Indef blocked as a standard admin action for not being here to build an encyclopedia, then CU linked as a sockpuppet. All non-AE actions, not logged. Closing as no AE action is needed. Dennis Brown - 2¢00:32, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below. Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Request concerning Playalake
User who is submitting this request for enforcement
Diffs of edits that violate this sanction or remedy, and an explanation how these edits violate it
15:00, 4 January 2017 1st edit here; a talk page comment: he Change.org petition lists the many problems with this article. I come here and see you editors locking discussion about it. Now NICE is being accused of being problematic. NICE is made of scientists who the NHS takes recommendations from. If you editors want to be on the opposite side of scientific officials, and pretend to have a scientifically backed article, shame on you..
4 January 2017 opening 2nd thread after first one was closed. You editors prefer to censor questions than answer them. I won't bring up other websites, but my questions remain unanswered. How did Wikipedia cover NICE before they updated? And why is everyone here quick to update based on NICE, but not care to update many Cochrane Reviews?
4 January 2017 Response on their talk page, when I tried to explain what article Talk pages are for: You locked my questions then you deleted them. Everything I saw on the Change.org petition is correct. Not only do Wikipedia editors censor studies beneficial to acupuncture, you also censor discussion on talk pages. You tell me to add what I believe is correct to the article but there is no edit button for me to make changes. This is obvious. Only select editors like you with an obvious censorship problem edit the article, nobody else is allowed to edit. Shame.
6 January 2017Thank you for this. These editors are very bad and you give good advice. I will set up my email.. This was Playalake's response to LesVegas' terrible initial welcome message (diff).
14 July 2017 Reverting an edit, with edit note: why does Wikipedia remove all positive statements on acupuncture? This is exactly what change.org accuses you of. Now you do it? Unbelievable
15 July 2017 reverting, with edit note RACIST EDITS! On talk page admits it's being removed because Wikipedia says if authors are Taiwanese then they are not following scientific proofs! RACISM!
Alerted about discretionary sanctions in the area of conflict in the last twelve months, see the system log linked to above and diff. 18 January 2017
Additional comments by editor filing complaint
Account is pure SPA. From their 1st edit here, this person made it clear that they had no interest in editing Wikipedia per the policies and guidelines, but came here to WP:RGW driven by a petition at change.org. They have never attempted to understand WP nor the policies and guidelines, and they are now just all-caps yelling personal attacks.
Notification of the user against whom enforcement is requested
Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.
Statement by Playalake
All positive statements about acupuncture are removed from Wikipedia and only insults remain. They remove everything! Studies from great journals are deleted because they say the authors of those studies are Taiwanese! So any Asians are problems for Wikipedia? Asian scientists are incapable of proper science? I am Asian American and Wikipedia now wants me to be internment it seems! That is how you deal with all of us, by deleting all of us from your encyclopedia. I am offended by your policies and will fight to expose this. I found the unjust article from change.org where it is shown that Wikipedia doesn't follow its own policies because they want to hurt acupuncture. We will create many more petitions now!
Statement by (username)
Result concerning Playalake
This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
A glance at Playalake's contributions show that they are a WP:GREATWRONGSWP:SPA here only to promote their point of view, and in a highly confrontative manner. Without admin objections, I intend to block them indefinitely per WP:NOTHERE as a normal admin action, which probably obviates the need for AE sanctions. Sandstein 14:29, 15 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I was just about to either block or topic ban this account the other day after I saw the edits made yesterday to this article and talk 1, 2, 3. This disruption wouldn't be tolerated on any article let alone an article under AC/DS... I agree that an indefinite block is justified here. ~Oshwah~(talk)(contribs)19:05, 15 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Checkuser needed. We have had more problems with Acupuncture as of late, and this SPA is raising some serious red flags. Otherwise, I agree with with Sandstein's solution, but I think a Checkuser should at least look at this and decide if the CU tools would be beneficial and justified here. Dennis Brown - 2¢18:19, 15 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
In progress I'm assuming I'm checking Playalake, not comparing the user to any other user/account. If I'm wrong, someone please ping me and let me know. Thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:09, 15 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'm going to assume good faith and believe Debresser's explanation that he didn't mean anti-semitic, he meant anti-Israeli-political-objectives. That is still focusing on editors and not edits, still a personal attack and, as far as I can see, battleground behaviour. We edit collaboratively, not by assigning each other to factions. I don't think this amounts to an indefinite sanction, but I do think it amounts to sanctions. Consequently, Debresser is banned from all edits and articles related to the Arab-Israeli conflict, broadly construed, for two months. I am very tempted by an indefinite IBAN between Debresser and Nishidani, but will (probably unwisely) leave it until next time.
