Talk:Azmi Bishara

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography. For more information, visit the project page.
Biography Portal
Start This article has been rated as start-Class on the project's quality scale. [FAQ]
This article is supported by the Politics and government work group.
Israel Portal
Azmi Bishara is part of WikiProject Israel, an attempt to build a comprehensive guide to Israel on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, visit the project page where you can join the project and/or contribute to the discussion. This template adds articles to Category:WikiProject Israel articles.
Project Israel To Do (Drop-Down Menu):
Start This article has been rated as start-Class on the quality scale.
Mid This article has been rated as mid-importance on the importance scale.
Azmi Bishara is part of WikiProject Palestine - a team effort dedicated to building and maintaining comprehensive, informative, balanced articles related to Palestine on Wikipedia. Join us by visiting the project page where you can add your name to the list of members and contribute to the discussion. This template adds articles to Category:WikiProject Palestine articles.
NB: Assessment ratings and other indicators given below are used by the Project in prioritizing and managing its workload.
Start This article has been rated as start-Class on the Project's quality scale.
Mid This article has been rated as mid-importance on the Project's importance scale.
After rating the article, please provide a short summary on the article's ratings summary page to explain your ratings and/or identify the strengths and weaknesses.

I'm glad that some efforts have been made to create a page on Azmi Bishara, but the material that is there, while substantative, is poorly written. I tried to fix some of it and may work on more in the future, but reorganization of the article should be a priority. --Jakob Huneycutt 14:05, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Did some clean-up today. I will probably do more in the future or try to expand the article if possible. --Jakob Huneycutt 17:56, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

He was born to a Christian family but is he Christian or Muslim or what?

I found out, he's a Christian.

He is not very religious. gidonb 12:21, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Palestinian Israeli

I have remove the term "Palestinian Israeli" because it is a political term for an Israeli Arab. Jon513 17:18, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be best to put his identity as he refers to himself, and I'm pretty sure it's not as an "Israeli Arab". In this article [1], he uses the term "Arab citizen of Israel" and explains his position for that choice, which might be worth including in the article. Tiamut 17:22, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unsourced?

I'm not sure that I follow why this has been given an "unsourced" template, given the sources reflected in the links, which support the article. --Epeefleche 15:59, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I appologize. I should have added some explanatory notes in this talk-page when i added the unsourced template to the article. Here are some reasons for labeling this article as unsourced:
  • He is controversial in Israel because of his support for turning Israel into "a state of all its citizens" - see the comment i posted on Jakob Huneycutt's talk page.
  • Bishara, also considered a public intellectual - Considered by whom? According to what source? See Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words
  • Azmi Bishara is responsible for many of the major concepts of debate in public and
  • The whole Visit to Syria section is not documented in any of the references.

political life of Israel.

Itayb 20:22, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I agree with all of your points. Tx. --Epeefleche 22:55, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wanted: Info of Bishara's tenure at the Van Leer Institute at the Van Leer site

I could not find information about his tenure at the Van Leer Institute in the Van Leer website. This is a shame, and i hope someone else manages to find it and replace the current reference (from the Adalah bio) with it. Itayb 17:37, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I have a biography of bishara in arabic where it states that he worked in van leer [2] its an extract of the archive.org from balad old official site.. there new site doesn't have this (or at leat i didn't find it). Bishara left van leer in 96 (according to the biography) and their site states only the current sraff. Histolo2 12:21, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] The picture, sadly, had to go for lack of copyright information

The picture, sadly, had to go, since it did "not have sufficient information on its copyright status.", as stated in its Commons profile (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Bishara_azmi.jpg). Copyright issues are very important in Wikipedia. Itayb 17:48, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

This pic was taken from the kneset site, i think its fair use to put it here. check out the hebrew page about him. Histolo2 12:22, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

I've reloaded the photograph. This time not to Commons but rather to the Wikipedia database. I stated clearly the copyright license (fair use), so i hope everything's fine now. Itayb 15:21, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Bishara is responsible for many of the major concepts of debate [...]" - obscure language

"Bishara is responsible for many of the major concepts of debate in public and political life of Israel." (my emphasis) Please replace claim by concrete evidence. I don't see how the words "many" and "major" can be objectively asserted in this context, but i dare anyone to prove me wrong. 18:38, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I totally agree with you. No doubt Bishara's opinion has been controversial especially for there contradictions for the classical zionist views but i don't see that He is responsible for many of the major etc... Histolo2 21:28, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] israelinsider - i wonder how adequate it is as a source

In the "Political Career" section the (online?) magazine israelinsider is quoted as a source. I've never heard of this magazine. This doesn't necessarily mean that it is not a popular and reliable magazine, but i'd like to be presented with some circulation statistics, or evidence that this magazine is quoted in better known magazines, in order to accept it as a reliable source. Alternatively, i'd like these links to be replaced by links to articles published by Yediot Aharonot, Ma'ariv, Haaretz or the Jerusalem Post, or by a notable non-Israeli newspaper/magazine. Itayb 20:54, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

