Talk:Israel

Notes

References

Mossad le-Aliya Bet

Although the literal translation of "Aliya Bet" is the meaningless "immigration B" (or "immigration 2") the actual meaning was "illegal immigration". This is well known and easily cited. The purpose of the "Bet" was to distinguish it from legal immigration. Zero^talk 07:03, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

Indeed, Mossad LeAliyah Bet "was facilitating illegal immigration in violation of governmental British restrictions". However, writing ("Institution for Illegal Immigration") near its name implies that this is the translation of its name, which is incorrect. "lit." near the arguably meaningless literal translation makes sure we do not mislead the readers. We could write (which facilitated illegal immigration), but the nature of the institution is explained in the following sentence. I suggest to either restore the literal translation or remove the clarification entirely, it is already available in the wikilinked article.“WarKosign” 07:31, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

I think that what was there will only confuse readers. Literally "Bet" is the second letter of the alphabet, but its meaning in this context is something like "alternative". I don't mind omitting it, given that there is a wikilink to where a longer explanation is (hopefully) available. The following sentences are a bit of a whitewash but I'm not on that case at the moment. Zero^talk 09:21, 10 May 2015 (UTC)

One theory is that Aliya Bet was initiated by the revisionists who were generally excluded from the legal certificates. They had a whole parallel Zionist body including the Zionist movement Bet and then Aliya Bet. It got absorbed into the mainstream when the certificates dried up.Telaviv1 (talk) 18:35, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Lead

The lead mentions the disputed status of Jerusalem which I don't think should be in the first paragraph. It should be about Israel and not its capital's status, saying Israel claims Jerusalem as its capital while internationally Tel Aviv is seen as it or some variation of this should be better. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jewnited (talk • contribs) 19:54, 21 May 2015 (UTC)

Jewnited how do you propose to have an article about a Jewish State (that has been called Israel) without addressing the question regarding the extent of that state? Have you read the previous indepth discussions on this issue? GregKaye 05:19, 22 May 2015 (UTC)

Judea and Samaria Area

Hi!

I do not speak English...

It can not be removed Judea and Samaria Area From the territory of the State of Israel! Judea and Samaria Area They are an integral part Of the State of Israel! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yair9a (talk • contribs) 05:44, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

@Yair9a: Israel government never officially claimed that the Judea and Samaria area (a.k.a the West Bank) is a part of Israel. The only part of the area which was (arguably) officially annexed is East Jerusalem, and it is reflected in the article. “WarKosign” 06:16, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

It's not an excuse ...

Currently the State of Israel controls there, so this area belongs to Israel right now. Not Palestine, not Jordan, not America, nor any other country. Only Israel. Therefore, to change the maps and texts on the Judea and Samaria will be inside Israel.213.151.40.2 (talk) 07:28, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia is built on reliable sources. If you have sources saying that that area is currently a part of Israel, it can be stated in the article. Sources do say that this area is under Israeli military control or occupation, and this is what the article says. There is no doubt that some people (apparently including you) believe that it should be part of Israel, but here we describe what is and not what should be. “WarKosign” 11:02, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

What is it that defines a certain area as part of the state? The implementation of state laws in these areas. No?Yair9a (talk) 15:39, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

@Yair9a: What you are doing is original research, which can't be used on wikipedia. Even if it could be used, you are incorrect - Most of Israeli laws are not applied in the West bank, except inside Israeli settlements. For example, consider taxation, education, criminal law, etc. Logically, Israeli law cannot apply to people who are not citizens (and not even permanent residents), and don't have a right to vote and elect the people settings these laws. The military control does apply restrictions and rules on Palestinians, but these deal only with security considerations. “WarKosign” 16:51, 27 May 2015 (UTC)

What are you talking about? ! All of Area C in Judea and Samaria apply Israeli law! Only in Areas A and B, there is a Palestinian government! In Judea and Samaria there are schools of the Israeli government, the police have the Israeli government has traffic laws by the Israeli government, there is the Israeli government's taxes, and more ... Yair9a (talk) 10:40, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

No state think the West Bank is a part of Israel. --IRISZOOM (talk) 15:36, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

What's the connection?Yair9a (talk) 16:31, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

I see a clear connection. How can we change it to that the West Bank is in Israel when actually not a single state think that? --IRISZOOM (talk) 16:41, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

If you have a child class that everyone beat him, and they all think it is necessary to beat him, it means we have to beat him ?! No! The question here is what reality is telling us, rather than what the world thinks! Yair9a (talk) 18:15, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

This being Wikipedia, 'the question' is actually how to neutrally represent what sources say, not what 'reality' is.     ←   ZScarpia   09:25, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

You hear what your mouth is saying? Is the copy, accurate than the original?!Yair9a (talk) 18:29, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

@Yair9a: you may want to read Wikipedia:Verifiability, not truth. If your opinion is correct, surely there are lots of reliable sources that agree with you, please point towards them. “WarKosign” 20:42, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

What is considered credible sources?Yair9a (talk) 05:47, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources“WarKosign” 07:33, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Infobox: Independence.

One of the infoboxes states that Israel became independent from 'the British Mandate of Palestine' (meaning Mandatory Palestine). That is factually questionable. Strictly speaking, what Ben-Gurion declared on 14 May 1948 was the creation of the state of Israel, to take place at midnight when Mandatory Palestine officially ceased to exist. Popularly, the Declaration of the Creation of Israel is referred to as Israel's 'Declaration of Independence' and the war which started on 15 May 1948 as the 'War of Independence', which often causes people to ask what Israel became independent from. Whatever the answer is, it was not really Mandatory Palestine, which had ceased to exist just before Israel came into existence and the 'War of Independence' started. The infobox title can read 'Independence' rather than 'Creation' if editors like, but if it remains the former, it shouldn't state as a fact that Israel became independent from Mandatory Palestine.     ←   ZScarpia   09:50, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

I see the word "independence" in the infobox, and agree that "establishment" (or "creation", although I like it less) would be more correct.

