Wikipedia Mediation Cabal
Article	Israel and the apartheid analogy
Status	Closed
Request date	02:09, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
Requesting party	Ryan Paddy ( talk)
Parties involved	User:Bjmullan User:Breein1007 User:Carolmooredc User:Epson291 User:Factomancer User:George User:Harlan_wilkerson User:Jrtayloriv User:Malik_Shabazz User:NickCT User:Plot_Spoiler User:RolandR User:Ryan_Paddy User:Unomi User:Wikifan12345 User:ZScarpia
Mediator(s)	Ludwigs2
Comment	This mediation progressed to a strong but incomplete consensus (14 participants supporting, 2 against, 6 offering no comment) to change the name of the article to Israel and Apartheid, with the inclusion of a disambiguation line to clear up any misconceptions that might arise from that title. At least two editors did not agree with this consensus, and further attempts at discussion seem unlikely to reach a more complete consensus on the matter. Given the strong opinions evidenced in this mediation, I recommend that the participants consider taking the issue to formal mediation or arbitration for a more authoritative solution than is possible in informal mediation. -- Ludwigs2 05:55, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Request details

Where is the dispute?

Israel and the apartheid analogy

Who is involved?

• User:Bjmullan
• User:Factomancer
• User:Wikifan12345
• User:Plot_Spoiler
• User:Harlan_wilkerson
• User:Ryan_Paddy
• User:Jrtayloriv
• User:Malik_Shabazz
• User:Breein1007
• User:ZScarpia
• User:Epson291
• User:RolandR
• User:NickCT
• User:George
• User:Unomi
• User:Noleander
• User:Andrensath
• User:Marokwitz
• User:Carolmooredc
• User:Be in Nepean
• User:Hmbr
• ברוקולי

What is the dispute?

The dispute is over the naming of the article Israel and the apartheid analogy. An alternative name Israel and apartheid has been suggested. A straw poll indicated 7 for the move, 5 against, and 4 neutral, demonstrating no strong consensus to move or to stay. The question of the title and whether it accurately reflects the contents of the article is raised relatively often on the talk page and there are strongly felt views in either direction, so hopefully mediation may be able to help find a consensus on the subject.

The main argument against Israel and the apartheid analogy is that the some aspects of the content may not be describing an analogy, particularly the content describing allegations that Israel is committing the Crime of Apartheid. The main argument against Israel and apartheid is that this title may be prejudicial, implying that Israel is guilty of apartheid. Another option that has been suggested prior to the renaming discussion is to split the content across two articles, one about the analogy and the other about the accusations.

Collapsing for procedural reasons: Please do not change the focus of the mediation without first establishing a consensus through discussion
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
There has been an on-going dispute with editors who insist that all references to Israel and apartheid are instances of "the apartheid analogy" (which they personally define as neither "apartheid" nor "the crime of apartheid"). They have prevented users from creating other articles on those topics, removed content from existing articles, created POV forks, and prevented editors from including wikilinks to Israel and the apartheid analogy in other Wikipedia articles. Those content disputes have been raised repeatedly in talk page discussions and are a matter that should be properly addressed in mediation.

What would you like to change about this?

Editors are in disagreement over whether Israel and apartheid is a prejudicial title, and over whether Israel and the apartheid analogy accurately describes the content of the article. It may be beneficial to have a structured discussion of the key points of disagreement, and a discussion of all possible options in search of one that would find a consensus.

How do you think we can help?

We need help to discuss the issue in a constructive fashion. The discourse described in the article is highly politically charged, and some editors have strong feelings on the subject. Mediation may help the editors to put aside differences to reach for consensus.

An existing ARBCOM remedy states:

1) Editors of articles concerning apartheid are directed to negotiate in good faith appropriate article names using relevant policies and guidelines. If negotiation is unsuccessful, interested parties are required to enter into good faith mediation regarding the matter.

• Passed 6 to 0 at 20:28, 2 September 2006 (UTC) [1]

Mediator notes

I have been asked privately not to mediate this so contrary to my prior statement I cannot do so. It remains opened for another mediator. Hipocrite ( talk) 19:29, 19 April 2010 (UTC) reply

---

First of all, I would like to propose another name for the article, perhaps "Israeli Aparthied Allegations" this is descriptive, and NPOV. Ronk01 ( talk) 21:57, 23 May 2010 (UTC) reply

Re-mediation

per this discussion on the MedCab talk page, I am willing to take over the mediation and see if any headway can be made. This is, of course, assuming that (1) Ronk01 does not want to mediate any longer, and (2) the participants to this mediation approve. Does anyone have any questions or comments? -- Ludwigs2 21:45, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Mediation rules

When I mediate, I prefer the following rules, most of which are common sense:

1. Be civil at all times. This means:
   • Comment on content only, not on other editors
   • Try not to post while angry, and try not to respond to other editors if they get angry at you
2. Keep focused on the subject at hand. This means:
   • Don't drag in material from disputes on other pages
   • Don't drag in a lot of history on past disputes
3. Be clear and concise. This means:
   • Don't write long exegeses on everything under the sun. Keep it short and sweet, as much as possible
   • Don't let yourself get tangled up in unhelpful debates over trivia
4. Comments by non-participants are subject to removal at any time. If you want to participate, sign onto the mediation, and be aware that signing on means that you explicitly accept these rules as given.