It is not a magazine but a Zionist blog aimed at American Jewry. Despite calling itself "Israel's daily news magazine, it contains no Hebrew. It has no paper edition and its website gives does not have any information about who stands behind it. A search on google.co.il for references to Israelinsider [3] gives a grand total of 4 hits from Israel. Not a particularly reliable source in my opinion. Abu ali 21:55, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
I just have time to spend a moment on this, but a couple of observations. 1. English (along with Hebrew and Arabic) is one of the three official languages of Israel. Abu Ali's suggestion that the fact that it contains no Hebrew is reason for exclusion is therefore not one that I find to be especially compelling. And that is just the easier point -- no doubt there are Russian Israeli papers that could be worthy of inclusion as well. 2. A google search of its name yields over 200,000 hits ... see http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&safe=off&rls=com.microsoft%3Aen-US&q=israelinsider+&btnG=Search . 3. It appears to have articles, not just be a blog, as has been suggested. 4. It has information as to who stands behind it ... see its reference to Koret Communications Ltd., and the magazine's history. 5. Am not sure that today the fact that it is an internet publication is reason for it to be ignored -- there is of course no paper version of Wikipedia either, for example. --Epeefleche 22:37, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
OK, (1) what proportion of Israelis speak English as their 1st language? (2) Who on earth are Koret communications ltd? Where is israel insider located? And how is it funded? It calls on readers to show their "support of Israel" by giving donations (3) The search I did was using the Israeli version of google requesting references from Israeli sites. I only got 4 references which suggests that it is off the radar as far as most Israelis are concerned. Abu ali 23:25, 14 February 2007 (UTC)
I am Reuven Koret, the publisher of Israel Insider, which has been publishing daily since 2001, more than 10,000 articles and views. We typically get more than 100,000 unique visitors per month. A search of "Israel Insider" on google yields about 480,000 results, last I checked. We are based in Tel Aviv, and our mandate is providing an insider view of Israel to outsiders. Our staff are all Israelis, many new immigrants able to translate the wonders and diversity of Israel to outsiders. 75% of our readers are in North America, 10% in Europe, 10% in Israel and 5% ROW. We aim for objective news reflecting the Israeli consensus. We aim for diversity of views from left to right, encompassing Israelis and foreigners writing about all aspects of Israel.

Israel Insider is self-funded and self-sustaining thanks to ads, sales of our Israel's Story in Maps interactive flash collection, and direct mails. [[User: Reuven Koret [Reuven Koret]] 02:39, 15 February 2007 (IST)

Shalom Reuven Koret of Koret publications. What is the street address of your headquaters in Tel Aviv? How many staff work on your website? And how are your readership numbers audited? Abu ali 09:39, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
Wow. Sounds pretty good to me. --Epeefleche 00:50, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] some facts about Koret Communications and israelinsider

I don't know whether the user identifying himself as Reuven Koren is genuine. If so, i find it quite exciting that a person of his calibre took the time to comment in this talk page; yesterday morning i couldn't have easily imagine circumstances under which i would be engaged in a professional debate with Mr. Koret. It just goes to show how influencial Wikipedia is conceived to be. In any case it doesn't really matter whether this user is genuine or not, because one doesn't have to put one's trust on a stranger's word when one can easily verify the relevant information by oneself. I've done some research on Koren publishing and israelinsider, and here's what i've come up with:

"Reuven Koret is CEO of Tel Aviv-based Koret Communications Ltd. (koret.com ) and Content Markets in the US. After creating, with Harvard University partners, Africana.com as the premier cultural and educational portal for African-descent populations, and selling it to AOL Time Warner, Koret Communications has focused on creating a network of content and community sites for Jewish and Israeli organizations and publishers, including Israel Insider , Jewsweek, ISRAEL21c, birthright israel, Avi Chai Foundation, Jewish Content, and soon-to-be-launched sites for The Jerusalem Post and The Jerusalem Report." -[4]

This short bio is taken from a page which seems to be describing the members constituting a working group set up by the European non-for-profit organization Minerva. It is consistent with the Koret Communications company's portfolio found on their website http://www.koret.com/.

Koret Communications is behind the French edition of the Jerusalem Post. Take the following steps to verify this matter:

  1. Browse to the Jerusalem Post's main page: [5]. Scroll down to the bottom of the page. To the right of the heading "JPost Sites" you'll see a link to "JPost Français". Follow this link.
  2. It's fair to say we're now at the official main page of the French edition of the Jerusalem Post. Scroll down to the bottom of that page. Click the link "Crédits". The first paragraph of this passage reads in translation: "The Jerusalem Post French Edition was conceived, developed [sic] by Koret Communications LTD which is also responsible for its maintenance. Every question or comment is to be addressed at producer@koret.com. In any technical problem contact: webmaster@koret.com"

According to Koret Communications' portfolio presented in their site, israelinsider is one of their projects. This is supported by the israelinsider site:

  1. Browse to israelinsider's main page: [6] and scroll down to the bottom of the page.
  2. The bottom line displays a copyright notice, reserving all rights to Koret Communications.
  3. Clicking the "about" link brings you here, where you can read: "About Israel Insider [...] Israel Insider is published by Koret Communications Ltd., an Internet design and development company based in Tel Aviv, Israel."