The idea of a "casting aspersions" restriction is a curious one to me. I accept that it has worked well in another area if others say it has, but casting aspersions and classifying people by their nationality or politics or religion or whatever is prohibited anyway. If someone wants to introduce this restriction as an AE action then they are very free to do so; I'm not going to as part of this close because I don't personally see what it adds to the existing policy. It is a bit disturbing to me that some editors here seem to consider the idea of not casting aspersions on the basis of ethnicity/nationality a novel one and something we should do.
Other editors are reminded: (1) This is arbitration enforcement and you are expected to behave with decorum here. (2) Evidence presented should be evidence that adds to the record, or uninvolved opinion that advances resolution, not, as BMK lightly puts it, statements ex cathedra (thank you for that touch of humour, even if I did feel I had to hat it). (3) When someone makes a mistake and owns it and corrects it, you should consider it done, not something to whip them with repeatedly (thus Debresser's edit summary). (4) While it is true that arbitration enforcement may take the opportunity to scrutinise the activity of everyone involved, presenting a string of months-old diffs is not relevant and not welcome. GoldenRing (talk) 07:54, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
This request may be declined without further action if insufficient or unclear information is provided in the "Request" section below. Requests may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs (not counting required information), except by permission of a reviewing administrator.
Request concerning Debresser
User who is submitting this request for enforcement
16:26, 13 July 2017 Debresser writes: "I would have no problem with that suggestion, but only if there would be some more input from editors who are not necessarily in the anti-Jewish camp."
16:35, 13 July 2017 Nishidani writes: "I'd appreciate you striking out your remark above about 'editors who are not necessarily in the anti-Jewish camp.' Contextually this says the two other editors here discussing this issue are in an 'anti-Jewish camp', i.e. their contributions are being read as motivated by anti-Semitic hostilities."
16:42, 13 July 2017 Debresser strikes: who are not necessarily in the anti-Jewish camp
16:13, 14 July 2017 Debresser restores: "but only if there would be some more input from editors who are not necessarily in the anti-Jewish/Israeli camp."
Participated in an arbitration request or enforcement procedure about the area of conflict in the last twelve months, on 18:14, 13 June 2017.
Additional comments by editor filing complaint
After 16:13, 14 July 2017 Debresser has had several requests to strike the anti-Jewish comment. He has not done so. I consider this extremely insulting, in my country to call someone anti-Jewish is basically saying that they are racist. I ask that Debresser either
User:GoldenRing: Your statement: "anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist and anti-Israeli are regularly conflated by both sides of the Arab-Israeli dispute," (My bolding) is simply not correct. Only one side conflates, or try to conflate, "anti-Jewish" with "anti-Israeli" and/or "anti-Zionist". Huldra (talk) 17:41, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Statements must be made in separate sections. They may not exceed 500 words and 20 diffs, except by permission of a reviewing administrator. Administrators may remove or shorten noncompliant statements. Disruptive contributions may result in blocks.
Statement by Debresser
Nishidani is only back from his latest month-long ban since July 12, although he had promised to retire,I'll retire from Wikipedia.Waiting for it to be archived so I can put in a permalink, and then goodbye and already he has managed to escalate what has been a very quiet WP:ARBPIA area for the last month. I will not hide that I am less than thrilled about his return, and for good reason. That, however, is not a crime, and should not be held against me. This post is likely some kind of payback for that ban.
Regarding Huldra. She can hardly be said to have clean hands herself, see this WP:ANI thread, where she was shown to hide POV edits behind the innocent "ce" edit summary. If that is bad editing in general, in the WP:ARBPIA area this is reason for sanctions. Please also see User_talk:Black_Kite, where Black Kite mentions that this is indeed a WP:AE issue. Per WP:BOOMERANG, Huldra should be sanctioned for making such misleading and POV edits in the WP:ARBPIA area, and then having the gall to report me.
What it is I am being accused of precisely? I saw 6 edit summaries above, of which the first is Huldra's, and another two are Nishidani's. By the way, I already stated more than once on the talkpage, that I have no problem with Huldra's proposal.