I believe my main role as mediator is to make sure that the conversation doesn't get sidetracked by unnecessary discussions or bad feelings. If I think things are going off track, I will ask the people involved to stop and refocus, and sometimes to redact unnecessary, unpleasant, or distracting material. I reserve the right to redact any material on this page myself, but I will generally only do so to remove uncivil comments, and then only if the people in question refuse to redact them on their own, for whatever reason. Hopefully that won't happen.

I will assume that all participants have read and agreed to these rules. if you have questions or objections, please offer them up here so we can discuss them. -- Ludwigs2 06:53, 7 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Opening Statements

Please do not edit this secition unless you are, or wish to become a party to this mediation

Comments by George

If I had to pick a "best" title, it would be Allegations of Israeli apartheid. It's a non-prejudicial title that accurately describes that some people claim that Israelis are committing (or have committed) apartheid against Palestinians. The UN defines apartheid as "inhuman acts committed for the purpose of establishing and maintaining domination by one racial group of persons over any other racial group of persons and systematically oppressing them." If someone is accused of committing a crime, and another person compares it to a similar crime, the comparison is largely secondary to the accusation itself. Likewise, while some have made analogies between alleged Israeli apartheid and other instances of apartheid, it's somewhat tangential to the allegation itself. ←  George  ^talk 01:51, 25 May 2010 (UTC) reply

George, I know that I am not technically supposed to favor one side, but I completely agree with your proposed title, as, like you said, it is descriptive, but not POV. Ronk01 ( talk) 02:20, 25 May 2010 (UTC) reply

Comments by Ryan Paddy

I think we need to look at all the options carefully and methodically. A great many titles have been attempted at different times, and there are numerous arguments for and against them. I don't think that attempting to push through any given title will create a durable success here. We need to have a full discussion that we can point to later and say "we discussed the pros and cons of all options, and we reached a consensus that the option we settled on was the best available", otherwise we'll just be having this same discussion again in 6 months time.

For example, it's notable that Allegations of Israeli apartheid was the title immediately before the current one. Possibly we may reach a consensus that it's better than the current title, but we can't make an abrupt decision to revert to it or we'll end up swimming in circles. There were perfectly valid reasons that we changed away from that title (many of the reliable sources cannot accurately be described as making "allegation" - they are merely drawing a comparison - and some users find "Allegations of X" titles to be unencyclopedic in tone), and those reasons will simply surface again if we don't do a full comparison of the options.

Likewise, there is no value in saying "we shouldn't be discussing this, it's been done to death". That's devoid of reasoning, it's just rhetoric. We need this discussion because this issue keeps festering on the talk page so it needs to be had out in full in a considered manner.

What we need here is some solid reasoning to compare the options. No option is likely to be perfect, they are probably all flawed (or can be perceived to be flawed, which is much the same thing) in one way or another. However, only a detailed comparison will give us a chance to identify the least flawed and most appropriate. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 03:37, 25 May 2010 (UTC) reply

Comments by Harlan Wilkerson

The current situation is the result of the improper use of the technique of deconstruction. A few editors have turned the article into an essay about the use of a term and are disrupting the project in order to prevent others from contributing to an objective article that surveys all of the available material concerning the State of Israel's treatment of the Palestinian people. A number of published sources mentioned in the article explain that the so-called "analogy" to South Africa is a legally irrelevant subject. That's because Israel's policies and practices do not have to be analogous to South African apartheid in order to satisfy all of the necessary legal elements of the crime of apartheid as defined in international law. Including the term "analogy" in combination with the definite article in the title is an example of biased or selective representation of the sources and not allowing one view to "speak for itself", or refactoring its "world-view" into the words of its detractors.

The question is not "Is Israel the same as South Africa?" It is "do Israel's actions with regard to the Palestinians meet the international definition of apartheid?" The article focuses so much attention on the use of the term "analogy", that authors expressing significant viewpoints are reduced to merely being enumerated in bullet lists as "persons who use the analogy" (whether or not they actually do so). Amazingly, some of the sources cited in the lists mention neither South Africa nor "the analogy". Their actual thoughts on the subject are not discussed at all. There have even been instances where authors were arbitrarily labeled "opponents of the analogy" by Wikipedia editors, despite the fact that no published source describes them as such. harlan ( talk) 15:51, 10 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Comments by ZScarpia

My personal view is that the inclusion of words such as allegations and alleged into article and section titles is a pox that should be discouraged in Wikipedia. The resulting titles sound very clunky and, rather than allowing the contents to speak for themselves, hint strongly in advance that what is said should be regarded with caution and treated with suspicion (just as if, say, the article was titled Refutations of Israeli Apartheid, it would be implied that it is normal to regard the practice of apartheid-like policies by Israel as an established fact). The words are used to mutilate that which is disliked but cannot be deleted.     ←   ZScarpia   00:00, 27 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Comments by Noleander

