Talk:List of cities in Israel

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Contents 1 Checking the list 2 Ethnicity? 3 This list is outdated, as is the one at he.wikipedia 4 Ramallah?! 5 Added Arabic names 6 Israel template

[edit] Checking the list

A serious extension, as well as some careful spell checking, are in order. (Elzamam, 25/05/03)

Today this list matches the corresponding list in the Hebrew Wikipedia, with two exceptions. First, understandably the Jewish populated places in the West Bank that are cities by Israeli standards (Maale Adumim, Betar Illit, and Ariel) are in a separate list. Second, although Caesarea is a historic Roman city, I suspect it's not currently considered a city. --Hoziron 04:17, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm converting the text form of the list to tabular form, so that it will be easier for me to add "Gazeteer" equivalents of the cities' names. Also, this will make it more obvious where Arabic equivalents are missing, so that they can be filled in. I've already done the top two regions (Northern & Haifa), will churn this out as my insomnia dictates ;) I'm using [Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names] as a source for Gazeteers' Forms; all of the "common" forms are listed there also, in fact many common forms appear! Suggestions are requested for other sources... --D'n 01:36 22-November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ethnicity?

OK, damage restored, and all the tabling is done. What do people think about adding a 5th column, "Ethnicity"? Most cities would be "Jewish"; while Taybe and Qalansawe (for instance) would be Arab; Rahat Bedouin; and Jerusalem and Lod would be Mixed. D'n 05:39, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• D'n: While the notion may appeal to you, it's nevertheless a very bad idea. You will open up a "can of worms" that will be too problematic. How and when will the "ethnicities" end, what criteria to use, are just some of the major problems. Many people will object, as you can see for yourself in the current UNANIMOUS Vote for Deletion (cfd) for Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2005 December 4#Category:Cities with significant Arab Israeli populations. Otherwise, the rest of your organizational and technical work has been excellent. IZAK 06:14, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• In the past I might have thought it worth looking into, but apparently this is a very sensitive area and I don't want to get into a huge minefield. However, I can see some benefits in a tabular format for linguistic purposes, where each entry has the common English name, the CBS transliteration, the locally-preferred transliteration, the English Biblical name, the modern Hebrew name, the Biblical Hebrew name, the Israeli Arabic name, and the Palestinian Arabic name (because of the conventions still used by Palestinian refugees). - Gilgamesh 09:30, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

• • I had an idea that something like this would fall out, which is why I floated the idea here. OK, advice taken D'n 22:24, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] This list is outdated, as is the one at he.wikipedia

Check nl.wikipedia for later developements in Israeli local state. There 71 cities now (up from 70), after two were added, and two were combined (another one was combined with a local council). I have no clue who wrote the Dutch article ;-) gidonb 09:35, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Note, however, that the German Wikipedia has other information. It claims Elad and Mevasseret are cities. gidonb 09:56, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm pretty tired now and with a temperature, won't check the entire list for each city, but I saw two changes in the NL article - Daliyat Al-Karmel is supposedly now a city called Daliyat Al-Karmel-Isfiya, and there's another 'union' there (Baka-Jat). I haven't heard about these at all, but they don't seem too likely. But I also don't think the NL writer was just writing at random. Does anyone have evidence that the NL version is correct? Also, El'ad and Mevaseret are definitely not cities unless they were given such a status around 2005. It's possible with Mevaseret, but El'ad seems quite unlikely. -- Ynhockey 15:18, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Ramallah?!

The list includes Ramallah!! which is not a city in israel (Ramla is), ramallah is a city in the west bank! am i missing something?--Mayz 01:51, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

No you're not missing anything, I have no idea who added Ramallah to the list but I'm removing it of course. -- Y Ynhockey || Talk Y 08:48, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Added Arabic names

Added Arabic names of Tira, Yafa, Eylat, Karmel.. (eom). 19:18, 28 January 2006 User:70.225.174.161 IP and timestamp added by gidonb

Thank you! That is a very useful addition to this page! gidonb 16:18, 29 January 2006 (UTC)

I filled in most of the blank slots in the Arabic names colomn. It is not easy to supply an agreed Arabic name for a city in Israel, since the Israeli authorities usually do not supply an official Arabic spelling, and even when they do it is often unaccepted by the Arab population. Jerusalem is the classic example for that. Several things should be pointed out - this list is useless when trying to navigate within Israel. Road signs usually trancribe the Hebrew name using special characters for non-Arabic sounds, a trend which is very uncommon in Arabic press. Hebrew names are sometimes Arabized, especially if the name can be translated, or if it resembles an Arab name or Arabic words. Jewish cities built after 1948 where an Arab village or city previously stood, are sometimes called by their Hebrew name or by their Arabized Hebrew name, and sometimes by their former Arabic name. An example to that is عسقلان/المجدل for Ashkelon. In all cases I used the most widespread forms. I brought two forms if they are both widespread, and I added a name in brackets if it is not widespread, but still worth while mentioning. Two final points - تل الربيع is a somewhat strange translation for the name Tel Aviv, but I don't think it is common enough to populate this table. ج and غ are both used to transcribe the /g/ sound in Hebrew names. This can be a bit tricky because in Arab cities' names they have different values (/γ/ vs. /dzh/). Drork 10:49, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Israel template

I think the State of Israel navigation box should be removed. While it's relevant to the list, I think it interferes with its flow and formatting more than it helps. It also makes it impossible to add more fields, which could be useful (like year when city status was granted or whatever). -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 12:30, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree - will do now Flymeoutofhere 14:58, 4 April 2007 (UTC)