I think that the change you made (removal of reference to independence from the British Mandate of Palestine) is correct. I would like to keep some mention of the fact that the modern State of Israel replaced the mandate as the sovereign over the territory. I see that typically the Formation section of state infoboxes listed the major powers that used to control the territory (using the sovereignty_type ,established_event, established_date fields of template:Infobox country template). “WarKosign” 15:31, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

That, or anything suggesting the idea of (partial) succession, sounds good.     ←   ZScarpia   21:29, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

The only thing I will argue with is that what you call the "Declaration of the Creation of Israel" is actually the "Declaration of Independence." In Hebrew, it is called מגילת העצמאות or הכרזת העצמאות‎, which translates directly to Charter/Declaration of Independence (where עצמאות translates directly to independence). There was no "Declaration of the Creation of Israel," but a Declaration of Independence. They aren't referring to independence from a specific nation, but establishing a nation of independence of government from all others - having their own, independent Jewish State. Goalie1998 (talk) 16:04, 1 June 2015 (UTC)

Actually, Goalie, you are mistaken. The official name of the document is the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel (ההכרזה על הקמת מדינת ישראל).[1] The term מגילת העצמאות (Scroll of Independence) refers to the physical scroll bearing the words, not to the text of the declaration.RolandR (talk) 11:50, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

I don't dispute that, however the point of my statement still stands. It is viewed as a declaration of independence. Everything relating to the establishment of Israel is referred to as Independence (here in Israel, at least) - from the document itself, to Independence Hall, and to the holiday - not to establishment. Again, they weren't referring to independence from a specific previous power, but to independence and sovereignty. Jews at the time felt they needed an independent Jewish State, much as Muslims and Christians had their own independent states. That is the independence they were referring to. Goalie1998 (talk) 06:54, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Jerusalem as Israel Contested Capital City

May I suggest that the English version of this article is modified to reflect the French version of the same article, which seems to be much more informative and precise with respect to the contested nature of Jerusalem as the Capital City of Israel. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.150.180.100 (talk) 15:02, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

Could you please describe what exactly is more informative and precise in the French version, for those not fluent in the language ? “WarKosign” 15:27, 29 May 2015 (UTC)

le sens de la langue - dedudelaisrajelito? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.90.196.227 (talk) 07:16, 31 May 2015 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 June 2015

104.162.28.233 (talk) 22:01, 2 June 2015 (UTC) religion:Jewish

The question of whether Israel has an official religion has been discussed on this page, and based on reliable sources, editors have concluded the answer is no. Please see footnotes 1, 2, and 3 in the article. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 22:24, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

Longest military occupation - session 3

This section is a continuation of "Longest military occupation - session 2". see also:

According to the following quote, the longest modern military occupation is in Kashmir: "If we consider the postwar legal regime that established the international laws that regulate and administer occupation, Kashmir is the first site of contemporary military occupation, yet its history remains comparatively less known than that of Palestine or Iraq, even though the number of Indian troops posted in Kashmir approaches 700,000 more than twice the US. forces in Iraq at the height of the military occupation there". Hence the article sentence: "Israel’s occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem is the world's longest military occupation in modern times" is incorrect. Ykantor (talk) 21:30, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

Maybe I'm missing something, Ykantor, but can you bold the part of the sentence that says the occupation of Kashmir is the longest military occupation in modern times? — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 21:38, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

-@GregKaye, Oncenawhile, WarKosign, Jeppiz, Flinders Petrie, Paul Barlow, and Zero0000: , @Yuvn86, Gouncbeatduke, and Malik Shabazz: : I would like to have your opinion. Thanks. Ykantor (talk) 15:29, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

I understand the bold portion of the quote above as "Kashmir is the earliest site of military occupation that is still in force today", which must mean that it began earlier than any other occupation, which must mean that it's the longest. “WarKosign” 17:45, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Comment the cited references for the "longest military occupation" statement present:

"See for example:
* Hajjar, Lisa (2005). Courting Conflict: The Israeli Military Court System in the West Bank and Gaza. University of California Press. p. 96. ISBN 0520241940. The Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza is the longest military occupation in modern times.
* Anderson, Perry (July–August 2001). "Editorial: Scurrying Towards Bethlehem". New Left Review. 10. ...longest official military occupation of modern history—currently entering its thirty-fifth year
* Makdisi, Saree (2010). Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393338447. ...longest-lasting military occupation of the modern age
* Kretzmer, David (Spring 2012). "The law of belligerent occupation in the Supreme Court of Israel" (PDF). International Review of the Red Cross. 94 (885). doi:10.1017/S1816383112000446. This is probably the longest occupation in modern international relations, and it holds a central place in all literature on the law of belligerent occupation since the early 1970s
* Alexandrowicz, Ra'anan (24 January 2012), The Justice of Occupation, The New York Times, Israel is the only modern state that has held territories under military occupation for over four decades
* Weill, Sharon (2014). The Role of National Courts in Applying International Humanitarian Law. Oxford University Press. p. 22. ISBN 9780199685424. Although the basic philosophy behind the law of military occupation is that it is a temporary situation modem occupations have well demonstrated that rien ne dure comme le provisoire A significant number of post-1945 occupations have lasted more than two decades such as the occupations of Namibia by South Africa and of East Timor by Indonesia as well as the ongoing occupations of Northern Cyprus by Turkey and of Western Sahara by Morocco. The Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories, which is the longest in all occupation's history has already entered its fifth decade."