I concur with ZScarpia when he/she says that the word "analogy" or "allegation" is confusing and unnecessary. Some sources may use the term "apartheid" (in relation to Israel) as an analogy, some may use it as an accusation, some may use it as a metaphor, some may use it as a statement of fact. The title should not contain the limiting word "analogy" or "allegation", since that prejudices all subsequent content in the article. If some sources do use it as an analogy, that can be explained in the body of the article in the appropriate places. Likewise, I think "crime of apartheid" in the title would be limiting, and would exclude all situations where the source was not contemplating it as a crime. In conclusion, including any qualifying word (such as "allegation", "accusation", "crime" or "analogy") in the title is unnecessary and confusing, and will lead to endless debate - therefore the best title is the simplest one: "Israel and apartheid". -- Noleander ( talk) 20:33, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

[Note: summary table of "candidate titles" was moved from here to Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2010-04-14/Israel and the apartheid analogy#Table listing candidate titles -- Noleander ( talk) 14:47, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

archiving opening statement - this user is no longer a participant
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Comments by Stellarkid I agree with no one here and voted for deletion for this article. {I did not vote on an AFD-- I made this comment on the talk page [2]} However since it is here and since the title is being debated, I believe "Accusations of Israeli apartheid" is the best name for this article, since that is all it is. The idea of editors here starting an article which accuses Israel (or any other state for that matter) of "crimes against humanity" when she has not been brought up to any tribunal for such a thing is outrageous. What some editors envision here is bringing in every biased commentator that has any kind of reputation (including merely a reputation for being anti-Israel) to swear that in their opinion Israel is committing crimes against humanity. Supporters of Israel then have the onus on them to find RS that say otherwise. Of course, since Israel has never been accused in a court of law there will not be many international lawyers making a defense for her. Thus, bingo! the anti-Zionists (and by "anti-Zionism" I mean those who would prefer to see Israel 'wiped off the map' not the no-where definition found on WP) and others on WP have created an article that indicts and convicts Israel in the court of public opinion (that is, anti-Israel propaganda) and in the world's most-read encyclopedia. Just imagine if Israel were an individual accused of murder, and WP put up all sorts of opinions that the individual was guilty. That would simply not be acceptable, nor is this. Stellarkid ( talk) 16:18, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Administrative notes

Mediation closed 8/19/2010

This mediation was closed with a strong but imperfect consensus to change the name of the article to Israel and Apartheid (see here, with the inclusion of a disambiguation line that would alleviate concerns about misrepresentations. This was bsed largely on a discussion of policy and sourcing issues (the use of qualifiers like 'allegation' and 'allegory' seemed inconsistent with policy statements, and were seemingly not represented in sources with sufficient consistency to justify using the terms in the title). There was an equally strong but imperfect consensus to close the mediation (see here), primarily on the grounds that there was large agreement among participants and no ongoing discussions on the matter.

At least two participants failed to acknowledge the consensus, and discussion had reached a stalemate, therefore I recommend that participants consider moving on to formal mediation or arbitration, if such becomes necessary from future activity on the article. Informal mediation is unlikely to produce any stronger consensus, given the strength of the ideological divide represented in the editors. -- Ludwigs2 06:10, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Discussion

It sorta surpises me that this subject won't die. We have a number editors on both of this debate who agree that "analogy" is appropriate. I hope those editors will join me in seeking a close to this debate. In my mind what's being covered by this article isn't the opinion that "the current situation in Israel is apartheid" but rather the notable opinion that "the current situation in Israel is like apartheid". In this sense, it's an analogy. NickCT ( talk) 13:53, 24 May 2010 (UTC) reply

But how can we address the concerns raised by Harlan? There seem to be sources which do in fact argue that Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid whatever we may personally think of the relative merits of their arguments, can we ensure that whichever title we end up with isn't used to exclude material? Unomi ( talk) 23:23, 14 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I, as mediator would have to say that it would seem logical that that article present the avalible evidence for both sides of the argument, and that the title should reflect the contents of the article, and vice versa, per the MOS. Ronk01 ( talk) 01:02, 15 June 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Unomi - Re "There seem to be sources which do in fact argue that Israel is guilty " - Sure. But, to be frank, I'm sure you accept that this idea really hasn't gained wided acceptence among reliable sources. As such, it shouldn't be stated as fact.

