Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Maavak Sozialisti

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was Keep. Cúchullain t/c 04:38, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Socialist Struggle

Maavak Sozialisti (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) – (View log)

Seems to be a nonnotable organisation TewfikTalk 23:30, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Keep Tewfik moved the article from Maavak Sozialisti minutes before nominating it for deletion. I have moved the article back to its original location. Maavak Sozialistit is the largest, most active and most notable Trotskyist organization in Israel. There are sufficient references from Israeli RS such as Haaretz and walla and other sources to establish notability: e.g. [1] [2], in addition there are many references to them (including criticism) from sites covering the left internationally ابو علي (Abu Ali) 17:48, 1 April 2007 (UTC)
    • I moved it because this is English Wikipedia, and that is the English name given on their website. I then nominated it because I couldn't find notable references for either name. Is there a reason that you moved it back to a Hebrew transliteration? TewfikTalk 03:00, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
    • I don't know which name it is known by, but convention usually uses the name (transliterated, translated, or otherwise) provided by the organisation, in this case "Socialist Struggle". The transliterated maavak sozialisti would be a redirect, and there would be no problems. TewfikTalk 17:14, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
      • On their website, they state that "Ma`avak Sotsyalisti is an organization of workers, unemployed, students, youth and pensioners. . . Ma`avak Sotsyalisti is part of the Committee for a Workers' International (CWI)", and in the leaflets and press statements on the site they regularly refer to themselves as Maavak Sozialisti, in a variety of transliterations. So this IS "the name provided by the organisation", and by which they usually refer to themselves. So it is clearly the name we should use. RolandR 17:59, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
    • Their logo in the upper left of all of their pages reads "Socialist Struggle", the same logo on the He version reads מאבק סוציאליסטי and in Ar اشتراكي. This isn't really relevant here though, I was only responding to Abu ali's comments on my actions. If notability is established, we can discuss the proper name on the article's Talk. Cheers, TewfikTalk 18:28, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
      • I agree that we should focus on notability here. Now Tewfiq, could you tell me whether this article [3] ] from Haaretz, which interviews their leader is sufficient to establish notability in your opinion. Thanks ابو علي (Abu Ali) 18:36, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
    • Re: your message, I thought that I had left word on all the proper places that by notability I meant WP:ORG. Just in case I wasn't clear, there need to be multiple nontrivial sources. The Haaretz piece you found is a good sign, but you'll need at least one more nontrivial source. Look at this as an opportunity to improve the article. TewfikTalk 02:03, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
      • Well we now have the Walla source as well as the Haarezt interview. So this does qualify as multiple sources. And we can find more (for instance they were on Israeli TV news in February). I agree that the article needs improving, but I don't want to put too much work in if the article will be deleted anyway. ابو علي (Abu Ali) 08:05, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep Maavak Sozialisti is one of several small but active anti-Zionist socialist groups in Israel, all of which should have their own article. The article requires more work, but should remain as a stub and be improved. RolandR 00:07, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment my concern is that the only sourcing I saw are references to its own site or its parent organisation Committee for a Workers' International (CWI). Abu ali now included this Hebrew language article which mentions them exactly once in 11 paragraphs: The initiative was joined by the life sciences student union, activists from the left wing group "Socialist Struggle", and residents of Rehovot. At the moment, they are only borderline in terms of establishing notability. TewfikTalk 03:12, 29 March 2007 (UTC)