This is not an issue that I have greatly followed but I had gathered that the issue was clear. GregKaye 16:22, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

The theory that Kashmir is under military occupation is WP:Fringe. Several POV pushers have tried to include it in the Kashmir article, but have (thankfully) been unsuccessful to date. Gouncbeatduke (talk) 16:58, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Correct. This is why: Instrument of Accession (Jammu and Kashmir). Oncenawhile (talk) 21:36, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm not a big fan of the longest-this, biggest-that, style of writing, but the extraordinary length of this occupation is one of its most notably features so it absolutely must be mentioned. Not just the length of it, but the extraordinary nature of that length. It would be easy to add additional excellent references that it is the longest. Zero^talk 23:03, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

A Wikipedia article should impart factual description of its subject. It should not approach the subject with a polemical attack. The BDS movement disapproves not merely of the "occupation," (itself a charged term despite its adoption by foreign diplomats) but of the existence of Israel as a Jewish State altogether. (This point of view is also implicit in the Palestinian Authority's refusal to agree to recognize Israel as a "Jewish State" during last year's framework negotiations with Israel mediated by John Kerry and the Obama administration.) Inasmuch as the word "occupation" has been adopted by the BDS movement some years ago now as a code-phrase for attacks on the integrity, security, and sovereignty of the State of Israel, I personally am motivated to again bring the question the prominence of its use in a Wikipedia article about Israel to this page. Would the BDS movement prefer the article to be renamed "The Fascist Occupying State of Israel?" That would be highly improper regardless of the number of Wikipedia Editors or Administrators who might like to see that! In short, it is inappropriate to demonize the subject of any Wikipedia article. The Israeli authorities, indeed, might prefer that Wikipedia simply excise any article entitled "Israel," preferring to separate its fortunes from a Wikipedia that is so implacably opposed to its existence as a Jewish State. The idea that Israel is "occupying" territory that is part and parcel of the historic Land of Israel, and indeed that was contemplated in the San Remo agreement as part of a modern Jewish State, is highly questionable, prima facie. Israel conquered the West Bank, a.k.a., Judea and Samaria, in 1967 at its peril. To the victors go the spoils. As far as voting rights for Arabs there are concerned, the establishment of areas under Palestinian Arab authority as contemplated by the Oslo accords has provided a measure of self-determination which could be further expanded for those indigenous Moslems. The Arab-Israeli conflict is highly unique. Attempting to frame it in terms of, e.g., colonialism, or, e.g., terms analogous to South African Apartheid or other struggles for self-determination is to perpetuate a serious miscarriage of justice. Hence, "I would like to see the phrase Israel’s occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem is the world's longest military occupation in modern times.[note 3][28]" removed, per se, from this article and placed in a separate article that covers the subject of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the Palestinian question.Jabeles (talk) 16:35, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

I am sorry you find this fact inconvenient. I note that your post implies you have extreme right-wing tendencies: (1) siege mentality (implying that "the world is against us"), (2) irredentist statements like "part and parcel of the historic Land of Israel" and "To the victors go the spoils", and (3) characterising Palestinians as "Moslems" (which is as facile as suggesting all Israelis are Jews). Genuinely well-balanced supporters of Israel do not try to hide inconvenient facts - they embrace them and work to make Israel better. Oncenawhile (talk) 18:38, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

Attacking my point-of-view ("extreme," "mentality," "irredentist," "Moslems") is not a legitimate form of discourse. Further your phrase "Genuinely well-balanced supporters" does not address the purpose of an encyclopedia, which is not to support one or another POV but rather to provided information. The term "occupation" is politically charged and must be taken as advancing a political agenda. It should only be used with careful qualification. As it stands this Wikipedia article is biased.Jabeles (talk) 08:05, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

This sentence is also a wp:pov since it implies that it is Israel's fault, without mentioning the Israeli generous peace proposal at year 2000 (p.m Barak) and 2008 (p.m. Olmert ) and the Mahmud Abbas refusal to negotiate. The main problem is the right of return of the Palestinian refugees. The public in Israel will never accept it, as the meaning is the end of Israel as a Jewish state. Should not the Jews have rights for their own little country? Since the Palestinians has rights for their own country as well, I am personally for an immediate and unilateral retreat of Israel from the West bank, while keeping what is needed to avoid smuggling heavy rockets into the Palestinian state. The situation is rather similar to the Egyptian peace proposal of 1971. The Egyptians caused the 1967 war, including public speeches that Israel will be destroyed this time. They lost the war and then in 1971 they proposed (sort of cold) peace, provided Israel would immediately give away her playing cards (the territories ) before starting negotiations (indirect only).! I propose to remove this sentence for both reasons: because the occupation of Kashmir started at 1947, and because this sentence is a wp:pov. Ykantor (talk) 17:26, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

The sentence most certainly does not imply fault. Oncenawhile (talk) 18:38, 7 June 2015 (UTC)

As mentioned, that Kashmir is occupied is fringe with only the involved parties in the dispute viewing it as such. You can also find sources that say Tibet or Hawaii is occupied but it doesn't mean it is true. There are many territorial disputes but they don't necessarily involve occupied territory. --IRISZOOM (talk) 12:14, 8 June 2015 (UTC)

You mean that Tibet is not occupied? so the U.S senate and congress voted for a fringe view ? " On 28 October 1991 both the Senate and the House of Representatives legislated perhaps the most important legal pronouncement on Tibet. The Foreign Relations Authorization Act, fiscal year 1992 and 1993 (Public Law 102-138 (H..1415) declared Tibet, including those areas: incorporated into the Chinese provinces of Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu and Qinghai, is an occupied country under the established principles of international law; (2) Tibets true representatives are the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile as recognized by the Tibetan people, and finally calls for Tibetan peoples right to self-determination " Norbu2012p275 Ykantor (talk) 02:44, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

It is technically "annexed". We have discussed this distinction previously. Oncenawhile (talk) 03:26, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

I can't see that is the US position (meaning the goverment's) nor have I seen any state view it as occupied (if there are it is still vast consensus it is not) though others does view it as such. --IRISZOOM (talk) 07:35, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Kashmir is not recognized as occupied in any international fora, certainly not with anything approaching the consensus on Palestine. It is of course true that there are a huge number of Indian troops there, and there is widespread separatist sentiment. Tibet is not occupied either, there is no country in the world that recognizes it as occupied. There were and remain border disputes, and problems with autonomy and repression, but that is not the same as occupation technically. International law can be crazy and inconsistent, but that's the way it is. Kingsindian ♝♚ 08:01, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

