twice seems pointless. The related groups section has to go as we aren't discussing them from the context of being an ethnic group so much as compiling general data about them. I've left the rest though just as a quick reference to the refugee numbers etc. Assuming then that the only difference between Palestinian people and refugees is that one group carry passports and are citizens of other countries. Tombseye 21:31, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

The "information" provides no value here. Jayjg ^(talk) 01:41, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the information provides no value here. It's redundant as the Palestinians article already explains the population. This article should just discuss the refugees and their status etc. and not make the mistake of representing them as an ethnic group of their own. If need be, we should vote on the matter just to avoid the edit wars. Tombseye 06:24, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

Katz and others

Here are some problems I see with recent edits regarding sources:

1. The Katz quote: a- While I am not usually one in favor of deleting sources, this Katz obsession does introduce undue weight into the article. His quote is disproportionate to the rest of the article, in my view. The article itself is more about the Israeli response to the refugee problem than the refugees themselves and their narrative. b- Using the phrase "some historians" and going on to use one long paragraph by one historian is a weasel phrase. c- According to policy, If an author has some reason to be biased, or admits to being biased, this should be taken into account when reporting his or her opinion.. This means that his position as chief Irgun propagandist ought to be mentioned.
2. The Syrian Prime Minister: I've looked all over and only find the same paragraph, with its multiple spacings (...) that make it look terribly out of context. I do not believe that the actual memoir itself has been consulted, but rather certain internet web sites. Again, according to policy, this violates Attributability, bias, and Editorial oversight.

Ramallite ^(talk) 16:06, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

al-'Azm is treated with more balance, better translation, comments from the experts, and a scan of the original Arabic text (tracked down by me) at Palestinian Exodus. As it is being presented here, there are several serious problems. One is that he was not the prime minister during the described events, but later. As politicians like to do, he published an attack on his predecessor that blamed him for all the ills of the nation. Two is that the translation is tendentious. It doesn't say "we who made them leave" but more like "we who constrained them to leave" (i.e. failed to give them an alternative). Nor does it say "bringing pressure to bear upon them to leave" but only "persisted in suggesting that they leave". Three is that the full text makes it clear that an invitation from the Arab states was not the sole reason or even the primary reason for the Arab flight. The text quoted here is actually part of item 5 of a list of reasons for the Arab defeat. For example he writes that the invitation was made only after "terror spread among their ranks in the wake of Deir Yassin's event." And "Arab governments...incessantly demand that the United Nations implement its decision to return the refugees to their homeland, knowing full well that they [the refugees] would not accept a return to [a life of] injustice and oppression, and that if they [the governments] drove them to return, they would be driving them to a death more evil than the death that awaits them in the Arab countries...". Why isn't this last sentence the part that is being quoted? --Zero^talk 23:55, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

These were all discussed in the past. The palestinian refugee issue is a controversial issue and we can certainly quote Israel's opinion on the subject. Katz' quote here was supported by Israeli prime ministers explicity by Menachem Begin and others and by content by all others... this is Israel's position. The syrian quote was discussed in the past in palestinian exodus article and affrimed. Amoruso 14:23, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Do you have evidence that Katz represents Israel's official position as you say? Is he an Israeli government spokesperson? And Katz is not being removed (by me), only shortened per policy and context (you ignored the discussion above). Your version was being reverted. I tried to compromise. Ramallite ^(talk) 14:27, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

yes, the evidence is Menchaem Begin's preamble to Katz's book. Your attempt at compromise is weak. I haven't ignored any discussion. Amoruso 14:33, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

That it's "weak" is your opinion. I don't need your stamp of approval. What I need is cooperation. Your version is constantly reverted. Do you have anything you can change to prevent that? Ramallite ^(talk) 14:35, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

errr.. don't you mean your version is constantly reverted? ;p Mathmo ^Talk 14:41, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

So you ignored the evidence you requested, interesting. Amoruso 14:37, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Begin died a long time ago. And the fact that he wrote the preamble to the book does not necessarily mean he adopted all the views in it. And was he PM at the time he wrote the preamble? I'd be happy to learn more about this preamble thing if it is indeed the evidence you say it is. Ramallite ^(talk) 15:23, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

He did endorse it explicitly many times, they shared this ideology and views on the events. you can read it from the book, it's translated. The first version was written before Begin was elected. But Begin continuted to endorse the subsequent versions of course and especially the fantasy of the refugees and the facts concerning Jewish presence in Israel. Amoruso 23:37, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

That's all well and good. I ask again: Was Begin's endorsement of the book an official endorsement by the Government of Israel? or a personal endorsement? Ramallite ^(talk) 00:21, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Begin was a person yes and a political leader eventually a widely supported prime minister. Amoruso 00:32, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Katz was a leading member of the organization that Begin led, and its foremost propagandist. Of course Begin endorsed the book. That has nothing to do with its reliability. Begin had no credentials as a historian either. --Zero^talk 13:23, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Credentials as historians, something very vague you mention from time to time although frequently contradicting yourself and saying that you have no problem with the historian definition applying to anyone, are irrelevant to this discussion. You obviously didn't keep up. Cheers, Amoruso 01:30, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Article is a disgrace, should be deleted.

This article is blatantly POV and unfit to be in the encyclopedia in its present form. It should either be written in a fashion that is sensitive to the victims, or else it should be deleted.

The first sentence states "which Palestinians call the Nakba". That's equivalent to saying "which Jews call the Holocaust". We should either use the word that the victims are happiest with, or have some very good reason for applying our own.

The second sentence is a definition apparently worded to insult the victims, seeking to deny that most of them had very, very deep roots in this area. (Many of them must have been there for 2000 years, otherwise DNA would be unable to link some roots of the diaspora to the same region).

The third sentence says that the numbers involved are controversial. It's more or less complete red-herring and it's deliberately insulting. It's a favourite tactic of Holocaust deniers.

I've created articles before, but played little or no part in deleting them. I think this article is a good candidate for an AfD, "Article for Deletion". I'd appreciate advice on how to go about it. PalestineRemembered 20:27, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

• I agree that every article that can not be made NPOV should be deleted. Zeq 20:29, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you two should read up on AfD discussions first?

The argument "non-neutral point of view" (violates WP:NPOV) is often used, but often such articles can be salvaged, so this is not a very strong reason for deletion either.