All I said which seems to have struck the wrong note with Huldra, is that the agreement of only a few editors is too feeble, and that I would like some outside input. Seeing the same group of editors time and time again, and noticing that they always agree with each other, makes one suspicious of team work, and so I felt that asking for outside input was the right thing to do. Surely that is reasonable. Regarding team work, please notice this, and see also the comment of another editor here, so I think some suspicion is not out of order, and asking for outside input is always a good idea. Debresser (talk) 01:11, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Additional comments by Debresser
Based on Huldra's "additional comments", I now see that she has taken offense to the fact that I asked for input from editors who are not "anti-Jewish/Israeli". Contrary to what she claims, I did not call her "racist" or "anti-Semite". All I did was notice, that her stance on the Israeli-Palestine conflict is such which shows her to be on the Palestine side of these political matters. As a matter of fact, I have not mentioned any editor by name, and she has decided herself that the shoe fits.
As a matter of fact, I had first written "anti-Jewish", and when Nisdani asked me to strike that, I did so, precisely because I meant the political side of things and "anti-Jewish" has another connotation than the one I had in mind. When I later had time for further consideration, I added "/Israeli", to clarify that I meant the political issue only. I am surprised that Huldra has ignored that clarification of mine, and is using the old version as an excuse to open this WP:AE post. I think that my subsequent commentaries on the talkpage in that section make it sufficiently clear that I had only the political issue in mind, nothing more. Whether Huldra has misread om good faith, is anybody's guess, although I think that in view of the WP:ANI thread just a few days ago in which I showed her to be hiding POV edits under misleading edit summaries, there is place for doubt in this regard. All cries here and elsewhere as though I called somebody anti-Semitic, are baseless and obvious attempts by the usual editors at discrediting me. Debresser (talk) 01:23, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Sandstein I struck out "anti-Jewish, as soon as Nishidani pointed out to me the problem with that term. How many more times do I have to say that? I changed it to "anti-Jewish/Israeli", because in the framework of the political situation in the Israel-Palestine area, the problem is between the Jewish Israelis and the Arab Palestinians. In other words, I made it unequivocally clear that I was referring to the political issue only. See also admin GoldenRing's comment to your post. Debresser (talk) 14:28, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@All Regarding my edit with the edit summary "The source does not say "no longer", just states a different opinion." All editors who are crying to high heavens how this was a mistake, conveniently ignore that I was the first to acknowledge the mistake in my following edit: More true. So let's simply ignore all those who raise that issue (like Nishidani and Johnuniq). Debresser (talk) 14:32, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
this basically amounts to "I would have no problem with that but I can only reach consensus with people who are pro-Jewish"—after that stunning admission, I think a significant TBAN would be appropriate, as it pretty clearly indicates an unwillingness to collaborate with editors who he perceives have a different POV from his own, the only "acceptable" POV. I would at least want to see a statement from the editor acknowledging that the he understands why this is a problem, and a commitment to sincerely engage the consensus process with all editors and not canvas for editors with a particular POV. (Posting to Wikiprojects seeking expertise is OK, but I don't think posting to Wikiprojects looking for editors with a particular POV is ok.) Seraphim System(talk)01:54, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
GoldenRing asked me to strike the above statement and I agreed. I should not have used quotes as this can easily be misinterpreted by those quickly scanning the page (even though I qualified it with "this basically amounts to"). However, I disagree that this casts the evidence in the worst possibly light. In my opinion, the language I used was more favorable then the language used by the editor ("anti-jewish") and I used quotations only as a convenience to summarize my understanding of the evidence - but the best thing would be to let the editors words speak for themselves.
It would have been better to say that my understanding of the evidence taken as a whole is that Debresser's approach to this was not conducive to collaborative editing. I also very much do not think that striking out anti-Jewish and replacing it with anti-Jewish/Israeli was helpful, since the content dispute is about what language to adopt for a periodization question, adding anti-Israeli here could be interpreted as an escalation. I don't believe the editor was unaware of how this was received, because this was the response when it was brought to his attention: [1]. I don't really find the explanation that "POV considerations" are excluded from WP:NPA acceptable. I will add that these disputes should be resolved based on current academic sources, and not religious "truth" or religious literary traditions.
