Talk:Israel Shamir

Weasel words

Each point in the "Background and personal life" section seems to be prefaced with weasel words. I can't see that an unsubstantiated quote from a single source is sufficient cause to do this. Reading over the Tablet article, other than quoting it, it doesn't appear to attempt to address Finkelstein's claim that Shamir's background is a fiction. Perhaps other better sources exist that explicitly cast doubt on his background? --92.2.82.159 (talk) 19:05, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

corrected attribution

"He says he was born Izrail Schmerler" - It is wrongly attributed to Shamir. It was written by Lundgren, so it should refer to him. I could not find Shamir saying that he had this name.

Kingfisher12 (talk) 19:38, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

Shamir on the Putin and the Olympics

I was going to write a paragraph on Shamir's undying support of Putin and his unironic:

"But only someone who has lost all touch with reality could brand the lenient rule of liberal-conservative Putin as the “murderous and corrupt regime” of a gangster, when he has never executed anyone, holds an electoral mandate, and has yet to break up a single legal demonstration."

But I couldn't fit it in the article, because really, once he lauds Pol Pot, what more can I say about his perspective on autocrats. Perhaps someone else can decide if his Olympic Coverage is worthy of inclusion. 96.251.85.48 (talk) 19:18, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

″Swedish″ in the lede

I see some kind of hair-splitting nonsense being pushed here. The guy is a Russian Jew, who has Russian, Israeli and Swedish citizenship. He has lived in Russia for decades, some years in Israel, in Britain, some suggest he has lived in Sweden, too, but what we know is that he now resides in Israel.
Now you tell me, according to what logic do you want to designate him in the lede as a Swede? --Lokalkosmopolit (talk) 11:50, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

His being a Swedish citizen (and not sourceably a Russian or Israeli citizen, apparently), the way we do for everyone else. I find this insistence that he can't be a real Swede because he's Jewish disgusting, and you need to stop now. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 14:06, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Stop making personal assaults like me claiming ″Jews are not real Swedes″. I have nothing against Jews, many of those are more sane than the 'original' Swedes in the sense of this article. Having Swedish ancestry myself I must admit some aspects of the life in the country brings tears to my eyes and this is only the fault of the ethnic Swedes themselves who let all of this shit accumulate while constantly voting for the landsförrädarpartierna.
Shamir is a citizen of Israel [1] (claims to be one himself: [2]). He writes on topics related to Israel and Russia. How is his Swedish citizenship the most important thing? Lokalkosmopolit (talk) 15:15, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Someone's nationality is rarely the most important thing about their work in this global day and age, but it's a common convention of Wikipedia to identify nationality in the first line. If other nationalities are also sourced, we might say "Swedish and Israeli" perhaps. Nothing you've posted supports identifying his nationality as "Jewish," however, and Wikipedia does not follow the racist belief that someone's Jewish ethnicity supersedes any national ties they have. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 16:36, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I think policies are quite clear on this matter. Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style_(biographies)#Opening_paragraph, point 3: Context (location, nationality, or ethnicity). While ethnicity is usually not to be emphasized unless directly relevant, choosing the most irrelevant formal nationality (as: citizenship) out of at least 2 (or likely 3) possible ones and writing in the lede is a Swedish[4][5][6] writer and journalist. is against the policy and nonsensical. He possesses Swedish citizenship only due to his marriage to a Swedish woman, having lived in many countries, his period of Swedish residence (apparently ended 20 years ago) is very limited in relative terms and his 'line of business' has nothing to do with Sweden. It is outright misleading to remove more important aspects and write ″is a Swedish[4][5][6] writer and journalist″ in the lede. Lokalkosmopolit (talk) 16:48, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

I notice that this doesn't support identifying him as Jewish as though he does not have a nationality. As well, the same policies would apply if he were an "ethnic Swede" living in Jaffa, but you removed "Swedish" because he's not an "ethnic Swede." You're clearly trying to justify a bad edit ex post facto and it's not really working. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 16:54, 15 April 2014 (UTC)

Shamir is not Swedish. He is a Russian Jew who obtained a Swedish passport for purposes of political expediency, and who resided in Sweden for a very limited time. His particpation in Swedish society was non-existent.