- "Tibet is not occupied either, there is no country in the world that recognizes it as occupied". Correct, and the reason is simple- no country dares to encounter China. If hypothetically , China would have occupied the West bank, It would have been the same- no country would have dares to encounter China and recognize it as an occupied territory. The International laws are not really applied to the big powers. But if you look at the definition of "occupied" in a dictionary, Tibet is 100% occupied. Ykantor (talk) 16:48, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Can we just not mention the longest occupation line since it is not npov and is not necessarily even true. The US is technically occupying Native American land, Tibet and Kashmir are both occupied, as well as similar occupations elsewhere. This line will just inflame tensions further for this article. PointsofNoReturn (talk) 17:35, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

The length of the occupation of the Palestinian territories is very significant (48 years now) so it belongs here. Giving examples of other territories you think is occupied too when they are not seen as that is not either a reason to not mention this. --IRISZOOM (talk) 06:06, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

Sorry, but I am not going to accept with equanimity the pejorative/polemic tone of the subject statement (regarding longest military occupation). Neither should any Wikipedia Editor or Administrator with a NEUTRAL POINT OF VIEW. To wit, the statement clearly is meant to calumnify Israel, the only Jewish State in the middle east. Clearly, the implication is that the occupation is a bad thing because it deprives certain individuals of self-determination and imposes inconveniences or hardships upon them! But the question is, who is responsible for the undesired state-of-affairs? That is the key point, and it is implicit. The clear and extremely biased insinuation is that the responsibility falls upon the occupying power, i.e., upon the State of Israel. But is this so? That isn't addressed in these talk pages. If the main page describing the State of Israel implicitly criticizes Israel savagely without justification, that is not a neutral point of view. The main page, to satisfy neutrality concerns, needs to touch upon the question of whose fault it is that this occupation has lasted since 1967 (48 years), and moreover acknowledge de minimus that there is honest disagreement among well-intentioned individuals as to (indeed) which side may be responsible. FURTHERMORE, the citation of scholarly and journalistic works claiming to justify a one-sided point of view (regarding the "occupation" being solely the responsibility of Israel) is fundamentally flawed since OBVIOUSLY one could find competing journalistic or scholarly works, or both, that would take an opposing point-of-view. So please dispense with that silliness.Jabeles (talk) 22:18, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

-@Oncenawhile: : yours:"The sentence most certainly does not imply fault." The occupying force is seen as the "bad guy" and rightly so. But:

1. In this case,Israel, the occupying force, captured the west bank from Jordan after an Jordanian attack. Moreover, even after this attack started, Israel told Jordan that Israel was not interested in a war with Jordan and if this attack would be stopped, Israel won't fight against Jordan. The Jordanian king did not bulge and continued his attack.
2. Israel proposed a peace agreement to the Palestinians at year 2000, a proposal that the American president considered as a generous offer, but the Palestinians refused. Another generous agreement was offered at 2008 and the Palestinians refused again.

In my opinion those facts should be mentioned together with the "long occupation" sentence, in order to avoid the current POV situation. Ykantor (talk) 13:28, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Both narratives in 1 and 2 above represent pro-Israel propagandistic summaries. Pro-Palestinian propagandistic summaries of the same questions are well known, so I am not going to repeat them here. The middle ground scholarly position is highly complex on both points, as it attempts to retain the facts but remove the hyperbole from both narratives. We are not going to solve this in half a sentence here. Oncenawhile (talk) 19:05, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Refs

References

First line

I want to remove the Hebrew and Arabic script from the first line of the lead, because we have those in the infobox which is just to the right. It's redundant and it just clutters up the first line. Most of our readers probably can't even read Hebrew or Arabic.Kurzon (talk) 10:13, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

In the few articles about states with native language not based on latin script I checked, the native name appears both in the lead paragraph and in the infobox.“WarKosign” 11:06, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

That's stupid and I'll happily fix those articles as well if my fellow editors will allow it.Kurzon (talk) 11:25, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

You can try changing China, Russia, Japan, Iran, UAE or about any other country's page and see if the editors watching these pages won't mind you removing their country's name. I suggest you raise this issue at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geography first. “WarKosign” 11:53, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

Please read MOS:FORLANG, which suggests you're both wrong. — MShabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 12:13, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

MOS:FORLANG#Clutter Kurzon (talk) 13:32, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

I think WarKosign's suggestion is spot on. Try changing one of those prominent articles (Russia, China) first, and see how that goes. Switzerland might also be a good example, as a country with more than one official language. Brad Dyer (talk) 18:25, 11 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree with OP. To objectors, please read WP:LEADCLUTTER. An argument may be made for including the Hebrew script, but two languages is too much. JDiala (talk) 01:55, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Two languages plus multiple IPAs is way too much. Most readers can't even read these things.Kurzon (talk) 05:02, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

Israel has two official languages, so no, two languages in not too much. There's a reason I brought Switzerland up as an example. Brad Dyer (talk) 15:16, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

"Clutter" is defined by how much space all this information takes, not on how many languages the country has.Kurzon (talk) 05:15, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

My opponent's arguments boil down to "most other articles do it this way". Yes, I like consistency too, do you have a better argument? Kurzon (talk) 07:22, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

if most articles are written that way, than the MOS is either out of date, or doesn't properly document Wikipedia practice. I don't really need a better one than that, but if you want additional arguments: Israel has two official, non-English script languages. It is useful for readers to know the official name and writing of the country's name in those languages. The Switzerland example is illustrative of this concept: Switzerland has 4 official languages, and the country's name is given in ALL FOUR, plus IPA for ALL FOUR, in the first line. Mind you, that article is rated as a "Good Article", which indicates that at a minimum, it complies with the MOS. I've read WP:LEADCLUTTER, and it is instructive to look at the example it uses for how leads should be written: it gives two IPA pronunciations for the name of a single individual , then a third one in a different language, and then an audio rendition of the name , and then two alternate spellings of the name. Compared to that, having two languages for a country of 8 million people seems quite uncluttered. Brad Dyer (talk) 15:16, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

More than two thirds of the first line is unintelligible to most readers, who do not speak Arabic or Hebrew or can read IPA.Kurzon (talk) 17:09, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

There are English transliterations for both the Hebrew and Arabic. IPAs are a feature of nearly every Wikipedia article. Again, look at the Switzerland article. If that one is a "good article", I don't see how you arguments here have merit. Brad Dyer (talk) 17:48, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