I would note that AGF runs both ways. As Debresser notes here [2] Hellenistic Period covers a shorter period, and allows for more precision, and it is also used more by academic sources. This comment POV attempts of editors to remove all mention of things Jewish from articles as much as possible escalated to an out right personal attack ("anti-jewish") for editors who are trying to introduce academic precision and update articles to reflect current scholarship. I disagree with characterizations that this is a "minor" issue. There are significant advantages to being as precise about dating as we can be [3]. Representing a religious/nationalist POV is not a factor that should be given equal weight in these discussions, and to accuse those who disagree of being anti-Jewish/Israeli is way over the line. It would not be tolerated in any other topic area (including Turkish history, Ottoman history, Chinese history, American history...) To me, this incident is part of a pattern that is not conducive to improving the encyclopedia based on academic sources, that accurately summarize the available, current scholarship for readers, students, professors and others who make use of this encyclopedia. It certainly does not help to assume that editors trying to make this improvements are motivated by nefarious intentions. Seraphim System(talk)22:49, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@No More Mr Nice Guy: I think this is an important point so I want to respond to it. I reviewed both of the sources Huldra used in her copyedit. The NY Times source says ritual baths were found in private dwellings, but it does not identify a source for this statement. More importantly, it contradicts the Haaretz source, which identifies the director of the dig (Debbi Sklar-Parnas) as the source for the statement that no ritual baths were found. This pretty clearly shows the problems that arise when non-academic sources are cherry-picked for statements that do no clearly identify a source. I would also note that this "The main indication that the settlement was a Jewish one is the assemblage of stone vessels found there. Such vessels, for food storage and serving, were only used by Jews because they were believed not to transmit impurity. Archaeologists believe stone basins discovered at the site were used to hold ashes from the destroyed Temple" is a direct copy/paste from the article, and Huldra was correct to remove it (and she should have removed the entire thing, not only that one sentence.) Seraphim System(talk)01:07, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@No More Mr Nice Guy: I'm not sure what those edits are supposed to show, other then an unwillingness to respond productively to an issue that you raised about another editor. It seems WP:BATTLEGROUND to dig up ancient edits which are not even peripherally related to what is being discussed here. What exactly are edits adding Sabra and Shatila to the lede of Ariel Sharon, or a long list of references in a discussion about eunuch slave trade on the Harem article supposed to show? The slave trade was kept in the article by Eperoton after I stopped working on the article, btw. I suppose you think it's somehow significant that I added a quote about Zionism from Mein Kampf to an article about Zionism. I didn't really fight over this quote, but when I added it, I didn't even know what WP:OR was, El_C told me, and it was removed for WP:OR not for any nefarious reason that your post strongly implies (and somehow connecting it to a post about Sabra and Shatilla, which the MacBride Commission said was genocide, makes it difficult to extract anything of significance from the random diffs you just posted)- I'm still not 100% sure it is OR - I think inferences can be drawn from it without secondary source analysis, but I didn't really go looking for secondary sources to try to add it back in, and it still isn't very high on my to do list. I still think the claim that Eichmann was a "major organiser" of the Holocaust needs a citation, and I have since found citations for this in law review articles. This seems like an obvious point, but sometimes we don't remember that it was disputed at the time. Eichmann, compared to others who were punished much more lightly then he was, does not really stand out - especially as some of those people (there were many) were found guilty of directly committing significant atrocities, but were punished very leniently. Hannah Arendt goes through a lot of them, and instead of bludgeoning others will ill-informed accusations, I would suggest reading her work carefully and making up your own mind. But these discussions would be more suitable for article talk pages (that is, if they weren't ancient and stale) Seraphim System(talk)02:59, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Another note about the Eichmann article, I made exactly two adds: The first was to make sure that Rafi Eitan's own recent public comments about Mengele/Eichmann were represented in the section about Eichmann's capture, and the second was to add the following quote from Arendt: "this case was built on what the Jews had suffered, not on what Eichmann had done." When I added the citation needed tag, I was still completely new and did not really know about FA criteria. I was satisfied with resolving this by adding the quote from Arendt, because I think her view is significant enough that it should be (briefly) represented in the article. So, again, I don't really appreciate the sarcastic comment about WP:RS, I think my edits did improve the articles I was working on. Maybe we can get back on track with the current discussion now? Seraphim System(talk)03:51, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@SpacemanSpiff: I think the idea of an Aspersions restriction is not a bad one, as so many discussions in this area do seem to focus more on the alleged POV of an editor, then the content of the edits or WP:RS. But there are a few problems - how would it be enforced? Tying it to allegations of Nationality would not seem to address the particular problems in this area where so