Tarc 21:00, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

It would be nice to think this article could be salvaged - do you think the community would tolerate me doing a whole-sale re-write, taking out everything that tends to degrade or humiliate the victims? PalestineRemembered 21:45, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Do you think you're capable of writing it from a neutral point of view? --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 23:11, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm capable of writing most things to NPOV, and capable of working to reach consensus. But I can see major problems getting an acceptable version of this article, which is why I'm proposing deletion. Two of the statements I've objected to (above) probably belong in the article in some fashion. But in the lead belongs an estimate of how many refugees left their homes/became refugees as a result of orders from Arab commanders. PalestineRemembered 08:28, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

i'm just wondering out loud on what User:PalestineRemembered would think if i say that the term "al-nakba" is insulting to the state of Israel? as if the creation of israel is "the great disaster". surely the palestinian exodus is a grave event for the palestinian people and i would not degrade or downplay on it like many arabs have done with the holocaust. but history tells us that these titles are very much politically motivated - otherwise, the palestinian exodus from kuwait (400,000 in one week) would have recieved a similar name. to place it in perspective, the jewish exodus from arab lands did not recieve such a polically motivated title. maybe the title fits because the arab refugees from palestine were never well recieved by the other arabs but i don't think that "the victims" point of view should allways be applied - and i give as example the battle of jenin and also place the innocent claims under further inspection with this link also: 1929 Hebron massacre. Jaakobou 00:10, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

I'll gladly be corrected if I'm wrong about this, but it's my understanding that Nakba (النكبة) refers specifically to the refugee flight of Palestinians during the war, rather than to the creation of the state of Israel per se. --Rrburke^(talk) 02:06, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

here are a few samples of why your thoughts are incorrect:

1. "1948 marked the NAKBA of the Palestinian people: the state of Israel was established over the disposession of hundreds of thousands of their life, land, ..." see description for www.alnakba.org
2. "nakba" revolves around political accusations that arabs were ethnically cleansed and disposessed[32] while disregarding that the same thing was happening to jews on arab land or that jews were defending themselves from a (not so well) organized arab attempt to commit genocide on the jews.
3. the only agenda is the arabization of israel (even if a "state of palestine" is created), not the circumstances of the refugees. [33]
4. the nakba day - Nakba Day
5. nakba on arab wiki - israelis call the war "war of independance" arabs call it "al nakba". [34].

i hope these, together with my previous comment, explain it better why it has an insulting intonation to israel and why it's a politicaly charged term and not an NPOV one (even arab wiki writes down both POVs on this). Jaakobou 10:29, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

I don't think I was trying to say that the two -- the flight of refugees an the founding of the state of Israel -- were unrelated, only that the term Nakba (النكبة) refers specifically to the flight of refugees during the war. I also said, and I offered it in the spirit of collegiality we are all as Wikipedians expected to observe, that I would gladly accept correction on this point. However, none of the sources you cite directly addresses this issue. The inauguration of Nakba Day, for example, took place in 1998, when the term Nakba (النكبة) already enjoyed wide currency; its meaning would seem to me to pre-date the official proclamation of this occasion, and this usage cannot be treated as foundational.

Moreover, there are plenty of articles in Wikipedia that make use of offensive words: I refer you to the articles Nigger, Kike and Greaser, for example; the fact that a locution exists and is offensive is not in itself a reason to exclude it from Wikipedia.

As well, you object that the term Nakba (النكبة) is "POV" and politically motivated. However, as an objection to its inclusion, this seems to me to be a (common) misunderstanding of the WP:NPOV policy. NPOV does not mean that any term used in an article must be neutral. That's simply not the case, and I refer you to WP:POV, especially WP:POV#Usage_note on this point. An article must "represent[] fairly and without bias all significant views", but in a particular way: articles must, to quote the policy, "assert facts, including facts about opinions — but... not assert the opinions themselves." The fact that any given term used in an article may not be neutral or may be offensive is neither here nor there: if it's there to elucidate a significant point of view, it's perfectly acceptable; if it is there to propound a certain point of view, it violates WP:NPOV. The fact is, many people, mostly Arabs, use the term Nakba (النكبة) to refer to the wartime flight of refugees from Mandate Palestine in 1948. This may be offensive -- you may view it as tendentious and politically motivated -- but the fact of its common use in this way is undeniable, and its putative offensiveness is rather beside the point. --Rrburke^(talk) 02:27, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Too much undue weight is given in wikipedia to the fantastic myth of palestinian refugee. There are no refugees but justified population transfers have taken place as in every part of the world at the time, the uniqueness of this one is that it was made voluntary by the Arabs in Israel in order to assist the Arab Armies in their war against Israel so that accidentally no brethern will die in the expected genocide. Obviously if this involved any other parties it will no longer be discussed as it's a non-issue and not encyclopedic enough, it's just propaganda. I agree with PalestineRemembered that this article can be merged with Palestinian Exodus. Amoruso 12:26, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

"Fantastic myth" and "justified population transfers" are of course a product of your own opinion. Thankfully for the rest of us, this is an encyclopedia, and not a blog. Tarc 12:42, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I disagree. There are Palestinian refugees. They are the people who have been kept incarcerated in refugee camps for 50 years, owing to the refusal of any Arab government to grant them citizenship. --Sm8900 13:51, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Many articles here on Wikipedia proove that it's impossible to make a NPOV article about something which is somehow political. Even when facts are agreed upon, their meaning can be disputed. Such article would never be accepted by everyone. TFighterPilot 16:57, 7 July 2007 (UTC)

"palestinian"

WHy is there no mention that arabs living in what was then called the palestinian mandate were JORDANIANS. It was only after the birth of the state of Israel that they referred to themselves as palestinians. A seperate culture from the Jordanians. when, in fact, there is no separate culture or anything that distinguishes Jordanians from Jordanians (aka palestinians). As Walid Shoebat has said: "Why is it that on June 4th 1967 I was a Jordanian and overnight I became a Palestinian?" (shoebat.com) This is left out completely from the article. Meanwhile there are 10-13 "refuge" camps in Jordan. Where Jordanians calling themselves palestinians are camping out in their own country. They've made campgrounds and called them refuge camps all over the arab world. For what purpose? Just to vilify the Jews. Hence why they say a large percentage of "palestinians" are in Jordan. well, Duh, They're Jordanians. There is no language known as Palestinian. There is no distinct Palestinian culture. There has never been a land known as Palestine governed by Palestinians. Palestinians are Arabs, indistinguishable from Jordanians. Ah you know, except in most Arab lands, they're not allowed to hold government jobs, own land, get a passport, etc.