@ Ronk01 - Agreed. This article is really about a political debate. As such, it should offer notable POVs from both sides of the debate. NickCT ( talk) 15:18, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

My concern was solely regarding the possibility of actively excluding sources and content who argue that Crimes of Apartheid have been committed on the grounds that they were not representing themselves as positing an analogy. Unomi ( talk) 00:32, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Unomi - Sure. Charges of actual apartheid lodged by notable sources seem notable within the context of the article. NickCT ( talk) 16:55, 8 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Israel and the crime of apartheid

I would like to suggest the title Israel and the crime of apartheid, since Israel was charged with that offense and the ICJ cited numerous policies and practices that are, by definition, constituent acts of apartheid. According to WP:YESPOV "The neutral point of view neither sympathizes with nor disparages its subject, nor does it endorse or oppose specific viewpoints."

Since there hasn't been much discussion, I'll make a long post outlining the reasons that the analogy is inappropriate. Notability determines whether a topic merits its own article. Whatever the so-called "apartheid analogy" is, the comments of NickCT and many other editors indicate that it is not intended to be truly analogous to "the crime of apartheid". See for example [3]. The lede of the article doesn't supply a published definition of the term, although I've specifically requested that a suitable definition be supplied from a reliable published source.

I think it's clear that there is content in the article that is on the subject of "Israel and the crime of apartheid". However, there is also content in the article that is not explicitly about whether a crime is being committed, but rather about whether Israel's actions resemble apartheid or have characteristics of apartheid without reference to international law. International law is not the sole authority regarding apartheid, apartheid is also a subject of general social/historical/political interest. The proposed title Israel and the crime of apartheid would significantly descope the article, requiring another article for the non-international-law discussion. This would be a content fork, which is valid. However, I'm not convinced that a content fork is in the best interests of the article. There would be a lot of redundancy between the articles, and I think readers are best served by an article that addresses the topic of Israel and apartheid as a whole, two parallel articles would be poorer than one well-integrated article. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 04:10, 21 June 2010 (UTC) reply

The article will have to explain the difference between "the crime of apartheid" and the Afrikaner term "apartheid", because Israel has been charged with genocide under Article 2 of the convention on apartheid. For example, the written complaint of Lebanon in the Wall case (cited above) cited Article 2 and "the deliberate imposition on a group of living conditions calculated to cause its physical destruction in whole or in part." The preamble of the convention explains that certain acts in the genocide convention can also be considered the crime of apartheid. The Arab League Fact Finding Mission report that was turned-over to the ICC Prosecutor cited Israel's failure to prevent incitement to commit genocide. Comments made by IDF and other Rabbis may have led to atrocities during Operation Cast Lead. Here are some other examples:

• Prof Francis Boyle called for the the Provisional Government of the State of Palestine and its President to institute legal proceedings against Israel before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for violating the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Palestinian Genocide
• Professors John Docker and Ned Curthoys condemned Operation Cast Lead as an example of genocide. They are scholars working in the fields of genocide studies and research. They say it seems clear that Israel - as in the history of white Australia since 1788 - is a genocidal settler colonial society that since its founding in 1948 continually seeks to destroy the foundations of life of the indigenous Palestinians, their health, dignity, livelihood, personal security, access to education, and political organisation, so that the Palestinians can be replaced by colonizing Zionist settlers. See the Australian Broadcasting Corporation story [31] Docker has written a paper for the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, Washington DC, 26 February 2004. [32]
• Herzliya Conference participant, Martin Kramer, discussed methods of reducing births in the Palestinian population of Gaza and suggested that was one of the goals of Israel's blockade. [33]

Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide to describe acts of murder and/or persecution. Segregation was "a lesser included offense" in his concept of the crime. In 1948, the UN couldn't persuade the colonial powers to outlaw persecution as part of the crime of genocide. Two decades later, when they were drafting the convention on the "crime of apartheid", the members of the UN took the opportunity to address issues related to occupation, colonialism, persecution, and genocide in keeping with Lemkin's concept. The UN expert panels tried to rationalize the situation by suggesting that allof the constituent acts of apartheid could be considered a "special instance of genocide". The South Africans quickly complained that physical destruction of blacks had nothing to do with their policies and practices of "separate development" or the original meaning of the Afrikaner term "apartheid". So, we ended up with a "crime of apartheid" that is not actually analogous to the South African practice of "apartheid". harlan ( talk) 09:41, 21 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Yes, an article titled "Israel and the crime of apartheid" could define the difference between the crime and other uses of the term "apartheid" in relation to Israel. However, it couldn't detail those other uses, because that would be outside the scope of the title. Those other uses must be detailed somewhere, because they're notable, so they'd need their own article to detail them. So this title would require a content fork. Most likely, the existing title "analogy" title would then stay and the "crime of apartheid" content would be split to another article. I'm not convinced this is a good approach, I think it would better to detail it all in one place and find a title that covers the full scope. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 22:46, 21 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Israel and apartheid