There are also indications that Koret Communications is closely associated with the Avi Chai Foundation, which is responsible for the current Israeli "Tsav Pius" campaign and is strongly involved in the production of the current prime-time TV series "Merhak Negi'a".

Reviewing the projects in Koret Communications' portfolio, they do seem to be taking Jewish-Religious, a-priori-pro-Israel attitude. To illustrate the second point, the Israel Insider is described in the KC porfolio thus: "israelinsider [...] is committed to communicating balanced and accurate information about Israel, relating to her conflicts, and celebrating the successes, innovations and contributions of her people." Even ignoring the "celebrating the successes" etc. part of the sentence, the fact that Israel is referred to in English as "her" may be indicative of bias. However, even if Israel Insider has biased interpretation of the facts, it doesn't mean that its reporters don't get the facts rights in the first place (those they do choose to report about), and therefore their articles may be considered reliable sources of information.

To sum up. Israel Insider is produced by Koret Communications LTD, which is a notable firm that has managed significant projects, such as the development of the Africana.com site (in the past) and the production of the French edition of the Jerusalem Post (presently). Israel Insider seems to be tending to the Jewish-religious, and to be taking an a-priori sympathetic approach to Israel.

Does the fact that Israel Insider is produced by a big player such as Koret Communications mean that it's a popular and reliable source of information? I suggest to take this matter to some larger forum of Wikipedians in order to establish consensus. I suggest taking this to the members of the Wikipedia:WikiProject Israel. In fact, i'd like to request that they compile a (not exhaustive, and not binding) list of newspapers, magazines and organizations, whose publications can be used as reliable sources of information in Israel-related articles. Itayb 12:40, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Good research. If you want to verify that it is indeed Mr. Koret responding, why don't you email him? By emailing the publication's editory ... you can send an email by going to "contact" on the publication's site?

As to Abu Ali's questions, 1) I'm not sure their street address is relevant unless he is going to visit -- if it is to verify who the sender is, he can also email the publication; 2) I don't see the relevance of the number of staff working on the website for inclusion in Wikipedia, and 3) do we require information as to how readership numbers are "audited" of any other source we cite in Wikipedia? I would guess not. I do think that these questions are starting to stray a little. --Epeefleche 13:35, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Koret here. Anyone who wants to contact me is welcome to do so at publisher@israelinsider. We are very interested in doing a wiki project on Israel and Jewish subject. I acquired Israelipedia.com for this reason, as well as Jewswiki.com, which is intended to be the user-content complement to another wholly owned site: Jewsweek.com.

Itay's research is partial but mostly correct. I should add that in addition to celebrating Israel's success we also vocally criticize her follies. As for calling Israel "her" -- I guess I think of the country more as a lady.... although I suppose that was just a momentary gloss.

We rely on HBX Analytics for our raw numbers. Nice system. Our Alexa rank floats between 60,000 and 90,000. Africana.com by the way is now AOL Black Voices.

We are a small company in the heart of Tel Aviv: a handful of people, privately funded. The opportunity to interact with pursuers of knowledge, whether supporters or critics, critical supporters or supportive critics, is my pleasure and livelihood. [Reuven Koret] Feb. 15, 17:49 Israel Time. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 207.232.5.36 (talk) 15:51, 15 February 2007 (UTC).

[edit] The map of a-Ram - admittedly biased, but i couldn't find an alternative

The map of a-Ram, which i gave a reference to, might well be challenged as politically biased. It appears on the site of the Israeli activist organization "B'Tselem", and depicts the Separation Barrier around a-Ram. My only excuse for linking to it is this: i could not find an alternative map of a-Ram anywhere else, neither online nor in the very detailed hard-copy maps of Israel i have at home. If anyone finds a more "neutral" map depicting a-Ram, please feel free to replace this reference. Itayb 22:09, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Two general comments on style

1. I would suggest that proper usage is for all footnotes to precede commas and periods (though they should follow semicolons).