and Nakba is politically motivated and should not be used. it is clearly a POV that only arab muslims and their supporters use. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.249.25.199 (talk)

It is not discussed here because it is not relevant to the article and is discussed at length elsewhere e.g.Palestinian people and Definitions of Palestine and Palestinian. Only the UK recognized the Jordanian occupation and annexation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Palestinians did not cease being Palestinians because they were occupied by Jordan any more than they have ceased being Palestinians because they are occupied by Israel. Jordan did not exist as a state or nationality until Jordan was created in 1949, before that it was part of "Palestine Trans-Jordan" or "Trans-Jordan." There is also no language known as Jordanian or Canadian. So, your observation that "There is no language known as Palestinian" proves nothing. --DieWeisseRose 05:11, 4 June 2007 (UTC)

Until 1948 the term "Palestinian" referred to Jews, it did not refer to Arabs living in the British mandate. Nekng (talk) 07:09, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

palestinians don't even speak the same dialect as the jordanians. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.224.208.210 (talk) 15:57, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Reasons for the mass voluntary exodus

Why does this article not talk about the reasons for the mass voluntary exodus of Arabs who were in the land of Israel. According to most sources they left because of pressure from big Arab countries and from fear of Jews. The Jews encouraged them to stay and offered them equal citizenship. Nekng (talk) 07:16, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

"Voluntary" lacks nuance, esp. in the possibility of a war. Duress is implied. Part of the exodus was anyway forced. Louisar (talk) 18:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

Ya, your right, I should have not used the word "voluntary". Nekng (talk) 20:44, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

An important source

[35] Zeq (talk) 13:27, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Removal of external links

I removed all the external links per Spam policy. There might have been few "worthwhile", but almost all of them were clearly not notable, unreliable, or did meet the necessary standards. I'm not arguing the merit, simply the rules.

Feel free to re-add external links that qualify, but we all know articles rarely need 25+ external links. Comments/suggestions/etc... appreciated! Wikifan12345 (talk) 23:48, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Reasons for Exodus

I'm trying to keep the current section as-is for now so try to avoid deleting whole paragraphs. As I said in summary, Morris is extremely biased and needs to be balanced off with another historian, or in this case a more expansive introduction paragraph. It needs more, and so I plan on revising in the next week or so when I have time but for now let's leave alone until we can come into a consensus. The last thing we need is an edit war. Cheers! Wikifan12345 (talk) 10:41, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Also, I think we should delete this sentence: While the specifics of Morris' interpretations have been contested from both sides, many of his arguments, and those of the other Israeli "New Historians," have become widely accepted within Israeli academic and public circle

I've read several of Morris' books and I know for a fact they are widely criticized (and praised) among Israeli academics. The above sentence implies a rather universal/majority acceptance, when that is clearly not the case. Wikifan12345 (talk) 10:41, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I have read all Morris books and I have discussed with him and several of his peers (pro- and contra-). If some parts of Morris work have been criticized, he is not at all biaised and his views concering the facts are not at all contested. His analysis are contested.

Today, his work is in the program of Israeli schools and The Birth... (Revisited) is quoted in absolutely all books about these events.

What you added in absolutely nosense. This concerns only the period of december and January, when the exodus was minimal. And Flapan is the oldest of the new historians and didn't really study the issue of the refugees.

No edit war, of course. I see you are already on wp:an/i. I remove your additions, that are not at all pertinent from my point of view and we can discuss them, based on wp:rs sources, when you have time.

Ceedjee (talk) 11:55, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

Was it? The exodus revolves around Morris' POV, that is unnacceptable considering his stance against Israel and advocacy for the refugee. I'm not say we shouldn't delete him, but there should be a balance. I only put that in there as a temporary bandage until we all could edit the summary, perhaps even rewrite it entirely with Israel and Palestinian perspectives. Also, I wasn't really considering your POV, only wikipedia policy. Sorry for the misunderstanding. Let's all try to assume good faith mmmmk? Wikifan12345 (talk) 20:57, 15 February 2009 (UTC)

I didn't feel personnally attacked by you.

Anyway, you cannot just put a tag in stating something is pov because you don't like Benny Morris.

• Whose mind would you think should be added, very precisely ?
• What in what is written currently is contested, by who, very precisely ?

Ceedjee (talk) 09:16, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Do you believe the article is neutral? I surely don't, and I can link this article to another Israel/Palestinian discussion which will hopefully allow other people to voice their opinion. I've explained why there is a POV issue and provided reasonable evidence to back it up. It's not just "I don't like it", there are plenty of other historians in Israel and the World who have a totally different viewpoint than Morris. I'm not arguing a this or that approach, but to infer that Morris is the end all be all fact-maker is rather silly and to deny there needs to be a balance, well....is odd. I'll summarize my basic points because I know if I write a super long argument most people tend to latch on what is easiest to refute and ignore everything else, so don't take it personal:

To start, Benny Morris is a self-proclaimed "New Historian," a moderately controversial stance as it challenges the governmental opinion and activities with the Palestinians since the day of independence. That in itself is reason for a neutrality issue, simply because Morris has aligned himself with what is basically an anti-Israel group of academics/writers. This doesn't mean everything he says is complete and utter bullshit, but if the article is dependent on his analysis most of the time, it is more than reasonable to say there is a neutrality problem. Ok, so now we've established who Morris is, now I'll quote the article.

The concluding sentences are clear and most obvious POV. My challenges are in parenthesis:

Here, Arabs fled fearing atrocities (This is an easy generalization, it paints a broad brush and established and either or situation. Not all "Arabs" fled fearing atrocities, in fact many were unaware until after they actually occurred. Second, what constitutes atrocity? There were several Jewish groups who truly wanted to exterminate all Arabs, but it wasn't the majority and the general consensus was to remove Arabs who posed a threat to the Jewish state, not so much kill the evil Arabs. It might seem rather odd to justify this, but the Arabs/Muslims dominated the region for over a thousand years, imprisoning Jews, Christians, anyone who challenged the status-quo through economic, social, and educational limitations a.k.a dhimmi) or were expelled if they had not fled. The violent expulsion was also in response to the exodus of Jews. It was definitely a tit or tat game except the Jews responded with 9 tits for every tat, more or less.) During Operation Hiram, at least nine massacres of Arabs were performed by IDF soldiers. After the war, from 1948 to 1950, the IDF cleared its borders, which resulted in the expulsion of around 30,000 to 40,000 Arabs.