many of the aspersions are worded as "anti-Jewish" or "anti-Zionist" or "anti-Israel" — I'm not sure if this is different from the Pakistan/India area, but in ARBPIA we don't really see aspersions about actual nationality as often as we see aspersions about alleged political or ideological POV (anti-Zionist, anti-Jewish, anti-Israel) — calling someone "anti-Jewish/Israeli" is not a statement about their nationality. This would really have to be specific to the problems in this area, which may not be identical to problems in other area ("Indian nationalist POV" etc.) It would be like, if one side were saying "You are an Indian nationalist" and the other was saying "You are anti-Indian nationalist" — if this proposal isn't worded precisely, it would go from being potentially beneficial to an absolute disaster that could exacerbate systemic bias in the area over a semantics issue - for example most Wikipedia editors are male, most are from Christian-majority countries, most are English speakers - so a Muslim woman's POV, for example, would be a net benefit to Wikipedia, because this group is severely underrepresented. In the India/Pakistan section, our own figures show participation is quite healthy due to the English language education in those countries. But this is not the case most Muslim majority countries, so we have to consider that those who are trying to improve content related to Palestine are usually engaged in a good faith effort to balance the encyclopedia. I would recommend broader discussion about the specifics before something like this is implemented, and not simply leaving the implementation open to interpretation. Seraphim System(talk)04:51, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Statement by Power~enwiki
Regarding the specific content dispute: I'm not sure that this neighborhood should be portrayed as having an independent history from East Jerusalem. Regarding the editors involved; they might all need a topic-ban based on the continuing hostility at Talk:Shuafat. Power~enwiki (talk) 02:33, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
That a user takes a request to strike a baseless personal attack, that one is antisemitic (and yes Debresser that is generally taken as a synonym of anti-Jewish) to continue with another personal attack that they are anti-Jewish and anti-Israel, is somewhat bizarre. That this very user has repeatedly complained about personal attacks and civility, including recently at this very board, in which he said of Nishidani that he has a habit of putting down his fellow editors, making denigrating comments about them, makes that a rather blatant example of cognitive dissonance. Debresser repeatedly denigrates other editors, and he routinely fails to abide by the basic principle of WP:NPA that one comments on content, not on the contributors, and he does this on talk pages and it disrupts good faith editing. Debresser has requested others be banned for much less blatant personal attacks than calling one an antisemite, what's good for the goose ... nableezy - 04:18, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
(1) I started to work on the article on Shuafat. Debresser immediately took my presence there as evidence I was angling to clash with him. Apart from the needless WP:AGF violation imputing to me that I was seeking a pretext to attack him, the assertion is demonstrably counterfactual. Since 2008, I have edited the Shuafat page 23 times whereas Debresser has made just 6 edits since May 2016. Likewise I have made 67 edits to the talk page (42.14% of the total) and Debresser only appeared there after I advanced a proposal. If one must make an inference it would be that, upset by my return, Debresser followed me to that page and sought a confrontation, accusing me of seeking one. He repeats this in his first reply above, accusing me of doing what I think he did, 'escalating' things. Indeed.
(2)I went to the Archaeology of Israel page. There was an old problem there. 2 editors, myself and User:Poliocretes were in favour of mentioning a third of the artifacts dug up in that field annually are Christian. Debresser alone has reverted all efforts to add the item. To resolve this old problem, I set up an RfC for external comment. I noted – it is verifiable on the talk page – that despite 2 editors being in favour and only Debresser opposed – he kept reverting it off the page. Hence my request for external imput. Debresser’s reaction was to personalize this,also here andhere by citing a statement regarding the edit on this by User:GoldenRing at AE which earned me a suspension, as if that remark evened opinion to 2/2. I put up an RfC to resolve a conflict, and Debresser kept on referring to that AE suspension, as if it invalidated my proposal, and the RfC.
(3) Soon after, as I tried to keep the argument focused, Debresser expressed diffidence about my whole outlook as an editor by insinuating I and the other editor were anti-semitic. That is one strong implication of referring to an 'anti-Jewish camp' on that page. It cannot refer to anyone else.
This was duly retractedat my request, signifying D realized it was inappropriate. A day later however, disconcertingly, he retracted his retraction here andfinissed it with a variation adding anti-Israeli as a further innuendo. For the record the article on Antisemitism uses the word ‘anti-Jewish’ as synonymous with anti-semitic.
To sum up, Debresser, challenging my return, followed me to Shuafat and falsified the source I used while messing up the text and (2) started baiting me about my putative 'anti-Jewish' attitude, admitted it should be retracted, then reinserted the offending words, and added 'anti-israel' as well, and refused to budge on the issue when asked to cancel the offensive language. It is, in both cases I believe, evidence of the WP:IDIDNOTHEARTHAT approach identified by Lord Roem a year ago. Nishidani (talk) 09:52, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
'anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist and anti-Israeli are regularly conflated by both sides of the Arab-Israeli dispute.