2. The phrase "According to" is used repeatedly, and no doubt if citations are supplied for the rest of the article would be used even more. Query whether this is necessary or appropriate, where the reference is footnoted -- especially when there is no evidence of a different view as to the fact in question. No doubt, otherwise, we could start every sentence in this article, and others, with that lead-in, which might not add to ease of reading. --Epeefleche 22:26, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments.
1. There may be good reason to use the style you suggest, but i prefer to follow the explicit directive "Footnotes come after punctuation" (original emphasis) of Wikipedia:Citing sources#Footnotes. If you think it goes against proper usage, please make this point in the guideline's talk page.
2. I agree with you. I've changed the style of this section. I hope you approve. Itayb 11:41, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] some things that got to be said

  • In my opinion there is no need to put citation to state where did u get the arabic/hebrew name of mr. bishara nor where did u get the arabic name of A-Ram... The spelling of these names is right, why put a citation? just a thought.
  • Why did u write that he lives in Nazareth as of February 2007? in all his biographies that i could find its stated that he lives in Nazareth.. although I know he used to live in Nazareth-Illit in 2000 (and i've passed near his house a couple of times) and i'm pretty much sure that he baught a house in Haifa in Hagefen street in 2002. nevertheless his biography at the knesset site states that he lives in Nazareth so i guess this is the "official address".
  • Most sources doesn't mention the communist past of bishara but its a well known fact that he was a member in Maki (israel's communist party) till the late 80s. he could study in Eastern Germany becoz he was sent there by maki (many arabs from israel studies in communist states like that) etc...
  • Bishara wasn't the first arab knesset member to go to syria Abd alwahab Darawshi his biograpgy at knesset site went first and the mid 90s and was not persecuted... Bishara went to syria several times since the late 90s to the 2000s and not just in 2006.
  • כיסופים בארץ המחסומים:רסיסי סיפור (במקור: : وجد في بلاد الحواجر"

This is not true the original title is الحاجز: شظايا رواية

In overall you did a good job and all the facts in the article has a source

Histolo2 12:58, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

p.s. many of the facts i wrote here aren't documented in online sources, i think the only source you'll find is old arabic newspaper in israel which u won't find online. Histolo2 13:04, 18 February 2007 (UTC)


Histolo2, i'll reply to the points you've raised in order.
  • The spelling of these names is right, why put a citation? How can a reader, who's never read about Bishara before, know that the spelling is correct? And indeed what does it mean for a spelling of a name to be "right" or "correct"? The best we can do is refer the reader to reliable sources that spell out Bishara's name. Also bear in mind, that since this is a free encyclopedia that everyone can edit, spelling mistakes may not be uncommon. It is reasonable to assume that the readers of the English Wikipedia can notice non-standard spelling of common English words and personal names, but when it comes to foreign words and personal names this assumption is no longer reasonable.
  • Why did u write that he lives in Nazareth as of February 2007? in all his biographies that i could find its stated that he lives in Nazareth.. It is not incorrect to make the qualifaction "as of February 2007". Possibly a stronger claim can be made, such as: "Bishara owns a residence in Nazareth, where he has lived for the past XX years." But this claim should be documented in a reliable source, like all other claims in Wikipedia. I guess one could hint at the stronger claim even without an explicit source, by giving (say in the footnotes) a list of sources dated from significantly different times, all claiming he lives in Nazareth. But, in my opinion, we can't "connect the dots" ourselves and write, say, "he's been living in Nazareth for XX years", because that would be original research, which should be avoided. However, this is a subtle matter, and could be brought to a larger forum (say in Wikipedia talk:No original research) for further discussion.
  • Most sources doesn't mention the communist past of bishara but its a well known fact that... Wikipedia has a strict policy of verifiability. If a fact is not documented in a reliable source, it should not be in an article.
  • Bishara wasn't the first arab knesset member to go to syria It's not written that he was. However i'm not sure how relevant it is to mention other people's visits to Syria. If many people think that Bishara was persecuted, in your words, this view should probably be mentioned in the article for the sake of a neutral point of view, but note that it is not a point you should try and prove by bringing examples of previous cases that were treated pronouncly differently. All you can do in Wikipedia is quote claims already raised by other, reliable sources. So if you find such a source that says something like "Many people in Israel think that MK Bishara was persecuted in this case, and bring as evidence the case of MK Darawshi, who visited Syria during the '80 and was never prosecuted for it." However, even if you do bring such a source, it could still be challenged as biased due to the use of the very strong word "persecuted", which should be supported by likewise very strong arguments.
  • Bishara went to syria several times since the late 90s to the 2000s and not just in 2006. I agree with you, this section is particularly incomplete, and you are welcome to add any missing detail.
  • This is not true the original title is الحاجز: شظايا رواية As indicated, this title is taken from the catalog of the Jewish National and University Library (see [7]). If you think this information is false, please support your claim with evidence.
  • many of the facts i wrote here aren't documented in online sources They don't have to be documented online, as long as they are documented in some reliable source (although i strongly favor online sources, as i explained in my message to Benwbrum of 08:35, 14 February 2007). Old Israeli newspapers in Arabic would do just fine (although maybe not quite any such newspaper), as long as they are archived by a public institution, like a library. Just give enough details so that they could theoretically be verified. Better yet, also replicate the exact quote. Best, provide a translation to English as well.
BTW, can you verify, or refute, the claim given in the article, that Bishara's bought a house in a-Ram? Itayb 14:42, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