While the specifics of Morris' interpretations (This is a weird term. We use Morris's opinions as factual evidence, and then go around and say it was an interpretation. It doesn't make sense.) have been contested from both sides (This is good. We can use this to expand and list opposing arguments, but we should first rewrite or readd more "interpretations" to balance Morris' opinion.) many of his arguments have become widely accepted among Israeli "New Historians," and other academic and public circles. (Too vague. New Historian is an extreme minority among Israeli historians, we're overstating their popularity with words like 'widely accepted' because it doesn't clarify just how small New Historians are, even in the article itself it doesn't mention it as far as I know. 'Other academic and public circles' is also too vague and leaves an unsettling feeling of ambiguity that should be answered.)

Whether or not Israeli schools use Morris' books are totally irrelevant. Schools also use pro-Israeli text, and neutral and every other perspective. I hope this clarifies my approach and it wasn't meant to be a disaster as you have inferred lol. ; ) Cheers! Wikifan12345 (talk) 23:49, 16 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikifan12345,

Sorry but your analysis of Morris's work are not our concern.

100% of the books published since 1990 who dealt with the 1948 palestinian exodus give Benny Morris in their bibliography and or reference.

Ok for Shlaim but it will be easy to find more precise quotes. I work on that.

Whatever, given everything is sourced, if you think that something is pov-ed, you have to provide another wp:rs source that would claim the contrary of what is written, so that we can neutralize this.

Do you have such ? Ceedjee (talk) 17:29, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

This isn't my interpretation, I'm simply pointing out what is wrong with the sub-section. If anything, the entire section is a users interpretation since they suspiciously chose Morris to be the ultimate fact-maker while there are tons of qualified experts who don't belong to the extremely controversial "New Historian" agenda. Get it? I wrote a lot and I figured you'd dismiss it but I did what I had to do so no excuses LOL. Wikifan12345 (talk) 00:07, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Given everything is sourced, if you think that something is pov-ed, you have to provide another wp:rs source that would claim the contrary of what is written, so that we can neutralize this.

Do you have such ? Ceedjee (talk) 17:29, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm just explained what is clearly and blatantly POV and I really don't understand why you continue to debate this. This has nothing to do with RS and everything to do with selective OR. Morris is a qualified expert, but not the ultimate end-all-be-all fact writer. He is controversial, POV-heavy, and not nearly as neutral as a topic so sensitive requires. Wikifan12345 (talk) 10:00, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

You have reverted without even reading.

As explained, nothing is controversed. It is not because Benny Morris's name is given, that it is controversed.

If you think something is pov-ed, you have to say what ! provide the wp:rs sources that prove so !

What are these ?

Ceedjee (talk) 11:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

What you write here :

While contested by academics such as Efraim Karsh, Anita Shapira, and Norman Finkelstein Morris' interpretations have become widely accepted among New Historians, and other academic and public circles.

is not correct and is in contradiction with the 1st paragraph.

If you want to explain the debate here, you have to talk about Walid Khalidi, Nur Masalha, Ilan Pappe and Yoav Gelber. Uri Milstein and Shabtai Teveth should be considered too. Anita Shapira should not be in the list because she attacked the new historians, not specifically Morris's work and Norman Finkelstein only wrote 2 articles about the topic, which makes him far from being a major reference for this topic.

What you want to write is in fact already here :

The causes and responsibilities of the exodus are a matter of controversy among historians and commentators of the conflict. Although historians now agree on most of the events of that period there is still disagreement on whether the exodus was the result of a plan designed before or during the war by Zionist leaders, or whether it was an unintended result of the war.

Nothing in the current text is controversed. You just don't know the topic. If something is controversed, you have to say precisely what.

Ceedjee (talk) 12:03, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

There's nothing the smallest bit controversial about the significant part of what Morris says about the refugees. Controversy concerns only recent and peripheral matters, such as whether to dig up potentially 100s of bodies at Tantura in 1998, the integrity of Palestinian negotiators in 2000 and Morris's conversion to the right-wing in 2002. (I'm going by Avi Shlaim in "The War of the Israeli Historians" where I was recommended to look). There is nothing there or elsewhere concerning the 1948 ethnic cleansing, which everyone now accepts and for which Morris remains a very pro-Israel but conveniently accessible source. Morris found there were 5 villages (and half of Haifa) in category A (Abandonment on Arab orders) and 346 villages in the other categories (C "Influence of nearby town's fall", E "Expulsion by Jewish forces", F "Fear of being caught up in fighting", M "Military assault on settlement", W "Whispering campaigns", with some overlap and 38 villages "unknown"). Every other investigator counted only larger numbers of villages(/tribes) and says the same of the causes. At least 90% and probably 95%+ ethnically cleansed - there is no controversy about it. PR^talk 13:56, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

PR, I respect your entitlement to an opinion but to consider this an "ethnic cleansing", violates NPOV in my opinion. I'm neither disputing or agreeing with your perspective, but surely you understand this, no? In regards to Morris, I cannot continue to provide evidence that he is not a strong candidate for this article as a unique expert. Again, I don't disagree/agree with him, but I'm convinced that the section needs an alternative viewpoint to facilitate a balance and ensure equal weight. Please see If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;. Wikifan12345 (talk) 15:52, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

"You are persuaded"...

Are making fun of me ? You just put a tag because you have the feeling that was is quoted could be contested but you don't have any idea if this is or not the case ?

More, it is not written that Morris is a "unique expert" and in the notes (you deleted) related to the 1st paragraph, I added the main publications (books) related to that issue. But he is the ones who reported, case by case all the events. His analysis are not taken here. Only the facts reported.

When you wrote here above that you had read most of these books, are you sure that you didn't make a mistake ?