I'm of the opinion that Israel and apartheid would be the best title in terms of describing the article. It is all-inclusive, covering sources that suggest apartheid-like attributes of Israel's actions and sources that explicitly suggest Israel has violated the international conventions and law regarding apartheid. The objection that has been made previously is that this article title implies that Israel's actions definitely have aspects of apartheid. I don't perceive the title this way. Israeli apartheid might have such implications, but the "and" in Israel and apartheid suggests a neutral discussion of the intersection of the subjects. However I do think it's a valid concern that is worth discussing. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 04:23, 21 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I've suggested two similar "Israel and etc. ..." titles. So, I have no objection with yours - except it will require an explanation of the differences (i.e. genocide) between "the crime of apartheid" and the Afrikaner concept of "separate development". I would agree that "Israeli apartheid" is a non-starter. harlan ( talk) 09:55, 21 June 2010 (UTC) reply

In the original talkpage discussion, I was one of the neutrals. I would like to restate that my preferred title is the one being proposed in this section. The reason why I marked myself as a neutral was that I felt it unlikely that any title change would stick for long. Presumably, though, the longevity of any title settled on here would be more guaranteed.     ←   ZScarpia   00:32, 23 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I'm an uninvolved user not listed in this case, so I don't know if I'm supposed to comment here, but I just wanted to say: I think this proposed name is a bad one. 'Israel and apartheid', to me, implies an article about the relations between Israel and apartheid South Africa - which, in fact, we have at Israel – South Africa relations#Israeli relations with apartheid South Africa. I think that's what most readers might expect from that title, but as I understand it, it's not what this article is about: it's about allegations that Israeli policy towards the Palestinians resembles that of apartheid South Africa, or that Israel is guilty of the crime of apartheid. I think either the current name (Israel and the apartheid analogy) or the one before that (Allegations of Israeli apartheid) are preferable to Israel and apartheid, which should probably be a disambiguation page instead. Robofish ( talk) 13:10, 26 June 2010 (UTC) reply

That's certainly a reasonable concern. However, there are also concerns with the existing title and the previous one, because each of them only includes some of the scope of the content of the article. It's unlikely we'll find a perfect title (although if you've got any thoughts, suggest away), so we have to look for the least bad title. I reckon editors should add themselves as involved parties if they have strong opinions on the title of this article. This discussion isn't a dispute between a handful of editors, it's a rolling issue. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 23:29, 27 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Seems like a no-brainer to me! Least controversial while making topic clear. CarolMooreDC ( talk) 12:13, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Israel and racial segregation

Have thought about this a little more. I still think it's a reasonable concern that "Israel and apartheid" may connote an article about relations between Israel and South Africa under apartheid. This raises the issue of what the term "apartheid" means. Is it apartheid a historical system of segregation in South Africa? Or is apartheid a generic term for systems of segregation? It's clearly both. The United Nations, academics, writers and activists use it as a generic term. However, when most people hear the word "apartheid" alone they probably think of the original South African situation. Perhaps it's unfortunate that the term apartheid is so ambiguous - unlike "genocide" for example, which is clearly a generic term with separate terms for specific historical instances such as the Holocaust and the Armenian Genocide. When the UN uses the term apartheid, it seems to define it as a system of racial segregation (to cut a long definition short). In order to avoid the ambiguity of the term apartheid, which is commonly used to denote a specific historical situation, perhaps we could move to a description of apartheid rather than the term. The article could be called something like Israel and racial segregation. I realise that sounds a bit left-field, but the WP:NAME policy does allow for descriptions of a subject to be used as a title if the common terms are not suitable. Redirects could be used to ensure that readers searching for Israel and apartheid still reach the article. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 03:18, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Perhaps an inversion of the title to something along the lines of Apartheid in Israeli-controlled areas would help to clarify what the article is about?     ←   ZScarpia   13:22, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

In principle yes, but that title is too close to implying the existence of the apartheid. I think using an "and" has a distancing effect, whereas a formulation like that with "in" makes it sound more definite - which we can't do because of the degree of disagreement among the prominent sources. Unfortunately Apartheid and Israeli-controlled areas is nonsense... I think the English language is our enemy here. If this were the German Wikipedia we could probably jam together one long word that means the-discussion-of-the-possible-existance-of-apartheid-in-Iraeli-controlled-areas-and-its-possible-nature. :) Ryan Paddy ( talk) 19:50, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I think something more general, like Israel and racial segregation is a good idea. However, it suffers from some of the same problems as our existing terms: (a) racial discrimination is not always illegal, e.g. affirmative action; (b) it isn't generally considered to be synonymous with the crime of genocide.

Once a stigma gets attached to the terms used to describe extreme policies of racial discrimination, people coin new terms to replace the old ones, e.g. ghetto, pale of settlement, and Bantustan. The Online Dictionary of Etymology says apartheid was coined in the 1920s and adopted when "segregation" had acquired negative connotations. [37] The South African authorities usually self-described their policies and practices as "separate development" after the UN condemned apartheid. Official policy in Israel was frequently self-described using the term Hafrada. Some published sources have subsequently equated that term with Israeli Apartheid, e.g. Israeli Apartheid (Hafrada) [38]. Lemkin coined the term genocide long after the massacre of the Armenians. It was applied retrospectively. In much the same way, apartheid is now used by the Royal Society and others to describe prohibitions on relations between various groups like those in the ancient British Isles. See Is it necessary to assume an apartheid-like social structure in Early Anglo-Saxon England?