@GoldenRing.This is wildly inaccurate. You are saying those who are critical of Israel's policies regarding Palestinians confuse 'anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist, and anti-israeli'. That is not their language at all. To the contrary serious critics are pertinaciously exact in distinguishing Jews, Zionism, and Israel, whereas their opponents conflate them.
@Sandstein. I have difficulty in seeing how a denial a given source has two words, when anyone clicking on the page can see that the source repeats those two words twice, is a content dispute. Debresser can dispute the content of the article. Disputing the known, independently verifiably content of the source page is not a content dispute. It is falsifying the evidence. In the old days, editors were banned at sight for doing that.Nishidani (talk) 12:50, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
User:Icewhiz. Please focus. The material you cited confirms that conflating 'anti Jewish', 'Anti-Zionist' and 'anti-Israel' is what one side, pro-Israeli, does. GoldenRing was making a different claim, that both sides do this. As all close readers of the topic know, this is not correct. It is a highly political and rhetorical stratagem to conflate criticism of Israeli policies (not Israel) with being anti-Jewish and/or anti-Israeli and/or even anti-Zionist (I can name off the cuff many Jewish Zionists who are critical of those policies. Please don't add to the initial confusion.Nishidani (talk) 14:29, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
NMMGG. Your ideas about anti-Zionism don't jell with the evidence at Anti-Zionism or better still Timeline of anti-Zionism. It has a long and very intricate history within modern Jewish thought, and violently 'dismantling' Israel has nothing to do with its maincurrents. Just to clarify since there's a lot of confusion around here on terminology.Nishidani (talk) 19:58, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
As to a bunch of editors trying to disconnect 'ancient Jewish heritage from today's Jews', don't blame editors for trying to keep Wikipedia updated on contemporary scholarship, in Israel or elsewhere, by Jewish and non-Jewish scholars. No one I know here who might be put in that dock cites anything but the technical literature, which, unfortunately is generally ignored in the public sphere, and therefore, to those unfamiliar with, can seem disconcerting.Nishidani (talk) 20:08, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
NMMGG. Since you apparently (a) have dozens of examples of how a 'group' of editors secretly remove and meddle with texts (suddenly this secret is revealed) (b) and you anticipate that your interpretation of what I might say regarding any one example will take it as mere 'spin', it is pointless answering, except in these terms: if you look at the last thousand edits of any of that 'group', you will find an extremely high percentage of the edits are reffed and linked to academic publications. If you look at what other editors -the revert and tweak school- are doing, this use of high RS plummets. But this is wasting AE time. I have stated my views sufficiently.Nishidani (talk) 21:34, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Statement by Johnuniq
I confirmed that Nishidani's claim of "source falsification" is correct. Debresser changed the meaning of Nishidani's edit five minutes after Nishidani made it, using edit summary 'The source does not say "no longer", just states a different opinion'. The source ([5]) uses "no longer" twice in the first paragraph, and it unequivocally sums up current knowledge, overturning an earlier finding from 1993 that was based on "general information". Describing that merely as a "different opinion" is highly misleading, and summarizing the source as "Others do not consider" falsifies what the source said. Standard procedure would be for Debresser to ask at WP:RSN about the reliablity of the source, a scholarly overview published in 2013 by Brill Publishers and written by Professor Rachel Hachlili from the Zinman Institute of Archaeology at the University of Haifa. Moreover, Talk:Shuafat#False edit summary shows unacceptable aggression from Debresser. Johnuniq (talk) 11:28, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
GoldenRing, you couldn't be more wrong if you tried. Only one "side" of the dispute regularly conflates criticism of Israel or its policies or actions with antisemitism. If you don't believe "anti-Jewish" is the same as antisemitic, I recommend you read an encyclopedia article about antisemitism or consult a dictionary. — Malik ShabazzTalk/Stalk13:16, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Statement by Kingsindian
I think Debresser did not mean to accuse Nishidani or Huldra of anti-Semitism, and most likely referred to a political POV. But their choice of words was bad and clumsy, and they should have struck it out when asked. I think Debresser doesn't realize even now that their usage was inflammatory. It might be simply be a language issue.