Ask questions if you like but we are not here to pilpul with you. Ceedjee (talk) 18:12, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I'm trying to accommodate you here but I have a feeling your pulling my hair. What is this "You are persuaded" quote, I never said that and I never made fun of you. How did I make fun of you? These aren't my opinions, it's clear Morris is an extremely controversial expert solely based on the fact that he belongs to the New Historian agenda. Nothing wrong with that, in fact I agree with a lot of their conclusions but if neutrality is our goal the section fails miserably. I just want you to understand this. I'm more then willing to continue to be as cooperative as I can but if we continue to be hitting walls I believe a dispute resolution would be the most effective method to end this. Cheers! Wikifan12345 (talk) 00:45, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Then answer : what are the claims, in the artcle, precisely, that are pov-ed ?

You will note that you have started an edit war. You have modified a 6 months-long version and you claim you debate but don't answer any question.

I am ready to any dispute resolution process. Please, proceed.

Ceedjee (talk) 07:08, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, for starters, the edit you contually reversed comes with 3 or 4 sources. This are notable historians who criticize Morris' perspective, which is a critical point that I've been making over this entire argument Ceedjee. I literally typed out a 5 paragraph easy-to-read explanaition that precisely pointed out what is blatantly POV, can you tell me what ISN'T POV? Morris is an expert historian and wonderful writer etc...but he is certainly not the ultimate expert and for such a controversial topic it make sense to include alternative perspectives instead of relying on such an extreme and what basically is a minority among Israel/Palestinian historian genre, New Historian. I've said this many times, more or less, with varying levels of evidence I have provided. Are you reading my responses? I literally copied and pasted the current section, quoted, bolded, and explained why they are biased. And even if that may be my opinion, I also included other expert opinion, and reasoning as to why Morris is not someone we should be totally 100% dependent on when there is a wealth of information available. It just doesn't add up, and I'm beginning to lose patience and good-faith. You seem resistant with practically everything I've said, quite cordially might I add, so yeah. I need to look up how to enter a content dispute but this seriously a waste of valuable time IMO. I am more than willing however. Wikifan12345 (talk) 08:02, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I don't have time to pilpul and answer such questions as this one : "can you tell me what ISN'T POV?". You are perfectly aware that the one who claims something is poved has to explain the sentence that would be poved clearly in order to modify or to improve this. I have nothing against that. But not time to hear you just claiming WP:I DON'T LIKE IT, my force a tag on the section. How many edits do you have on the main and how many on talk pages ?
About the sentences with 4-5 wonderful websites as sources, the 2nd line of the section says exactly the same, with 9 academic books. I added these to answer your comments.
We can keep this article the way it is currently. Ceedjee (talk) 18:02, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

That was one single sentence out of the 100+ I have written explaining what is wrong with the current section. You seem completely fixated on the current section and have refused every single one of my suggestions for the most part. I'm forwarding this to an experienced editor who will hopefully help me with submitting this to a dispute resolution portal/center/helpdesk whatever lol. Cheers!

The fact you sign using "whatever lol" to most posts where you have a disagreement is not wp:civil.

Try to keep cool.

A mediator will indeed be welcome. Ceedjee (talk) 07:42, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

You're taking that statement out of context, please quote and link the entire sentence before making such an inflammatory accusation. Similarly to your claim that I was, "making fun of you" accusation, which I explained in plain terms how that was not the case. I've been more quite civil IMO, probably more than I should be and perhaps I'm being overtly polite (or perhaps not) and not emphasizing bluntness. From reviewing previous posts, you seem to latch on to single statements made by me and argue from there, dismissing more important suggestions. this is my opinion of course, but a reasonable accusation as far as I can tell. According to Cerejota, I need your approval to request a 3rd opinion/dispute resolution/etc...Wikifan12345 (talk) 09:38, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

The facts are that the article is currently in your version and that I have made changes in your direction.

I asked you to tell me precisely, what information from Morris in the article would be controversed.

You answered Morris is controversed.

I asked you to tell me precisely, what information from Morris in the article would be controversed.

You answered me that you had already explained me and had sourced Morris is contreversed.

I asked you to tell me precisely, what information from Morris in the article would be controversed and asked you if you was making fun of me ?

You answered me that you was not making fun of me and that "[you] really don't understand why [I] continue to debate this" and that you will ask for conflict resolution etc.

I said that I was not interested by a pilpul with you but that a mediator is welcome. I invite you to proceed but I still ask you to tell me precisely, what information from Morris in the article would be controversed.

Ceedjee (talk) 10:18, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Again, if you asked me the same questions, and each time I've responded. I will reiterate: There is nothing particularly wrong with Morris' analysis, but as I've said he is a controversial figure. I personally don't see anything majorly wrong with his opinion, but it's just that...an opinion. If you want someone to pick a part the POV-pushing, go to the Israel portal and find a pro-Israel user. With time, I'm sure he will. This isn't so much a personal issue or imposing my version of the section as it is promoting NPOV and ensuring all sides are heard. Is this enough clarification? Again, I never made fun of you, ever. I really don't understand why this debate because I don't believe I should have to re-answer every single question. You could very well repeat your exact post no matter how insightful/valid my comments are, because you aren't listing your disagreements exactly. Therefore, I will ask you questions: 1) Do you consider Morris a controversial figure? 2) Do you consider the current section NPOV and balanced? 3) Do you believe the historical analysis attributed to Morris is undeniable inarguable fact and cannot be balanced with an alternative perspective from an equally notable expert?

That is all, Cheers! Wikifan12345 (talk) 00:33, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

There is no analysis or opinion of Morris in this section. He is just used to report facts that are not controversed. Else, which ones are so ?

1) Do you consider Morris a controversial figure ?

Some parts of his work have been highly debated and some are still controversed and will remain. He is not really controversed except because he is accused to be racist.

2) Do you consider the current section NPOV and balanced?

If we remove the last paragraph that is useless, yes. Because this section doens't concern Morris analysis.

3) Do you believe the historical analysis attributed to Morris is undeniable inarguable fact and cannot be balanced with an alternative perspective from an equally notable expert?

Of course analysis of Morris are far from being the last word and if only his analysis were introduced, it would be poved. But his analysis is not introduced. The main article (Causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus) deals with that in full details. But this is not the case here in the article.

All you require to be in the article is in these sentences :

The causes and responsibilities of the exodus are a matter of controversy among historians and commentators of the conflict.. Historians now agree on most of the events of that period but there is still disagreement on whether the exodus was the result of a plan designed before or during the war by Zionist leaders, or whether it was an unintended result of the war.

And the events are given after that.

I have answered you, precisely.