OK certain points i wrote here were just to give you points of thinking and i know you need evidence to write things in wikipedia... i didn't write some of the "facts" i mentioned in arabic wikipedia becoz of that. Now:

  • House in A-Ram: i remember reading about it in some newspaper will try to look for a reliable source... i think he does own a house there.
  • the novel: i didn't check the citation for the original title, however both of us are right. according to this article The title is الحاجز: شظايا رواية الجزء الأول وجد في بلاد الحواجز. I think u can manage arabic... Anyhow the arabic version is salled under the name of الحاجز just check the links in my messege in arabic wikipedia.
  • THe residence: when i edited his page in arabic this was a bit frusterated for me. I knew that he lived in Nazareth-Illit coz i remember driving next to his home ~ year 2000 and i remember seeing security guards (it was the same week when his house was attacked) and then i know many peaople saying (and very sure about it) that he lives now in Haifa. However, in the lack of documentauion of this and due to the fact that all the biographies i could find stated he lives in Nazareth i didn't change that fact. the arabs in israel are a small community (thats the feeling at least) and everybody knows everyone so i'm pretty sure of the fact that he lives in haifa but there is no evidence so it doesn't count.
  • MK Darawshi: you misinterpretted this, I just wanted to say that this section lacks a lots of facts , especially that it starts in 2006. i mentioned MK Darawshi just by the way. But if u wanna know some other perspective about his visits there where claims raised that he was a messenger between Israel and Syria [8] [9] [10] the first is an interview with khaddam and in the latter article there is a mention of interviews (with dates) in which both bishara and yatom approved these claims, you can try and verify them. BTW i'm not sure if assenara is a very reliable source.
  • BTW He had a kidney transplant, this is mentioned in hebrew wikipedia and in some knesset protocols just google for it in hebrew...
  • The sources: A biography about Bishara has not yet been written. The only source of information we have is articles/news/interviews about him and some biographies that mainly lacks much information. I think if we had access to archive of local arabic newspaper we will have much more info.

Anyhow you're doing a great job meanwhile, writing a good article takes much time and effort but so far so good.

Histolo2 22:16, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the complement. :) Now back to business...
  • It is my understanding that وجد في بلاد الحواجز is either the first book of a trilogy named الحاجز..... شظايا رواية, or it's the other way around. Yet another possiblity is that one of these fragments is the main title and the other the secondary title. Can you please tell me if any of these possibilities is supported in the link you've supplied? Bishara's apparently already published the second book of the trilogy, Love in the Shadow Zone, in 2005. Can you verify this, please?
  • The article mentions a book Bishara has supposedly written: The Palestinian Intifada and Its Reflections in the Israeli Public Opinion. This piece of information was entered by an anonymous user (85.250.10.17) in the revision of 09:20, 18 October 2005. I tried looking up this title in Yahoo, but i only checked the first couple of pages, which turned up nothing useful. Then i tried cross-searching the Muwatin database (in Arabic) for Azmi, Bishara and Intifada. It turned up a single entry: The Intifada and the Israeli Society. I wonder whether this is the title which the anonymous user had in mind. Bishara wrote or contributed to many books, which are not yet mentioned in the article. The only reason i obssess on this particular book is the notion that it might be available in English (or German or Hebrew). Do you know anything about it?
  • Why is assenara not a reliable source? (It may be obvious to you, but i know nearly nothing about the Arab media.)
  • Regarding Bishara's kidney translplant: it's mentioned in the Miscellaneous section. Perhaps it should be relocated to a more prominent position. Any suggestions? Itayb 14:53, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
  • The Novel: I didn't buy or read the book but according to the article[11], its a trilogy named الحاجز شظايا رواية and the first book is وجد في بلاد الحواجز. so i think the best thing is to keep the title in arabic just fix the typing error its حواجز and not حواجر. (i know that this mistake is from the library website)
  • maybe the book is الإنتفاضة والمجتمع الإسرائيلي: تحليل في خضم الأحداث [12] BTW other than Muwatin publications he has published also a few books BTW you can check them through these 2 arabic online bookshops [13] [14]
  • Assennara is a bit yellowish newspaper and the late editor in chief at the time wasn't in good relations with Bishara. Bishara himself had a column there in the 90s (before he went to politics). If you ask me I think that most of the things there are true but maybe a bit exaggerated. |ANyhow most of the stuff there aren't relavent for wikipedia except for the interview with khaddam, if i was in your place i would look for other verifications (of bishara's role in messeges between syria and israel) in hebrew media and would mention the interview with khaddam (some people -especially from balad- said that lotfi mashu'r (assennara editor in chief)isn't reliable but assennara renounced these claims)[15]
  • I will leave you to decide whats best for the kidney transplant. BTW bishara and anar maor aer trying to make a law that will make organ donations easier [16] [17]. I once found a protocol of a discussion in the knesset website where someone says that Bishara himself had a transplant etc... didn't find it now but google for it if you are interested.
  • A question: Do you know arabic? i assumed you did so i gave you lots of arabic resources but when i took a look at your page here i saw you aer level 0 in arabic... but from the other hand most of the articles you wrote are connected to arabic culture etc... so this makes me wonder.