Leaving aside anti-Semitism issue, the charges about personal attacks are correct. As I said in the last AE request, some amount of heat is to be expected in this area (and other political areas). The questions which should be asked are the following. Does the overall discussion concentrate on the content? Are the participants trying to argue in good faith, and are amenable to compromise? I believe this is true (this was true of the last request as well, but the admins thought otherwise). This matter should simply not have escalated this far.
I don't think an indefinite ban would be proportionate to the offence. Something milder should be pursued first.
Finally, a word about the "source misrepresentation" issue. Debresser is clearly wrong in their edit summary. The source clearly uses the words; Debresser either didn't read carefully or didn't care, and didn't accept their error. They, however, did edit their own text in the article to mitigate some of the error (which is still not enough) Anyone can make a mistake, but one hopes that they accept it if it is pointed out. Kingsindian♝♚13:57, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Conflation of anti-Israel or anti-zionism with anti-semitism is a widely asserted claim. Various books (e.g. [6][7][8][9]), and even the president of France today - Macron: Anti-Zionism Is a Reinvented Form of anti-Semitism, Jule 16 2017. Conflating the two is a legitimate political viewpoint. The specific content dispute regarded redacting ancient Jewish (more than 2,000 years ago) history of a modern location in the land of Israel - which would be hard to label as anti-Israel or anti-Zionist as Israel did not exist back then. It seems Debresser's use of anti-Jewish was intended to label this action of redacting ancient Jewish history (which was not Zionist or Israeli) - an action not limited to the Shuafat article.Icewhiz (talk) 13:53, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
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It is totally scurrilous to equate criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. The main difficulty here is that there is no evidence at all that the editors in question are anti-Jewish. More broadly, the equation is illegitimate insofar as it suggests that Jews cannot be critical of Israel (when in fact many Israeli Jews are very critical of their own country/government). In any event, this way of viewing/treating other editors is poisonous and completely unhelpful in this topic area. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 16:17, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
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Since making pronouncements ex cathedra seems to be the order of the day, I'll make a few of my own for the consideration of the assembled AE admins.
"Anti-Jewish", "antisemitic", "anti-Israel", and "anti-Zionist" are not all exact cognates. Of them, "anti-Jewish" and "antisemitic" are equivalent, and "ant-Zionist" and "anti-Israel" are very close in meaning, but not exactly the same. It is true that many who oppose Israel do so from antisemitic motivations, but one can oppose the policies of that state, or even, in extremis, its very existence, without being anti-Jewish or antisemitic. In the real world, though, given the close correlation between them, it's no wonder that "one side of the debate" would see them as equivalent.
All of which is perhaps interesting, but also probably irrelevant. Debresser used "anti-Jewish" (meaning antisemitic), and struck it out, only to return it connected to "anti-Israel". Even if one wishes to be tolerant of the strong feelings in this area and issue a pass for "anti-Israel", "anti-Jewish" (antisemitic) was never permanently struck out. Since that is the case, Debresser is guilty of a personal attack in calling another editor a racist without evidence of such.
In the examination of the various words involved, one should not lose sight of the fact that "anti-Jewish" remained on the table, and was apparently a deliberate choice, as it was returned after having been struck out. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:47, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
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First of all, "anti-Zionism" is not "criticism of the Israeli government", it is a movement to have Israel dismantled, violently. Very few Jews support it and many Jews and non-Jews alike find it to be based on antisemitism or antisemitic in practice. Let's try not to obfuscate that point.
Second, what Debresser was probably trying to say here is that there's a group of editors who methodically attempt to disconnect ancient Jewish heritage from today's Jews. They try to dilute ancient Jewish connections to the Land of Israel, and the connection between today's Jews and ancient Jews. I can easily support this with diffs if anyone cares (I know. Nobody does). No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 18:30, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Nishidani, that self-serving description does not jive with the actual practice of the aforementioned group. Let me give you an example (just one out of literally dozens I can provide) that's relevant to this case. In the Shuafat article we're discussing, Huldra, the editor who submitted this AE, made this edit with a "ce" edit summary (ie, it's just a copyedit). She moved two large chunks of text, while surreptitiously removing "Archaeologists believe stone basins discovered at the site were used to hold ashes from the destroyed Temple" and adding "However, no remains of ritual baths were discovered, therefor doubts remains about weather the inhabitants were Jews. The baths were probably used by the Romans". Feel free to explain how this is "trying to keep Wikipedia updated on contemporary scholarship". I look forward to seeing how you spin this. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 21:20, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Nishidani, you made a claim. I posted proof that your claim is self-serving falsehood. You decline to refute my proof. I'll call that case closed. By the way, the above is just something I happened upon while looking at the history of the article this AE refers to. It's quite easy to show much worse abuse of academic sources. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 23:41, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
@Seraphim System, thanks for the ping. It reminded me I wanted to address your "a pattern that is not conducive to improving the encyclopedia based on academic sources" above with these few examples of your edits (just the tip of the iceberg): [10][11][12][13]. That's some high quality improvement of the encyclopedia using academic sources right there. No More Mr Nice Guy (talk) 01:55, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
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I followed the link provided by Debresser, and the full statement (after revision) was: ...but only if there would be some more input from editors who are not necessarily in the anti-Jewish/Israeli camp. That's not only accusing fellow contributors of being anti-semites, but also of belonging to a "camp" of such problematic editors. Debresser's explanations on this thread have not been satisfactory, and I would support AE sanctions in this case. K.e.coffman (talk) 23:27, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Statement by (username)
Result concerning Debresser
This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the sections above.