You still haven't answered to "what information from Morris in the article would be controversed."

Ceedjee (talk) 09:43, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Another way to proceed

What is controversed and by who and where (wp:rs source, reference, page) ? :

• From December 1947 to March 1948, around 100,000 Palestinians left. Among them were many from the higher and middle classes from the cities, who left voluntarily, expecting to return when the situation had calmed down.[15]
• From April to July, between 250,000 and 300,000 fled in front of Haganah offensives, mainly from the towns of Haifa, Tiberias, Beit-Shean, Safed, Jaffa and Acre, that lost more than 90 percent of their Arab inhabitants.[16]
• Some expulsions arose, particularly along the Tel-Aviv - Jerusalem road[17]
• and in Eastern Galilee.[18]
• After the truce of June, about 100,000 Palestinians became refugees.[19]
• About 50,000 inhabitants of Lydda and Ramle were expelled towards Ramallah by Israeli forces during Operation Danny,[20]
• and most others during clearing operations performed by the IDF on its rear areas.[21]
• During Operation Dekel, the Arabs of Nazareth and South Galilee could remain in their homes.[22]
• They later formed the core of the Arab Israelis. From October to November 1948, the IDF launched Operation Yoav to chase Egyptian forces from the Negev and Operation Hiram to chase the Arab Liberation Army from North Galilee. This generated an exodus of 200,000 to 220,000 Palestinians. Here, Arabs 'fled fearing atrocities or were expelled if they had not fled'.[23]
• During Operation Hiram, at least nine massacres of Arabs were performed by IDF soldiers.[24]
• After the war, from 1948 to 1950, the IDF cleared its borders, which resulted in the expulsion of around 30,000 to 40,000 Arabs.[25]

Ceedjee (talk) 10:30, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

Did you not read my post? I am not disputing what Morris' is saying, I can't because I agree with most of itl. But there are "experts" out there who have a different spin, this clearly is a POV piece in some respects (bolded for reference). Cerrejota basically said I should find x notable expert that has an alternative perspective of an exact statement/situation from the article, and plug that it. That sounds good to me. Wikifan12345 (talk) 21:22, 21 February 2009 (UTC)

The thing you don't understand it that :

• there have been events during that period, that are not controversed even by "experts" out there who have a different spin" and so it is not pov-ed
• there are analysis by historians on the causes of these events, that are controversed bu they are not introduced in that article.

It is clearly stated in the article the analysis of the causes are controversed. And they are not given in the article. Then the facts are given and you will not find any expert to give different facts or to claim these facts are false.

I have answered your questions. Now it is up to you to prove a good will :

1. do you understand what I write ?

2. is this false that there are 2 paragraphes : 1 with facts, 1 stating the causes are disputed ?

Thank you to answer. Ceedjee (talk) 08:28, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

3PO

A third opinion was requested for this talk page. Please describe briefly in this section what the disagreement is. Specifically each editor may want to briefly state what changes they would make (or not make) in the article. NJGW (talk) 16:26, 22 February 2009 (UTC)

The discussion below is hard to follow by a person brought in from the 3PO noticeboard. It is important that each of you distill your desired changes to a few short statements with a very succinct justification. If this is not possible because the issue is too complex, then a history expert may be required instead. It does appear that editors are being asked to choose between disagreeing historians, and this is not a simple task for some one not extremely familiar with the methods and conclusions of (as well as source material used by) these various historians. NJGW (talk) 17:56, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

You are right...

That it is difficult for a non specialist to make the distinction between eg Anita Shapira and Yoav Gelber, who are good friends, share globally same minds, are both wp:rs sources of high standing each in their speciality but with one who never published on the issue while the other wrote 2 books and numerous articles about this.

• Maybe you could help in just translating to each other of us what the other requires and if he wants is pertinent ?

Ceedjee (talk) 18:09, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Ceedjee: I will try, but it will be important that each of you realizes how important it is to keep your responses short and to the point. Wikifan apparently wants verification that the consensus view of this history is what you claim. Can you distill what is controversial about Morris's claims and what is not?

Wikifan: I'm not saying that a notable expert should be brought in to analyze the situation, but that someone with a history degree may be needed to fully appreciate the methods of each of the historians and discuss the value of their contributions to the debate. Ceedjee seems to be saying that the disagreements between historians are not cut-and-dry. They often agree on some points but not others. Can you give the exact claims you are questioning so that Ceedjee knows which issues to focus on?

Re: Benny Morris. If he is considered controversial, we need to know (in the article) what exactly about what he says is controversial, who says so, and why. Simply saying he is controversial could almost seem like a scare tactic to have people discredit his conclusions outright. Readers will benefit much more from a thorough discussion of Morris's methods and how his conclusions differ from previous conclusions than from a few names of historians that disagree with him.

Hope this helps. NJGW (talk) 21:34, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

This isn't simply about finding disputed info, we're using an expert who belongs to the New Historian genre, which is an extreme minority (and controversial) academic organization so to use the views of such a POV expert it makes sense to balance it out with a more neutral or opposite field expert. I am not an expert on this section so I personally can't tell you what exactly is wrong without using my own opinion or conducting an OR investigation. Point is, the section relies almost entirely on Benny Morris, and then basically says most of his views are endorsed by the majority of historians....yeah, sure. :D

You see what I'm saying here? I want to get to the point where we understand a second expert could prove to be beneficial (assuming such expert as a different opinion than Morris). I'm not going to spend hours finding sources and making paragraphs and then be told no-go. I've done that too many times in the past lol. I was more precise in past discussions because as you said you don't want long explanations. Wikifan12345 (talk) 22:06, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Whose designation is "new historian"? Is this designation given to him by a consensus of historians? Is it the consensus of historians that Morris holds an "extreme minority" view? These are important questions which must be answered before I can give a full and informed opinion. You seem to say that because some people (who?) consider Morris controversial (why? how much? when?), they must be represented in the article. What I'm saying is that giving such information with no context is a disservice to the readers. Finally, it is important that you not use your gut decision when discussing this topic, except when it is leading you to do through research on the subject. Gut reactions are good for instigating a search for more information, but not for presenting logical arguments. NJGW (talk) 22:38, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

He has been identified as such: Benny Morris. Assume hypothetically he belongs to the mainstream, it would still be appropriate to balance his analysis if there is an alternative perspective from a notable history....right? Wikifan12345 (talk) 23:22, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