There are at least three definitions of genocide in international law. The definition in the Genocide Convention, the same acts which are mentioned in the preamble and Article II of the Convention on the Crime of Apartheid, and the definition adopted by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). See Jorgic v. Germany. See [39] The latter corresponds very closely to Lemkin's broader definition. Jorgic was guilty of executing 8-22 people. The ECHR stated that the "destruction of a group" meant destruction of the group as a social unit in its distinctiveness and particularity and its feeling of belonging together; a biological-physical destruction was not necessary. That sort of definition includes targeted killings carried out to achieve regime changes, eviction, etc. Incitement to commit genocide is a constituent act of the crime of genocide. So, it really isn't necessary to participate in the actual killing. See Finland sentences Rwanda preacher to life for genocide harlan ( talk) 02:14, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

On your point (a), note that I suggested racial segregation, not racial discrimination. On point (b), are you saying that the crime of apartheid is synonymous with genocide, and racial segregation doesn't sufficiently connote this? I would say that for most readers "apartheid" probably doesn't connote genocide either, so there's no difference. Overall, I think that apartheid largely means segregation, although the UN definition certainly has a wider scope that includes all means of racial domination. "Racial segregation" largely encompasses the UN definitions, while also encompassing other uses of apartheid such as those used by various authors who are addressing historical or social (not legal) definitions of apartheid while not connoting historical instances of racial segregation such as apartheid in South Africa. If your main concern is that apartheid is more than just segregation, that seems valid. It would be unfortunate if a title change descoped the article. In terms of the rest of your comments, I gather you're concerned that using "racial segregation" instead of "apartheid" would be a way to avoid stigma. That's certainly not my intent, and as you noted yourself "segregation" has its own stigma. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 02:37, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

On point (a) the only explicit prohibition against racial segregation in international law is contained in the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD). As the name implies, it is a species of "racial discrimination". Most readers will need an explanation of that term of art, because "racial discrimination" is defined in the ICERD to include almost anything except religion, i.e. "any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin." It also permits the adoption of affirmative action preferences on a temporary basis. There have been large influxes in the past of thousands of non-Hebrew speaking, non-Orthodox Ethiopian and Russian olim into make-shift pre-fab absorption centers; Bedouins sorted-out into "descent" groups on "tribal plots" in the ILA's resettlement towns; & etc. Those sort of population transfers have resulted in instances of de facto racial segregation.

The definitions of the crime of apartheid and genocide overlap. The preamble of the apartheid convention explains that certain acts in Article II of the Genocide Convention can also be considered as crimes of apartheid. Articles II a-c of the Genocide Convention [40] are included in Article II(a)(i), II(a)(ii), and II (b) of the Apartheid Convention. [41] Several of the interested parties in the 2004 Wall case reported that Israel was deliberately imposing on a group living conditions calculated to cause its physical destruction in whole or in part or murdering members of the group. An Independent Fact Finding Commission turned over their report to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court on behalf of the League of Arab States. See paragraph 8 [42] The Independent Fact Finding Commission report [43] cited the ICJ conclusions and stated that violations of the (ICCPR), (ICESCR), (UNCRC) give rise to criminal responsibility which may constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide. See paragraphs 428-433 (page 109-111). The report also said some members of the IDF may have committed acts of genocide and that the state of Israel may, as a consequence, be responsible for the commission of the crime of genocide. See Paragraph 30 (page 6), paragraph 558 (136), and paragraph 607 (page 148).

On point (b) that is exactly what I meant, i.e. we have the same problem with segregation that we already had with apartheid (it is a difference that makes no difference) - the reader won't associate either term with the acts of genocide that are included in article II of the international convention on the crime of apartheid. During the ARBCOM case [44] an editor redirected Apartheid outside of South Africa to Racial segregation and also proposed that Israeli apartheid be merged. There is no mention of Israel in the entire article on Racial segregation, and the CERD is only listed in an info box. That hardly reflects the fact that Israel's periodic reviews have contained numerous Article 3 issues and recommendations. harlan ( talk) 12:25, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Mediator note: just a reminder about synthesis. It is not our purpose to establish the 'true' state of affairs between Israel and the Palestinians, or to try to construct language so that readers get the 'correct' idea about what is happening in the real world situation. Our only concern lies in determining (a) which sources we consider to be reliable on this topic, and (b) what those sources have to say on the matter. If the preponderance of reliable sources use the word 'apartheid', then we should use the word without trying to second-guess what that word might mean to readers or whether it truly applies to the situation.