A native name is an important part of a state's identity. Users not interested in the native name(s) can easily skip them. I agree that it could be placed less prominently within the article, but since you are trying to change a long-standing consensus affecting tens of popular articles, you should discuss it at a much larger forum than just one of these articles. “WarKosign” 17:52, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

"Other articles do it; therefore, so should we" is not an argument. Notice how cluttered the lead for Switzerland is. That is unacceptable and not proper (per policy). The Republic of India has a myriad of official and nationally recognized languages all of which are important to its identity, yet there is no more than a single transliteration. Another example would be Zimbabwe; sixteen official languages, none of which are included. Now, personally, I don't think it's problematic to include the Hebrew so long as it's not very cluttered. Regarding the argument that name is an "important part of a state's identity", well, one should keep in mind that the (self-proclaimed) identity of Israel is the sole Jewish state and homeland, with Hebrew, the historical language of the Jewish people, being the de facto official language. Arabic is therefore not necessary, since Arabs are a minority. Generally speaking, the minority languages is not included. Furthermore Brad, your interpretation of WP:LEADCLUTTER is erroneous. The point is not that there is some ideal amount of "acceptable" clutter, but that generally speaking, when possible, clutter should be minimized by removing extraneous information. JDiala (talk) 23:45, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree with JDiala. It's one thing to include Yisrael (Israel) once, in Hebrew; it's something else entirely to include Medinat Yisrael (State of Israel) in both Hebrew and Arabic. — MShabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 23:59, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree that Hebrew is more important for Israel than Arabic, and if only one of the two official languages is to be presented - it should be Hebrew. I remember some people succeeding to add Arabic spelling of Benjamin Netanyahu's name to the lead despite my objections, but its gone now.“WarKosign” 14:36, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

The Hebrew, Arabic, and IPAs are relevant and should be included, but since there is so much of it, and since most readers won't understand them, they should be shifted to some other part of the article, such as the infobox or a "Names" section.Kurzon (talk) 05:21, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

Precisely. Do we have consensus? JDiala (talk) 17:57, 13 June 2015 (UTC)

The only part of the opening sentence that I would question would be the inclusion after the first word of: "(/ˈɪzreɪəl/ or /ˈɪzriːəl/)". Israel for goodness sake. How hard is that? I think that the inclusion of the languages gives a nice flavour of cultural identity. Hebrew is also unique as a reformatted reinvented or at least resomethinged language and if there ever was a partially English speaking country that deserved reference in another script, this, I think, would be it. Israel is also openly multilingual. See the road signs. See: he:ישראל. The Hebrew version of the page presents the name in English. This is the culture and it would not be encyclopedic if we failed to present this. Arabic is an official language and also the most widely spoken language in the area for long periods of history and should also be included. It takes up little space. GregKaye 17:43, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree that the Arabic and Hebrew names should be included too - IN THE INFOBOX.Kurzon (talk) 04:32, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

As do I, but either national languages are to be taken out of the lead or they should remain. What is it about the national languages that makes this culturally relevant content a problem while the arguably pointless "(/ˈɪzreɪəl/ or /ˈɪzriːəl/)" text remains? An example of a famously neutral country is Switzerland. Please do not make "Israel" to be different. GregKaye 06:37, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

These IPA spellings are not as pointless as you think. I've heard Israel being pronounced both as is-rah-el and and is-real by native English speakers, which is exactly what these IPA spellings say. Whether they should be in the lead or somewhere else is a different matter. “WarKosign” 07:18, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

How about as a footnote?Kurzon (talk) 09:22, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Since this seems to be a wikipedia wide issue, and not near resolution to Kurzon's standards, how about a RfC? Goalie1998 (talk) 13:43, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

An RfC sounds like a good idea, but it should be done at a larger scope than a single article, perhaps Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Geography. “WarKosign” 14:17, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

I really do not see how the p&g of WP:LEADCLUTTER as per the example of Ghengis Khan (with its two and a half lines of text inclusive of three citations and a section of vertically aligned text) applies.

The sequence in the text of the Israel article is that we read "Israel (/ˈɪzreɪəl/ or /ˈɪzriːəl/), officially the State of Israel"; then there is a bracket; then there is the text at issue which contains a very significant changes of formating styles and which, if anything, is consistent in its variation; then there is a close bracket; then, after less than one line of text (at least on display on my screen) we get back to a more expected presentation of text in Latin script. Once finding the beginning of the bracketed section, it is relatively easy to find the end.

Another option would be to remove sections of text such as:

• "Medīnat Yisrā'el" and "Dawlat Isrāʼīl"

or

• "IPA: [mediˈnat jisʁaˈʔel] ;" and " IPA: [dawlat ʔisraːˈʔiːl]".

In total the Arabic related content has about 80% of the length of the Hebrew related content

GregKaye 05:52, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Religion in the Infobox

Before I discuss the change that I am proposing, let me introduce myself. I am Guy Macon, editor for nine years and DRN volunteer mediator. Recently I have been working on correcting problems that occur on multiple pages. You can look at my edit history to see the sort of things I typically work on.

A while back I posted an RfC (you can see it here) concerning pages that have "atheism" in the religion entry of the infobox. Of course atheism is not a religion, for the same reason that bald is not a hair color, off is not a TV channel, barefoot is not a shoe, silence is not a sound, never is not a date, clear is not a color, and not collecting stamps is not a hobby.

As a result of the Request for Comments, I removed the religion parameter from the infobox on over 600 articles. This is the last one that needs to be changed. Note that the closing administrator made it clear in his closing comments that the RfC applies to all articles, not just articles about individuals.

I saved this one for last for two reasons, first, this page is an obvious vandalism target, and someone working through a list fixing problems like I am doing can look a lot like an editor who has never edited a page before and is here to edit disruptively. Second, the information and the sources in this particular infobox seem like something the reader should know -- I know that it surprised me to find out that Judaism is not the official religion of Israel. It gives me hope that maybe, just maybe someday the world will grow up and stop fighting over religion. But I digress.