Histolo2 22:04, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for all the info. It's all very helpful. :) As for my knowledge of Arabic, i guess 0.5 would be more appropriate than 0... I know enough to be able to understand an article's title (with the help of a dictionary), but not enought to be able to plow though the article itself. I hope by next year to be able to increment this figure by 1... Itayb 22:22, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Weird behavior experienced, trying to edit the "Early life" section

When i try to edit the "Early ife" section, i am presented with text from some previous revision. Does anyone experience the same problem? Do you know how to solve it? Itayb 15:18, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Someone had missed of a ref ending, have fixed it now SGGH 13:30, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] my reasons for deleting the quotation excerpted from the video interview

I've deleted the quotation excerpted from the video interview for the following reasons:

I welcome discussion about this move.

P.S. I've moved the reference to the interview to the "External Links" section. Itayb 17:06, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Bishara's resignation from the Knesset

No doubt the current developments in Bishara's are important and in due time will have to be mentioned in the article. But right now, they are nothing but descriptions of plans, expected future events and speculations regarding the background of these events. This is certainly newsworthy, and would surely be welcome in WikiNews. But Wikipedia is an encyclopedia; not a news agency. An encyclopedia reports about well-established facts, not about speculated future events.

  • There is no reason to change "he currently lives" to "lived until April 2007." There is no explicit statement in the cited sources that his leaving Israel is permanent, so this claim constitutes original research, which is deprecated in Wikipedia.
  • The statement "a gag order prevents releasing details." This clearly does not belong in an encyclopedia.
  • The following sentence is inappropriate: "Bishara planns to announce his resignation in a televised Al Jazeera interview from Jordan." An encyclopedia reports about facts and scientific theories; not about speculated future plans of individuals.
  • The following sentence is inappropriate: "He submited his letter of resignation to the Knesset via one of his colleagues." The Ha'arets article states "Bishara will also send his letter of resignation to Knesset Speaker Dalia Itzik following the Passover recess, later in the week." It also states: "Senior Balad officials stressed to Haaretz on Sunday that the resignation will be confirmed only if Bishara does in fact make the announcement." (my emphases) So the resignation is a speculated future event. It does not belong in an encyclopedia.
  • As for Bishara's supposed escape to Jordan with his family. This formulation is both original research and biased.
The Jerusalem Post reports: "According to sources, Bishara left the country immediately following the allegations. The MK, who is currently staying in a Jordan hotel, has been overseas for nearly a week and a half. His family joined him in Jordan on Sunday." Escaped? To Jordan? Escaped with his family? I don't think so.
The Ha'arets reports: "The Balad chairman left Israel two weeks ago. He initially left for Qatar to serve as commentator for the Aljazeera TV network during the Arab Summit in Riyadh. He then flew to Amman, in order to promote the release of his latest novel. He plans to announce his resignation from Amman, and it is unclear when he intends to return to Israel." No escape. Not to Jordan. No family.

I request all editors to have a bit more patience. A few more days are all that's required before speculation become (or not) facts. Only then will they be eligible for inclusion in Wikipedia. In the mean time, there is WikiNews. Please also bear in mind: Wikipedia is not about truth; it's about explicit and direct attribution to reliable secondary sources (see the Attribution policy). Thanks. Itayb 10:52, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

Fine. Zeq 15:53, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Listen

i've moved down the 3 versions of saying "azmi bishara" into a seperate section here: [18] so that the into would look more legible: [19] compared to [20]

regardless that it looks a tad better on Explorer, i can testify that there's a world of difference on Firefox - i think it's counter productive and clogs up the intro if 3 Listen files are placed like that. Jaakobou 11:53, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

Point taken. No need to disrupt the structure of the reference sections, though; neither is there need to compromise direct attribution. I've tried to accommodate your worthy concerns for legibility with my concerns for direct attribution and good structure. Hope i've struck a good compromise. Itayb 12:38, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
i cleaned it a tad, the ref section is still a gigantic mess. so i must say i was and still am a bit surprised when you say "No need to disrupt the structure of the reference sections" - in my opinion, there's a great need to "disrupt" (i.e. organize) it. Jaakobou 13:17, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
"gigantic mess"? Please explain. Itayb 13:31, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

compare it with the far cleaner Yasser Arafat article - and there's so much more info about arafat. Jaakobou 14:09, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. Could indicate specific points you find troublesome? Itayb 14:13, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
I'll work on it when i feel the itch to go there. Jaakobou 21:06, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Israeli Arab / Arab member of the Knesset

I don't think many people would presume the reasoning for the change by Number 57 from "Arab member of the Knesset" to "Israeli Arab" which was: "original phrasing could suggest some non-MK Arabs could have run." however, i do think that the change results in an ommission of information. Jaakobou 09:05, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