You are pointing me to one uncited instance of one person calling him by that term, but you still haven't bothered with my questions of context (for example: what made the people that call him that do so? what bearing does this have on the reliability of his research methods or his conclusions? which specific statements are his critics attacking?). As for balance, it is important to keep wp:UNDUE in mind. We do not give every side equal weight in a discussion... rather we give each side its due amount of coverage based on the academic consensus of the viewpoint's importance. Answering the questions I have asked will help uncover what the academic consensus is. Any of us saying that our gut feeling is that Morris is or isn't in the mainstream is meaningless. Further meaningless are any implications such a statement has on the article (such as how much discussion for/against Morris is appropriate), as these are again based on gut feelings. Please focus on finding the answers to the questions I've asked. NJGW (talk) 23:57, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

What are you asking? I'm confused, I thought I answered. Wikifan12345 (talk) 00:08, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

What are you confused about? I asked many questions and so far all you have told me is that Morris is a New Historian. Please re-read my comments. They explain the importance of context to answering your concerns here and fleshing out the article. They also ask the questions whose answers will provide this context. NJGW (talk) 01:07, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm genuinely confused. I've said more than Morris is simply a New Historian, is that all you read? Ok, I'm going to bullet your questions because it's hard to cipher through question/commentary/etc..

• what made the people that call him that do so? what bearing does this have on the reliability of his research methods or his conclusions?

As far as I know it isn't our job to determine whether his analysis is correct or not. Keyword here: Analysis. If he was so righteous, there wouldn't be 100+ experts with a different opinion. I'm not denying the reliability, or it's truth. He is a reputable expert and published author, but so are dozens of historians. Why did we decide on Morris, opposed to someone else?

I'm not asking for an analysis of his work. I'm asking about what the academic consensus of his work is. Also this isn't an either/or proposition. NJGW (talk) 05:12, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

• which specific statements are his critics attacking?

I don't know. It's understood that there are clear disputes, especially when he is examining from a new historian perspective. Do you understand what I'm saying here? What are you arguing? That his POV is 100% reliable and factual?

I'm not arguing anything (especially for or against any POV) other than the fact that with no context, a statement of the existence of critique tells us nothing. If the article is going to say that his conclusions are criticized, any rational reader is going to want to know which statements and why. I mean, if he's as reputable and expert as you say he is, and he's included in the article, then his critics better have some good reason for critiquing him. NJGW (talk) 05:12, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

• As for balance, it is important to keep wp:UNDUE in mind.

Precisely, which is why an alternative perspective is necessary to maintain wp:UNDUE, right?

With a topic so controversial it bothers me how we could think a reliance on a single expert, no matter how intelligent, is sufficient when others are readily available. I truly do not understand the resistance.

Have I answered your questions? Wikifan12345 (talk) 04:18, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps I'm confused. What exact changes are you proposing for the article. NJGW (talk) 05:15, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I want to include different experts challenging or offering an alternative analysis on a specific happening as detailed on the section by Morris. Not just, "Morris' views have been criticized by x, y, and z..." That's what I wanted from the start. I mean, if a vast amount of criticisms do exist for Morris' views on this specific topic, is it not reasonable to in the least mention them? Does that really violate undue weight?

It made is extremely different to do any sort of editing when everything I said was met with reverts, roadblocks, and long lectures about how credible Morris is. Opinion? Wikifan12345 (talk) 05:24, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Don't mispresent the debate between us, please :-)

Morris view are not in the text, as I told you. Ceedjee (talk) 07:44, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

I've never said one way or the other, only asked questions to help me understand. Now that we have a clear statement of your intent: Ceedjee, are Morris' views currently considered mainstream (and do other's support his conclusions)? I notice that there are at least 3 variations of the story (which probably need to be corrected if they are to be included in the article): the Palestinians left of their own accord, the Palestinians were encouraged to leave, and the Palestinians were forced to leave. Ceedjee, can you write a section which incorporates all these views with the due weight given to each by the academic community? NJGW (talk) 05:37, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Hi,

NJGW, you ask me two questions.

1.

About the 1948 exodus, the mainstream views are from the following historians :

• Benny Morris, Israeli historian, claimed to be pro-Palestinian formerly, claimed to be right-wing today. Only challenged on some on his analysis, used as reference in 100% of the books published on the issue of the 1948 Palestinian exodus since 1990.
• Walid Khalidi, Palestinian historian, challenged by most Israeli historians on the fact he considers the exodus is the result of a planned expulsion, a little bit controversed.
• Nur Masalha, same.
• Ilan Pappé, Israeli historian, highly controversed and highly supported (yes, don't ask me why). He considers the full exodus is an ethnic cleansing but the way he defended his thesis is not accepted.
• Yoav Gelber, Israeli historian, (not New Historian),
• Efraim Karsh, Israeli historian. He didn't publish on the issue of the '48 exodus but attacked the New Historian as a whole, rather than Morris in particular. It was in a book published in 1994.
• Shabtai Teveth, Israeli historian. He answered on the issue but mainly for what concerns allegations of planified cleansing and to point out the idea that many Palestinian fled, which is not contested and is in the article.

The most "pro-Israeli" historian, who is not a new historian, today, is Yoav Gelber in his book about the 1948 war and the exodus. He is the one who the most heavily attacked Ilan Pappé and supported his expulsion of the University of Haifa. He points out mainly a collapse of the Israeli society during the november-47 -june 48 period, followed by expulsions.

2.

I can hardly, given it is not true.

The fact the Arabs would have left voluntary is not accepted in the causes of the 1948 exodus and this idea is not debated any more. The main work concerning this dated Erskine Childers in the sixties.

About what is agreed today :

• For the facts, Palestinians fled or were expelled. That is 100% accepted.
• For the causes of the expulsions, whether they were planned or were the result of the war.

What other perspective would Wikifan be there ? If he can precise which one, I can find the sources that talk about it. No problem. Ceedjee (talk) 07:44, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Wikifan statement

At this point I'm rather unmotivated to pursue further editing disputes beyond this, so whatever result occurs I will not object. Previous talk discussion was extremely time-consuming. : )

Ok, I've left a lot of info and perspective above. It might take awhile, but feel free to skim through the posts between Cee and I.