The request is actionable. In calling another editor "anti-Jewish", which means the same as "anti-semitic", Debresser has personally attacked them, without providing, even when challenged here, appropriate evidence for such a charge. In addition, by insisting here that they meant to accuse the other editor of a political bias against Israel (for which they also do not provide evidence), they conflate opposition to Israel and opposition to Jews. Editors must comment on content, not on the contributor (WP:NPA). Such conduct is not acceptable, particular in this sensitive topic area. Considering Debresser's long list of blocks in this topic area, and a previous topic ban in July 2016, I intend to impose an indefinite topic ban. - As to the "source falsification" issue, the discussion at Talk:Shuafat#False edit summary indicates that this is probably more of a content dispute than a conduct issue, but there also Debresser uses a dismissive, aggressive tone ("be quiet for a while!"), which is also entirely inappropriate for a collegial, collaborative scholarly project such as ours. Sandstein 12:05, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'm more inclined to believe Debresser's explanation - anti-Jewish, anti-Zionist and anti-Israeli are regularly conflated by both sides of the Arab-Israeli dispute. It does still represent a beach of NPA - the comment is on editors and not on edits - but I don't think it necessarily amounts to the same as "anti-semitic". I'm still thinking about what is an appropriate response; the history is long, but the offense, to me, seems relatively minor. GoldenRing (talk) 12:26, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I would also remind editors commenting here that they are expected to assume good faith and edit collaboratively and constructively, even at AE. Recasting the evidence in your own words with the worst possible interpretation is a transparent assumption of bad faith and does not help your cause. GoldenRing (talk) 16:04, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I'm concerned by the fact that Debresser wrote "All I did was notice, that her stance on the Israeli-Palestine conflict is such which shows her to be on the Palestine side of these political matters" as an explanation for calling an editor "anti-Jewish/Israel", as if this were a zero-sum game between two sharply delineated parties. Such black-and-white thinking (no matter which side is black) is not only far from a useful characterisation of the conflict, it also makes it very hard to edit cooperatively with editors who do not share his position exactly. For me, this suggest a (temporary) topic ban. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 20:02, 16 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think this is actionable. While this topic area is rife with poor behavior on all sides (which Debresser is not innocent of), I'm inclined to believe the statement that Jew, Zionist and Israeli are often conflated. It is a personal attack, for sure, but I don't think an NPA block is warranted. This topic area is an inherently polarizing one, and accusing somebody of being against one partisan side is poor behavior, but hardly an uncommon offense in these parts. If we sanction for this case, we should also sanction the majority of contributors to the topic area for making similar accusations at one point of another. The WordsmithTalk to me03:35, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
We have an "casting aspersions" restriction around the ethnicity/nationality of editors, including using their own self-declared status in arguments around the Kashmir conflict, enacted here after discussion -- Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive196#TripWire. Something like that could be implemented here too. I believe it's helped in that area and could be beneficial here too. In this particular case I share Stephan Schulz' opinion. —SpacemanSpiff03:54, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Sandstein. This is actionable. It is more than reasonable to assume (given editing history) that Debresser understands the whole meaning of the term "anti-Jewish". You would have to be completely ignorant of 20th century history to not understand it. Accusing someone of being anti-Semitic (which is an equivalent term) without evidence, is a bright line, even in this disputed territory. Given the opportunity to strike it, they did at first, then ante'd up, parsing slightly, but confirming their original comment was fully intended. I think an indefinite topic ban is appropriate. Per some other comments, if this sort of comment hasn't been properly policed in the past, it is high time it was. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 08:10, 17 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]