So we have a clear community consensus that Wikipedia is no longer going to put atheism in the religion entry of the infobox in any article, but instead of simply deleting it in this case I would like one of the editors who has been working on improving this page to move the information into the body of the article. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:44, 15 June 2015 (UTC)

The RfC concluded that there is no justification to write in the infobox that a person or another entity is not associated with a religion, and "religion=none" should be removed everywhere. In case of Israel, it's not a simple "religion=none", but "none officially" and 3 long citation over 4000 bytes in length since non-officially Israel is strongly associated with Judaism, and is an important place for Christianity and Islam as well. There is a whole article dedicated to Religion in Israel, so I think that with all due respect to the RfC it should be discussed here before being applied blindly.

I think it was bad procedure to run such an important (and welcome) RfC at template:Infobox person, defined as related to infobox person, only to change its result at the last moment to include nearly all the templates on wikipedia. While I personally support the result, more people should have had a chance to participate. “WarKosign” 03:49, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

We are discussing it here, as specified in WP:BRD. The closing admin did say that [A] it applies to all articles, and [B] anyone is free to post another RfC concerning just countries or even just Israel if they think that it should not apply to all articles (more specific RfCs trump more general RfCs). He also said that the arguments would be the same, which is true. There are good arguments for not having any variation of "none" or "atheism" in any infobox religion entry. "None" is not a religion, and in no other infobox entry do we specify "none" -- no "spouse = none", no "children = none", no "degree = none", no "birth date = none" (applicable to the pages of certain fictional characters, gods, etc.).

As for importance, we also have articles about Religion in Afghanistan and Religion in China, but despite this the editors of China and Afghanistan accepted the clear consensus that "it is clear that they [secularism and atheism] are not religions and it is both confusing and technically incorrect to label them as such" and allowed the entry to be removed.

Keep in mind that nobody is suggesting removing the information or the citations, just moving them to a prominent place in the body of the article. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:39, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree with your (and the RfC's) reasoning that religion=none should be removed everywhere. You did not reply to my main point - that Israel is not a simple case of "religion=none", but rather "religion=none officially", which in my understanding means that there is an unofficial state religion, which means it's not covered perfectly by the RfC. “WarKosign” 07:00, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

One of the points that have been made repeatedly (and supported by overwhelming consensus) in various infobox discussions is that the more subtle, nuanced, and complicated something is, the less suitable for inclusion in an infobox. This one is subtle, nuanced, and complicated indeed and, in my opinion, deserves an entire sentence or paragraph, and possibly an entire section. Not a two-word summary that really doesn't convey the actual situation unless you check the citations.

That being said, if the sources support an unofficial religion, then "Religion = Judaism (unofficial)" would be acceptable, and would avoid the problem that there is no religion called "none official" and thus "none official" should not follow "Religion =" in an infobox entry. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:31, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

The sources do support an unofficial, but recognized national religion. There is no separation of religion and state government - the religious parties are active in government, and write laws openly based on religion. Even non-Jews in Israel recognize that Israel is the Jewish State. Is "Religion = Judaism (unofficial)" accepted by the wikipedia community as a whole? If so, I suggest we use that. However, if not, I also suggest we remove the religion=none. Goalie1998 (talk) 12:06, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

We need to find good sources saying that Israel has an unofficial state religion. Many sources like this or this discuss separation between the religion and the state and thus implicitly say that today they are not seaprate. This one for example says it explicitly, but perhaps there are better sources.

Note that there is a big dispute whether the label Jewish State refers to Judaism or to Jewish ethnicity. In my opinion it must be the latter since Law of Return criteria differs from Halakha, but many people think otherwise. “WarKosign” 12:34, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I will leave those questions to you folks; I am just someone who is removing the religion parameter on hundreds of Wikipedia pages as required by the recent RfC on the topic. So can we move the information as it is now into the body of the article so I can move on and continue working on the 1,800 pages with "a the" errors ("Yoichi Hiruma is a the member of a the Deimon Devil Bats")? --Guy Macon (talk) 14:39, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

Would people be opposed to changing it to "Judaism (unofficial)," leaving the current citations, instead of removing it completely? Goalie1998 (talk) 20:42, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

My opinion doesn't matter as much as that of those who have been working on improving the page, but for what it is worth, no objections from me. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:59, 16 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm beginning to agree that it's pointless to try and have such a complicated concept explained in 2-3 words in the infobox. "Judaism (unofficially)" or "None officially" is meaningless without the context, and the context can only be provided in the prose of the article itself. At the moment the situation (no official religion, but no separation between the religion and the state either) is not mentioned at all in this article. One possibility is having infobox contain "Religion: complicated", but I don't think many people would accept it. Status quo (Israel) is dedicated to this subject, I think a mention and a link should be added under Israel#Politics. “WarKosign” 07:04, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

• Comment - Currently the "demographics" section has got a POV tag - the infobox should not change until the POV issue is sorted out in that section. -- Aronzak (talk) 23:52, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

• If you look at Template talk:Infobox country#RfC: Religion in infoboxes of nations there is already a clear consensus for removing the parameter, and according to WP:CONLOCAL, consensus on this talk page cannot override the community consensus from the RfC. Unless the consensus at the RfC changes soon (unlikely), the infobox entry will be removed from this article. Your only choice is whether to move it into the body of the article or just let it be deleted without being moved into the body. --Guy Macon (talk) 03:37, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Nope. Start an actual RFC based on the actual issue first. Your narrow -- and, ironically, uttery dogmatic -- application of a not-widely held RFC in a different area as if it were a ruling handed down by God isn't going to fly. There is no "requirement", no matter how much you like to use the term. --Calton | Talk 04:06, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Keeping in mind that we won't have an actual consensus until the RfC is closed after 30 days and an uninvolved administrator evaluates the consensus and posts a determination in the closing comments, you should be aware that if at that time you refuse to accept the consensus you will be warned, and then blocked from editing Wikipedia (not by me -- that will come from an administrator). See WP:OWNERSHIP. The RfC is still open, so you might want to make your best argument there and see if your argument is compelling enough to turn the developing consensus around.