My points:

Section - 1948 Palestine War

• Unnecessary dependence on New Historian Benny Morris. I am not disputing his expertise, factual arguments, or reputation as a respected historian, but only the overt concentration of his analysis on the extremely controversial event. I believe the section would be beneficial with an alternative perspective to provide balance and ensure NPOV. Before I edited, nothing mentioned Morris' views as disputed. I added this sentence with much resistance: "While contested by many academics such as professor Efraim Karsh, historian Anita Shapira, and author Norman Finkelstein Morris' interpretations have become widely accepted among New Historians, and other academic and public circles. ."

For example, I don't believe this is a fair or neutral edit:

"Whereas historians now agree on most of the events of that period there is still disagreement on whether the exodus was the result of a plan designed before or during the war by Zionist leaders, or whether it was an unintended result of the war."

Haven't looked up the editor yet in history, but that kind of phrase is an extreme generalization. Morris' views, especially on this topic, have been disputed by several historians (including pro/anti). It's edits like these that make it incredibly difficult to keep up with the article, as not only do I have to focus on past edits, but future potentially-hazardous ones. Cee is a great editor, but this isn't going anywhere and even if you do conclude in an accommodating way (from my perspective hehe) I don't think I'll come back to this article unless there is strong collaboration. Hope I'm not crossing any lines here. Please understand, I've been as fair as I can be. Cheers! Wikifan12345 (talk) 08:15, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Ceedjee statement

The section 1948 Palestine War is dedicated to be an introduction related to the 1948 Palestinian exodus and its causes. Therefore, it send the reader to the main articles on the topic.

There are 2 paragraphs in this section. The 1st one treats with the events and the second one with the causes. Everything is sourced. In the 2nd paragarph, there are 3 sentences :

• The 1st sentence (The causes and responsibilities of the exodus are a matter of controversy among historians and commentators of the conflict) just reminds there is a controversy for what concerns the causes.
• The 2nd sentence (While contested by many academics such as professor Efraim Karsh, historian Anita Shapira, and author Norman Finkelstein Morris' interpretations have become widely accepted among New Historians, and other academic and public circles. .) gives 3 references (Efraim Karsh, Anita Shapira and Norman Finkelstein) who contested Benny Morris's work.
• The 3rd sentence (Whereas historians now agree on most of the events of that period there is still disagreement on whether the exodus was the result of a plan designed before or during the war by Zionist leaders, or whether it was an unintended result of the war.) summarizes the current status of the research of the topic. In the note, the main works published on the issue are given (books from Benny Morris, Walid Khalidi, Nur Masalha, Efraim Karsh, Yoav Gelber and Ilan Pappé)

My points are :

• The 2nd sentence is useless. There is no added value in focusing on Morris's work and even less on these 3 people who have not really published on the topic of the 1948 exodus but have rather, on one side attacked Morris's analysis or on the other side, New Historians. And in this article (whether 1st paragraph or 1st or 3nd sentence of second paragraph), there is nothing related to Morris's analysis. More, What it wants to say is already written in the 1st sentence or in the 3rd one.
• The 3rd sentence summarizes the controversy and reminds it concerns the analysis and not the events (except for one case in fact, the al-Tantura). And indeed, in all the publications given, there is not controversy about the events as described in the 1st paragraph of the section of the article. Concerning the analysis, today, only two are debated as explained in the references of the book.

I am ready to make modifications but then, I'd like to know what precisely is bad and how to modify, ie, what particularly should be added, such as numerous events that would be contested or other analysis that are still debated today concerning the cause of the exodus. Ceedjee (talk) 11:36, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Answer to wikifan statement

About the 3rd sentence of the 2nd paragraph, wikifan writes : "Haven't looked up the editor yet in history, but that kind of phrase is an extreme generalization. Morris' views, especially on this topic, have been disputed by several historians (including pro/anti). It's edits like these that make it incredibly difficult to keep up with the article, (...)

• Haven't looked up the editor yet in history, but that kind of phrase is an extreme generalization

It is a summary but is there something else to add ? If so, what ?

• Morris' views, especially on this topic, have been disputed by several historians

The 3rd sentence is not a summary of Morris's view. Morris, Gelber and Karsh shares the same conclusion that the 1st part of the exodus was an "unexpected result of the war". (Karsh disagress wiht Morris for other things concerning arguments he had given to the other faction that the exodus was "planned" or "organised".)

• It's edits like these that make it incredibly difficult to keep up with the article, (...)

I don't understand.

Ceedjee (talk) 11:43, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Answer to Ceedjee

I'm confused: Can you prove this? Evens so, Gelber and Karsh aren't the only "experts" on this article. There are thousands, and to believe "most" historians endorse Morris' analysis on this specific subject is inaccurate: "Whereas historians now agree on most of the events of that period." Hence, a sentence like that makes it "incredibly difficult to keep up with the article." Understand?

We've gone through this a billion times and it's gotten to a point where I just repeat myself until I give up, so I will summarize in bullets:

• Morris is a controversial history - CHECK

• Morris analysis is disputed by many historians - CHECK

• This article would be beneficial for an alternative perspective from an equally notable expert? Assuming if one exists, which Ceedjee would obviously dispute considering his above post.

When does the 3rd opinion come? : ) Wikifan12345 (talk) 21:09, 23 February 2009 (UTC)

Answer to Wikifan

Same for me and I answer again.

• Morris is a controversial history
• Morris analysis is disputed by many historians.

There are no analysis of Morris in the article.

• This article would be beneficial for an alternative perspective from an equally notable expert? Assuming if one exists, which Ceedjee would obviously dispute considering his above post.

Once more. Please, be more precise than just saying you have the feeling somebody is not neutral. Ceedjee (talk) 07:11, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Answer to ÑJGW

Very shortly. I suggest to remove the 2nd sentence of the 2nd paragraph. This is the only one where it is talked about Morris's work and it doens't bring any information in addition to 1st and 3rd sentence. Ceedjee (talk) 07:11, 24 February 2009 (UTC)

Answer to Ceed

• There are no analysis of Morris in the article

source 6 - 15 is Morris' analysis, and that includes the majority of the info in the section. There is no justification for reducing my argument to "[Straw man|you have the feeling somebody is not neutral]", when I have provided overwhelming commentary and proposals to affirm my perspective. I like Morris personally. But my POV doesn't matter. Wikifan12345 (talk) 07:21, 24 February 2009 (UTC)