What information does changing "Arab member of the Knesset" to "Israeli Arab" leave out? The article already mentions that he is an MK. It does not look right to say he was the first Arab Member of the Knesset to run for PM, and it does leave it open to suggestions that non MKs could (i.e. previously non-political public figures). Number 57 09:13, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
Number57, you're right, it leaves open this possibility, and that's precisely why this possibility should remain open. By attempting to "close the gap" by drawing from your personal knowledge you are engaging in original research. Original research is deprecated in Wikipedia, because the ideal is that any reader should be able to verify the consistency of all information in Wikipedia without need for specialised knowledge, in this case this means without having to be familiar with the Israeli political system. Itayb 10:15, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
It is not original research, it is obvious fact! Anyway, your edit summary is wrong; the text in question is not a quote (which should remain left untouched) but just a reference - there are no quotation marks. Also, be careful with your reverting - you put back the unnecessary text in the info box. Number 57 10:19, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
P.S. I can't work out how the referencing system in the article works, so could you please replace the original reference for that with this BBC article that says Bishara was the first Israeli Arab to run for PM [21]. Thanks, Number 57 10:22, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
It is not an obvious fact. Say A is the group of Arab MKs excluding Bishara, counting all Knessets; and say B is the total group of Arab/Palestinian Israelis, excluding Bishara. Then A is only a small part of B.
1. The reference states: No member of A ever ran for prime-minister
2. Your formulation states: No member of B ever ran for prime-minister.
These are very different statements. A does not imply B, (while B implies A). If you are trying to deduce B from A, you are synthesizing B from A and some (currently unidentified) external information. That's original research. Seriously. Itayb 10:34, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
I'll replace the reference. I'll explain the referencing system in a moment. Itayb 10:38, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
There is another reference here saying he withdrew to help Barak win: [22]. Although the eventual margin of victory was quite large, it was a bit of a surprise at the time, and the three that withdrew would have probably got enough votes to force a second round. Number 57 15:44, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Now you're talking business. Now you can write about Bishara's reasons for withdrawing from the race, citing the reliable source. But please be sure not to present this as a fact: we don't know if this was in fact the reason Bishara withdrew from the race. All we know is that this what he said. Itayb 16:04, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Image text

I don't see any point in the ommission of information (date, basic backgroud) from the image. Jaakobou 09:08, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Captions inside infoboxes just look bad. You definitely don't need the words "Image of", and the fact that he ran previously ran for PM is totally irrelevant to the picture (and slightly misleading as he withdrew his candidacy before the election). Number 57 09:14, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Number57. It also makes it appear as though that's the most important fact about Bishara, which is disputable. Itayb 10:17, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
i don't quite get the "rv until dispute resolved" style of "resolving" conflicts. i do believe i placed the image and caption first, so it's basically enforcing an extra revert and a personal opinion. anyways, i don't have the time right now so i'm making a slight change to the image and later i'll discuss the Israeli MK thing from the intro - feel free to mess with the changes i'm making, although, it would be good if you give reasoning for the change here. Jaakobou 11:15, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] the referencing system explained/defended

I agree the referencing system is untidy and inconsistent currently, but it is a far cry from a "gigantic mess", as Jaacobou's put it ([23]). It is i who created this referencing system. Bishara was the first article i edited seriously, and i was groping my way to find the best referencing system. The article reflects my experiments. I now have a much more solid idea of how a referencing system should look like. You can see a representative example at Pearse Jordan (look at the underlying code too, for both the references and the citations, and see how the footnotes look like). That's how i'd like the Bishara article to be, too.

(More in an hour or so)...

Itayb 11:31, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

I'm not having a go, but I really don't understand why there is a need to separate the notes and references - it just seems like two steps for doing one thing. If you look at a featured article such as Ipswich Town F.C., notes sections are just used for making quick points in the text, whilst all the references are in the references section. Number 57 11:40, 18 April 2007 (UTC)


(continuing...) Basically the referencing system i prefer is the one described here. It consists of 1. a References section, listing all the works in alphabetical order, and 2. inline citations in the form of footnotes, gathered in a Notes section. (Footnoting is the least obtrusive method available in Wikipedia to do direct inline citation, and i espouse the widely supported Attribution policy proposal, in that i believe that "Material added to articles must be directly and explicitly supported by the cited sources." (original emphasis))

Additionally, every item in the References section is enclosed in a "wikicite" template, and all footnote citations are enclosed in a "wikiref" template. This way, when a reader clicks the citation, the page automatically jumps to the corresponding reference.