Please note that part of the problem we're dealing with here is that this Wikipeida article focuses on a topic (scholarly theories that Israel has created an apartheid like political structure) that is inherently critical of Israel (which is part of why I wondered whether it was a content fork, below). This means we need to find a way of presenting that critical perspective without appearing either to support or oppose that critical perspective. that's a difficult thing to do. -- Ludwigs2 14:45, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I concur that we need to focus on what the sources say, rather than the opinions of editors. That is why Im suggesting that we eliminate all qualifying words ("crime", "analogy", "allegation") from the title, because those words come from editors, not sources. Or, more accurately, the sources are all over the map on this topic, and so the the title should remain silent on the nature of the relationship between Israel and apartheid. The relationship is covered in detail in the body of the article, where the sources (often contradicting each other!) are identified and explained. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:58, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I was just in search of compromise names. But you're right, we should use the terms used in prominent reliable sources, and that's certainly "apartheid". Noleander's point is solid for the same reason. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 19:41, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Ludwigs2 I am discussing the definition of the topic of the article. It is Wikipedia policy that a brief definition of the topic should be included in the lede. The South African form of Apartheid did not include the crime of genocide. That prevents it from being an analogy, but that did not prevent it from satisfying the necessary elements of the crime of apartheid (which by definition included "racial segregation", and "racial discrimination").

Neolander's point that the word "crime" comes from Wikipedia editors, and not the sources, is incorrect. For example, the, Special Rapportuer, John Dugard [45] and the state of Lebanon (page 8) [46] both cited the 1973 Convention on the Crime of Apartheid, and said that Israel's policies and practices satisfy the necessary elements of the offense. Lebanon cited this constituent act from Article 2 of the convention: "the deliberate imposition on a group of living conditions calculated to cause its physical destruction in whole or in part". Prof. Richard Falk, the current United Nations Special Rapporteur on Palestinian human rights, cited the very same constituent act a few years ago in connection with the Gaza blockade. He said it was an example of the Crime of Genocide. [47] The apartheid convention itself explains that certain acts of genocide may also be qualified as acts of apartheid. WP:PSTS permits the use of the text of the conventions so long as the analysis is provided by sources like Dugard, Falk, the International Law Commission, etc.

The ICERD and its definition of "racial discrimination" is discussed in Dugard's report under the heading "VII. RACIAL DISCRIMINATION AND APARTHEID". The Apartheid convention uses the words "crime", "racial segregation", and "racial discrimination". The preamble of the Apartheid Convention says

"in accordance with the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, States particularly condemn racial segregation and apartheid and undertake to prevent, prohibit and eradicate all practices of this nature in territories under their jurisdiction,"

Article 1(1) of the Apartheid Convention says

"The States Parties to the present Convention declare that apartheid is a crime against humanity and that inhuman acts resulting from the policies and practices of apartheid and similar policies and practices of racial segregation and discrimination, as defined in article II of the Convention, are crimes violating the principles of international law,"

Some commentators think that Article II limits the scope of racial segregation to the actual practices of Southern Africa (Rhodesia, Angola, South Africa, etc), while others say the regular ICERD definition of racial discrimination still applies. No one ever claimed that the included acts of genocide were actually practiced in 1973-era Southern Africa. harlan ( talk) 13:42, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan: When I said that "the word 'crime' comes from Wikipedia editors, and not the sources" what I meant was that emphasizing "crime" in the article title would be a decision made by editors, not by sources. Let me try to rephrase my point: WP needs to reflect what the sources say. The sources discuss the relationship between Israel and apartheid from several angles: (1) as an analogy with South Africa; (2) as an accusation of discrimination; (3) as a crime in violation of international law; (4) in a rebuttal manner, refuting negative allegations; and (5) other ways. My point is that mentioning a single focus in the title (analogy vs. accusation vs crime, etc) violates POV policies because it steers the article (and reader) into just one aspect of the relationship. That is why I maintain the most neutral title is "Israel and apartheid". I know some editors don't like it because it seems to draw a conclusion, but contrast it with the proposal of "Israeli apartheid" which is perhaps too conclusive (and I dont support that title). Here is another idea: imagine some day that the article grows so large that it is broken into several sub-articles. What would they be? Whatever the answer is, then ask this: "What should the title of the parent article be, so that it encompasses all the subarticles?". -- Noleander ( talk) 14:30, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

harlan - discussing the definition of the topic of the article is acceptable, so long as it's focused on the mediation goal (deciding on the article title). The problem I'm trying to avoid is having the discussion wander off into more general debate, which would be distracting. Most sources on this issue are going to demonstrate a distinct POV, and within the body of the article all those POVs should be spelled out with proper respect to balance. But there is no room for that in the article title - the title should be minimal and purely descriptive. As best I understand it (currently) this article is about a common argument which compares the state of human rights in Israel to apartheid (either the original apartheid in South Africa or the UN definition of apartheid). There are going to be more extreme and less extreme statements of that (as well as rebuttals) in different sources, obviously, but we don't need to sort through that here. what we need to do is find a nice, neutral, less-than-ten-word statement of what the article is about that we can use as a title.