To the other editors who maintain this page; unless the consensus at the RfC changes soon (unlikely), the infobox entry will be removed from this article, possibly after Carlton is blocked. Your only choice is whether to move it into the body of the article or just let it be deleted without being moved into the body.

If I wanted to be a jerk about it, I could invoke the rule that everything in the infobox has to be covered in the body and delete it on that basis alone, but my goal here is not to start a fight, but simply to implement the community consensus. I have a lot of respect for the editors who look over this page despite a bunch of disruptive vandals wanting to mess with it. --Guy Macon (talk) 05:01, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Both RfCs are not applicable here since they refer to "religion: none" which is not the case here. The state has an official and legal association with a religion, I linked above to some sources that prove this. While I tend to agree that it's better to explain this complex relation between the religion and the state in the body of the article, we should complete a civil discussion first and make sure that this is the best way to represent verifiable and unbiased information. There is no need to delete the whole infobox to make a WP:POINT, nor to threaten people who disagree with you.“WarKosign” 05:29, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

The first RfC has been determined not to apply, so discussing it is a waste of time. The entry with the most support so far in the second Rfc clearly states "In infoboxes on articles about non-religious (as opposed to anti-religious) nations, religion should not be listed in the infobox, and the religion parameter should be removed." nobody thinks Israel is an anti-religious nation. If Israel is a religious nation, then no variation of "none" is allowed in the religion entry of the infobox because it would be factually incorrect. If Israel is a non-religious nation, then the RfC applies and the parameter must be removed. If you want to retain the "religion =" parameter, pick an actual religion. Nobody is threatening anyone. I am merely explaining how RfCs work and what happens to editors who refuse to follow the consensus as defined in the administrator's closing comments of the RfC. Would you prefer to end up blocked without anyone warning you about the sort of behavior that will get you blocked? Again, if you really think you have a valid argument, the RfC is still open, and you have every opportunity to post your argument on the RfC page and see if the Wikipedia community agrees with you. --Guy Macon (talk) 14:27, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

@Guy Macon: Looks like I need to explain you how RfCs work. A community is asked a question, and if it is a specific question then the answer can be applied imediately. If it is a policy question (like in our case), then in each case it's a judgement call whether or not the policy applies. Anybody can voice an opinion, and nobody ever gets blocked for voicing an opinion in a civil manner.

This is not a case of WP:CONLOCAL - we are not discussing whether we should ignore a community consensus that clearly applies to this article, but whether or not this community consensus applies to this article at all. Both RfCs are applicable if and only if Israel's religion is "none", which in my opinion is not the case. You're saying that Israel is a non-religious nation, I disagree and have sources that prove it. Nonetheless, in my opinion it is better to remove "religion=none officially" from the infobox, because it can be explained better in the body of the article. “WarKosign” 15:39, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

@WarKosign and Goalie1998: Do you want to participate in the RFC? If it is a special/important issue, you might want to raise it there. Discuss-Dubious (t/c) 19:12, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

@Discuss-Dubious: It looks quite obvious that the RfC will pass, so I won't bother supporting it. It takes care of non-religious nations, so it's not applicable to Israel. “WarKosign” 19:43, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

De facto religion is not meaningful to the argument. Only de jure faith is. Discuss-Dubious (t/c) 19:55, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

@Discuss-Dubious: If you have access to jstor, try reading Law and Religion in Israel, Izhak Englard, The American Journal of Comparative Law, Vol. 35, No. 1 (Winter, 1987), pp. 185-208. If not, here's a quote from its conclusion: "The centrality and intensity of the conflicts about law, state and religion in Israel are grounded in the very idea of establishing a Jewish state. ... The noncomitant emergence of factual and legal symbols concerning the nature of the Jewish state constitutes a decisive factor both in the configuration of the system and in the course of the conflicts. ... In view of the fact that the topic of law and religion goes to the very foundations of Israel's statehood, one can hardly expect in the near future any lessening in the conflicts' acuteness or a decline in their frequency." Basically it says that the situation is more complicated than a simple binary "Israel does/doesn't have an official religion"“WarKosign” 20:42, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

Comment I think that as long as there is good reason to present the "None official" statement in the Religion entry then this presents greatly notable content.

Guy Macon In regard to atheism I thought it was inappropriate to comment that "bald is not a hair color, off is not a TV channel, barefoot is not a shoe, silence is not a sound, never is not a date, clear is not a color, ..." Head shaving is an option in hair styling; off is a setting; going barefoot is a potential radical choice dependant on conditions; silence, a state in which no sound is heard, can also be of great note; A fact that something has been reported not to have happened will in some cases, be similarly notable; clear is an appearance.

Your final mention that "not collecting stamps is not a hobby" seems to me to offer nothing but argumentum ad absurdum. Religious choice is an issue that effects a great number of people at a potentially deep psychological level. A choice as to whether or not to adopt a stamp collecting as a hobby/investment based activity is not something likely to have anything like a similar level of personal affect. GregKaye 07:38, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

So you are arguing that atheism is a religion? If so, the overwhelming consensus of the Wikipedia community is that it is not. We have multiple RfCs an discussions that clearly show that the consensus of the Wikipedia community is that "religion = none" and "religion = atheist" (and close synonyms like "none (atheist)", "state atheism" "irreligious", "NA", and "none official") should be removed from the religion field of all infoboxes on all articles.