Number57 asked: "why there is a need to separate the notes and references". There are (at least) three good reasons for this separation:

  1. The same online source may be cited from on different dates. Each time it is cited, the date of access corresponding to that citation should be noted. To see why this is important, please consider the Gullible.info example i've added to the Factoid page. Readers accessing the Guardian article on April 27 2006 would have been seen a slightly, but significantly, different article than readers accessing the same article via the same link today. (Yet another, more recent, example of this phenomenon, known as "scrubbing", is described in this Regret the Error posting.)
  2. Sometimes you want to cite the same reference, but with different supplementary remarks, such as the page number from which you quote something. If you put the full reference in the footnotes, you need to repeat it everytime you cite it with a different supplementary text.
  3. Separating the full reference from the citation makes for shorter citations, and this is more convenient for editors. When a sentences you're editing gets interrupted in the middle by a long citation, it's difficult to keep track of the main sentence.

As for how to format the references: i tend to follow the MLA style.

As i wrote before, the article Pearse Jordan is currently a good example for the way this system is supposed to work. Itayb 13:44, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

In response to your arguments for using your system:
  1. Normal referencing can also cite the same online source from different dates (see the Ipswich Town F.C. article mentioned above), and would use the same amount of space in the notes/references sections.
  2. I don't think it's a big deal to write out a reference twice - copy and pasting takes 10 seconds!
  3. It is only convenient for the very small number of editors who understand the system (which I still don't). Whilst it can be annoying to see a sentance split up by a long reference citation, what is more important (and I will bold this because it so very important) is that using this methodology on this article has meant that it is virtually impossible for an average wikipedia editor to add references to the article (as Jaakobou and myself have commented today). Even after the explanation and going through the edit history, I still can't really fathom it. It also has the problem of when you click on a reference, for some of them you then have to scroll down some more (remembering the code letters) to the actual reference to see what it is as it is not linked to the references section (e.g. for FRE). The normal referencing system is so much easier to use; we are not all so advanced!
As for the Pearce Jordan article, I don't think using § is a good idea - how many people without knowledge of the legal system will understand what it means (I just had to look it up!) Number 57 21:39, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

1.

(a) The current referencing system is normal. There are many kinds of normal. For instance, there are at least five normal approaches to academic referencing: AMA, APA, MLA, Chigago, Turabian. The referencing system i've described is used in the "real world" (with a slight variation: the citations are inline rather than in the footnotes as here), for instance in Steven Muchnick's "Advanced compiler design and implementation" and Dorit Hochbaum's (editor) "Approximation algorithms for NP-Hard problems".
(b) I've looked at the Ipswich Town F.C. article. There are many references there. Could you please be more specific and point out specific numbers of references exemplifying your claim?

2. So we agree that the scheme i described is more efficient.

3.

(a)You say you don't understand the scheme used in the Bishara article, but you find the scheme used in the Ipswich article easy? I find it hard to believe. It seems to me you haven't really looked at the underlying code that goes on there. Please do, and then report back to me. When you do so, i'm sure you will also fully appreciate what i was referring to in point 3.
(b)It is not enough to apply bold font and use vague statistical terms to make a claim stick. In any case, creating a coherent and professional referencing scheme is not a trivial matter. Are you aware that the whole Ipswitch references scheme was created by only two editors, as you can easily verify by browsing the history page?

As for the funny letter you've seen in the Pearse Jordan article, the whole point is, it was used with respect to a source, which is a legal document. Anyhow, it has nothing to do with the referencing scheme.Itayb 22:54, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Finally, i'd like to stress, that i don't think the current Bishara references section is good. The reason i mentioned the Pearse Jordan article is to show how the scheme works when it is applied consistently, but in the Bishara case, it is applied only semi-consistently. Practically speaking, you can add references any way you like; i'll make sure to format them properly. You can even simply insert a link inline and leave it at that. I'll do the rest. Itayb 22:54, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] I'm leaving Wikipedia for a while, maybe forever. Goodbye!

I'm leaving Wikipedia for a while, maybe forever. Goodbye!

[edit] Balad leader

The phrasing in the first paragraph suggests that when he resigned from the Knesset, he also resigned as head of Balad. To my knowledge, he is still party leader. Does anyone else have any info? Number 57 08:29, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Deleting external link

I strongly object to Jauerbach's deleting my external link to a blog post I wrote about Azmi Bishara during the recent spy scandal [24]. My blog is an authoritative, well-source publication about the Israeli-Arab conflict. The link I provided benefits me in no way commercially or otherwise. My blog was the sole source for information about the spy scandal anywhere at a time when Israeli publications could not publish in any detail about the matter due to censorship rules. The blog post contains information I received fr. Israeli journalists in confidence. The purpose of adding this link was to provide a source for Wikipedians who wish to read more in depth background on this incident. I hope that anyone who has a problem with this link will communicate further with me about this before reverting it.Richard (talk) 06:21, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, Richard and Roland, but you're both wrong. This link is interesting and may be valuable, but it still comes with zero fact checking since it's not from 'professionals' in the field. I cannot parse out what the Italian source is saying and whether it's the same thing you want to add, it may be possible to add the information, but not the way you're doing it. PRtalk 16:17, 29 January 2008 (UTC)