Fair point. Googling "Maavak Sozialisti gives 2600 matches [4] in English and 800 in Hebrew [5] This in itself does not show notability, but these search results probably contain enough WP:RS to establish notability. For instance [6] contains an article in Haaretz which interviews the editor of Maavak Sozialisti's newspaper about the organisation. I will try to go though some of the other results. But as my hebrew is very basic, some help from fluent Hebrew speakers would be useful. Any volunteers? ابو علي (Abu Ali) 08:08, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
Yes, of course. Not today, but by the weekend I will have a proper look at these. RolandR 10:17, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
Well, I don't know how you found 800 references in Hebrew Google, Abu Ali. I tried several times, and found only 60 [7]. Following your link, there are 59. Most of these are probably not accepted as reliable sources -- their own website, various blogs, Hebrew Wikipedia (which has no other sources). There is a polemic between a supporter and an opponent of the group at the Israeli left discussion board HaGad HaSmalit (The Left Bank)[8]; but I don't really want to translate this. The group is also discussed briefly, alongside Balad, Hadash, Meretz and others in the same site's listing of left parties in Israel [9]. MSN News mentions that they work together with Hadash, the Women's Coalition and others in the new Progressive Socialist Unity group within the Labour Party. [10] This seems a bit confused, since Hadash is obviously not inside the Labour Party; but that's what the site says. There is more about the PSU group on the Labour Party website at [11]. This does not mention Maavak Sozialisti, though since they are probably operating as entrists within the party that is not really surprising. Most of the other references are listings, or contributions in the name of Maavak Sozialisti to online discussions and forums. There is also an article in Arabic on the site of the Eqraa Association [12]; you will have to read that and assess it for yourself.
Although not a huge amount of material, it seems to me enough to establish that the group exists, is active, and is known in Israel. Surely this should be enough to establish notability? RolandR 15:45, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Thanks! The reason you only got 59 sources is that you searched www.google.com whereas I searched in www.google.co.il. If you click on this link [13] you should get my results. The Eqraa article is about a demonstration on the Har Hozvim campus in the Hebrew University in Jerusalem which Maavak Sozialisti participated two years ago... ابو علي (Abu Ali) 16:04, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Clicking on your new link still gives only 62 results. And they are from Google.co.il, not Google.com or Google.co.uk (my default). Even if I go directly to Google.co.il, and type in "מאבק סוציאליסטי", I only get 62. Does Google filter results according to IP location?
The University campus is at Mount Scopus; usual transcription into English Har Ha-Tzofim. "Har Hozvim" is clearly the result of transcribing into English an Arabic transcription of a Hebrew original. I've seen some very odd names of Israeli places and people after that process! RolandR 17:41, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
hmm, make sure you have "Search for pages written in any language" selected in google preferences. ابو علي (Abu Ali) 21:57, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
Yes I do. This is the results page for Google.co.uk: [14] and for Google.co.il [15]. Are you sure you searched for "מאבק סוציאליסטי", with quotation marks, and not מאבק סוציאליסטי, which will find all documents with both words, though not necessarily as a phrase? Though, as I said, even clicking on your link only gives me 62 documents. Maybe someone else can try, and see what they get. (I just tried without the quotes, and got 14,000 hits, so that's obviously not the problem). RolandR 23:12, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
So with all the Googling, were you able to find a second nontrivial source? It seems that a number of CWI and Socialist Party sites have been added, but there is still only the one Hebrew article and the security Guard blurb with the one line mention. TewfikTalk 04:56, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
Yes, the Haaretz interview [16] qualifies as a second non trivial source. As you know hebrew, perhaps you can translate the relevant paragraphs for us. ابو علي (Abu Ali) 06:28, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Keep There seems to be enough information to write an article. In addition to the ones listed, the illustration refers to an Israeli television broadcast, and it should be possible to give a more specific reference. If it is the subject of part of a national TV broadcast and also an unrelated newspaper, it meets the technical requirements I do not see how WP can fairly decide on the significance of political parties-- anymore than it can on religions an nationalist movements. The only practice free of POV is to give an article for any such organization possessing a verifiable identity and some source of information. It can generally be presumed that arguments about the N of the subject are o some extent arguments about the politics (or religion or whatever involved. We can't arbitrate that sort of question. if it meets the technical requirements for sourcing, that is sufficient. The number of ghits is irrelevant for these situations. DGG 23:35, 30 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Comment The TV screen shot is not a source, since we have no way of knowing what is actually in it or whether even if there were Maavak people present, they were actually mentioned. A transcript of the report would be far more useful. The technical requirements call for at least two non-trivial independent sources. So far there is one nontrivial and one "trivial" independent source, respectively. TewfikTalk 04:59, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
Well we can assume that Maavak Sozialisti Members were present as some of the people in the demonstration are wearing red shirts with which say Maavak Sozialisti on them [17]. Anyway by my arithmetic we have more than one source: [18] [19] [20]. There is other Hebrew stuff which I have not had time to decipher: [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] And this does not include many English language refs, including articles from various left wing organisations accusing Maavak Sozialisti of "capitulating to Zionism" ابو علي (Abu Ali) 06:44, 2 April 2007 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.