You (Greg) appear to have not participated in the discussion at Template talk:Infobox country#RfC: Religion in infoboxes of nations. Please join the discussion there. If your arguments are sound, you may end up swaying the consensus your way. That's what happened during the previous RfC about individuals; the final result went against my initial choice and I ended up removing the entry on 600 articles that I had previously (based on the consensus at that time) changed to "religion = None". --Guy Macon (talk) 11:48, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Guy Macon If a government makes a decision for the country to have no official religion then this has relevance to views on the religion of the country. If a government was to do something such as to actively promote atheism or if the country has a culture that otherwise was to actively promote atheism then this has relevance to religion. Bald is not a hair colour and the not having an official religion is not a ritualistic practice within a religion. However, it is a stance relevant to religious practice in a country. GregKaye 14:08, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I am going to try once more and then give up on you. After your response implying that bald is a hair color, off is a TV channel, and barefoot is a shoe, I asked you if you arguing that atheism is a religion. It is a simple question: is atheism a religion? I also asked you if you were going to join the RfC discussion. Are you or aren't you? You can, of course, choose not to answer, but I am equally free to choose not to have a discussion with you as long as you exhibit WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT behavior. Finally, I would strongly advise you against editing the article against the consensus in the RfC. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:01, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree with WarKosign in that this is not case of a country having no religion, but of one not having a legally defined official religion. What you have to remember, is that the law here is so intertwined with Judaism, that if you were to separate the two - religion and law - this country would no longer be the same. There are many aspects of daily life that are subject to the rabbinic courts here, and as such under Jewish Law, not Israeli Law. I still think this page requires Judaism to be in the infobox as the religion. Goalie1998 (talk) 14:59, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Just as a procedural note, the RfC only forbids variations of "none" and "atheist"; "Judaism" would be allowed. I have no opinion on whether it is a good choice. I will leave that to those of you who are interested in this topic. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:01, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

The RfC doesn't seem to be addressing articles like this, and this issue is important, appears in many RS and as Guy notes is apparently not common knowledge, so I think readers will benefit from it being in a prominent place like the infobox. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 18:36, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

I wrote the RfC specifically to address articles like this. I don't see any way I could possibly have made that more clear when I wrote the RfC. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:50, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

If I'm not mistaken it was held on a page relating to personal pages, not country pages? That is not the forum for making decisions on this kind of page. How could it be? You can't extrapolate from people to countries. That's ridiculous. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 19:02, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

@No More Mr Nice Guy: I suppose that saying that Israel's religion is Judaism (unofficial) may be considered POV, but it is well supported by sources. Goalie1998 should have linked to sources, but failing to link does not make a statement unsourced.

@Goalie1998: I do not think we had a consensus to actually make this change - while I consider it correct, I think having this statement in the infobox serves no purpose, it's better to have it in a section under Israel#Politics. “WarKosign” 18:40, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

If it's put in the article without citing a source, it's unsourced. I believe the balance of the sources will tell you that Israel has no official religion, not that Judaism is it's "unofficial" religion (what does that even mean?). If there's such a thing as an unofficial religion every European country would have Christianity in the infobox since they draw many of their laws from what they think that religion says, often invoking god and whatnot. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 18:46, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

RfC Lead sentence clutter

The first line of the lead of the Israel article notes the English, Arabic, and Hebrew transliterations of the name along with their IPAs. Consequently, the first line is heavily cluttered. About three quarters of the line is text that most of our readership will not be able to understand. Most of our readers do not speak Arabic or Hebrew or understand IPA. I submitted a motion to clear the first line of this text, perhaps moving the material to some other section of the article. I noticed that the infobox in the top-right of the article already has the Hebrew and Arabic translations of "State of Israel", so I see no need for them to be in the first sentence of the lead.

It was pointed out to me that this is a problem that appears across many articles concerning countries with multiple official languages, such as Switzerland. Since the issue is widespread, I would like some external comments. These articles all seem to be in violation of WP:LEADCLUTTER.Kurzon (talk) 03:23, 19 June 2015 (UTC)

• The current site-wide consensus and de facto status quo is that country articles feature official and common names of the country in that country's official languages, in addition to Latin romanisations. However, in many cases a country has multiple official languages, and often the case there is talk page consensus on those articles to move the information to an infobox or language template. Take China, for example, which has many official languages (Chinese, Tibetan, Mongolian, Uyghur and Zhuang) - the lead paragraph only shows the name in Chinese, and the rest of the languages are placed in a template on the right hand side, below the country infobox. Ultimately, a solution for lead paragraph clutter should be decided by community consensus on that particular article's talk page; I personally would be opposed to forming a Wikipedia-wide "rule" or "guideline" which firmly dictates in stone what editors can and cannot do, per WP:KUDZU. --benlisquare_T•C•E 09:26, 19 June 2015 (UTC)
• I oppose removal of the native name, for the reasons stated by Benlisquare. "Most of the readers don't understand Hebrew or Arabic" is an invalid reason to delete material. Per the MoS, IPA should be provided when pronunciation is non-obvious, which is the case here. “WarKosign” 15:51, 19 June 2015 (UTC)
• I oppose removal of the native name, for the mentioned reasons. Ykantor (talk) 18:26, 19 June 2015 (UTC)
• Oppose. I really do not see how the p&g of WP:LEADCLUTTER as per the example of Ghengis Khan (with its two and a half lines of text inclusive of three citations and a section of vertically aligned text) applies. The sequence in the text of the Israel article is that we read "Israel (/ˈɪzreɪəl/ or /ˈɪzriːəl/), officially the State of Israel"; then there is a bracket; then there is the text at issue which contains a very significant changes of formating styles and which, if anything, is consistent in its variation; then there is a close bracket; then, after less than one line of text (at least on display on my screen) we get back to a more expected presentation of text in Latin script. Once finding the beginning of the bracketed section, it is relatively easy to find the end. Kurzon by extension of the rationale that you have presented we could also remove the first three pictures from the article as they all present otherwise unexplained symbols and scripts. GregKaye 06:02, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

My main argument is that the Hebrew and Arabic translations are redundant when we have them in the infobox.Kurzon (talk) 06:26, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

• Oppose removal of the text per GregKaye, it doesn't look like it's violating LEADCLUTTER. Moreover, this kind of text is common and appears in almost every single country article. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 18:34, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Some consistency, please?

When I google "Capital of Israel" I get a box from Wikipedia stating that it's Jerusalem. When I google "Capital of Palestine" I get two little boxes from Wikipedia that say Ramallah and East Jerusalem.

I propose that the information for Israel's capital be changed to "Western Jerusalem", or "Jerusalem (proclaimed)", or something of the sort. It's simply not factually correct to say that Jerusalem as a whole is Israel's capital, it's not recognized as such. 80.6.70.42 (talk) 01:21, 21 June 2015 (UTC)