In other words, we all know that there are sources which call what Israel is doing a crime or say that it amounts to racial discrimination - you don't need to demonstrate that such sources exist. However, is it your contention that 'crime' or 'racial discrimination' are the most common/mainstream/frequent designations used in the preponderance of sources? If you believe that they are, then say so; if you don't believe that's true, then it seems to me that 'crime' and 'racial discrimination' are probably not useful terms in the article title. -- Ludwigs2 15:08, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Article Scope - Occupation, Colonialism, Apartheid

The article already includes sources, like the HSRC study, which discuss occupation, settler-colonialism, and genocide/apartheid. John Dugard mentioned the fact that "The international community has identified three regimes as inimical to human rights - colonialism, apartheid and foreign occupation." See A/HRC/4/17, 29 January 2007.

The inherent connection between displacement by military occupation, colonization, racial segregation, and genocide/apartheid had been a topic that was openly discussed in the works of Jewish thinkers of the day like Ze'ev Jabotinsky, Raphael Lemkin, and Hannah Arendt. There are many modern works which address the colonization of Palestine, e.g. "Settler Colonialism in the Twentieth Century: Projects, Practices, Legacies, by Caroline Elkins (Editor), and Susan Pedersen (Editor), Routledge; 2005, ISBN: 0415949432.

The General Assembly summed up the Nürnberg crimes by including that linked combination in the "Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity": [48]

(b) Crimes against humanity whether committed in time of war or in time of peace as they are defined in the Charter of the International Military Tribunal, Nürnberg, of 8 August 1945 and confirmed by resolutions 3 (I) of 13 February 1946 and 95 (I) of 11 December 1946 of the General Assembly of the United Nations, eviction by armed attack or occupation and inhuman acts resulting from the policy of apartheid , and the crime of genocide as defined in the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, even if such acts do not constitute a violation of the domestic law of the country in which they were committed.

The General Assembly resolution which contained the draft convention on apartheid, UNGA resolution 2786 (XXVI) 6 November 1971, had explicitly linked the crime with occupation and colonialism. So did the subsequent drafts:

Reaffirming again that the conclusion of an international convention on the suppression and punishment of the crime of apartheid would be an important contribution in the struggle against apartheid, racism, economic exploitation, colonial domination, and foreign occupation. -- UN GA resolution 2922, 15 November 1972

Imperial Germany colonized the land and committed genocide against the local Herero and Nama peoples. So, before the Union of South Africa was established in 1910, the Boers had already concluded their genocidal phase and went on to persecute the remaining native population in subsequent years. See "Prelude to disaster: An analysis of the racial policies of Boer and British settlers in South Africa before 1910", by Okon Edet Uya, Dept. of History, Howard University

Benjamin Madley, Hannah Arendt, and others wrote that the German Imperial experience in places like Namibia was a crucial precursor to the Nazi policy on colonialism and genocide, Lebensraum. See Benjamin Madley, "From Africa to Auschwitz: How German South West Africa Incubated Ideas and Methods Adopted and Developed by the Nazis in Eastern Europe," European History Quarterly 2005 35(3): 429-464 and "Hannah Arendt and the uses of history: imperialism, nation, race, and genocide", Richard H. King, Dan Stone eds, Berghahn Books, 2008, ISBN: 1845455894. The latter contains a discussion on Palestine [49] Thoughts?

I think the article is already large with the scope it has, attempting to increase its scope further may make it unwieldy. Those related subjects could be covered in other articles, perhaps as sub-articles under an overarching parent article regarding the relations of Israel and the Palestinian people. This article isn't that overarching article, it would have to lie somewhere between this article and Israeli–Palestinian conflict. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 20:24, 24 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I mentioned it because Wikipedia already has unrelated articles that do not mention the historical relationship between occupation, colonialism, and apartheid/genocide: Human rights in Israel, Israeli-occupied territories, Israeli settlement, Israel and the apartheid analogy and Settler colonialism - Israel. harlan ( talk) 01:03, 25 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Perhaps Harlan would answer just one question for me. That is, every Jew in Gaza and West Bank is an unwelcome "settler" because the Palestinians believe they own that real estate. "Settlers" (ie Jews in land Palestinians call theirs) are considered #1 problem. Well, sure. The Jew is the problem. Yet "Arab citizens of Israel comprise just over 20% of the country's total population." Arab citizens of Israel (who, according to WP in the majority ..."identify themselves as Arab or Palestinian by nationality and Israeli by citizenship") basically (perhaps with a few arguable exceptions) have the same rights and privileges as other Israelis. Why is it that the Palestinian Arabs will not tolerate a Jew on what they consider their land? I say your Palestine is a better example of apartheid than Israel is. The leader of the Palestinian people Mohammad Amin al-Husayni met with Hitler to urge him to "oppose the establishment of a Jewish national home in Palestine." Surely you will not contend, that today's Hamas, whose charter (a legal document?) acknowledges that they wish to throw the Jews into the sea (figuratively of course), and has wrenched total control over the Gaza Strip and has no qualms about seizing the rest of "Palestine" immediately upon Israel ceding it to the Palestinian people, intends to allow Jews to live there with the same rights and privileges as the Muslim Arabs, ie with the same rights and privileges of the general population? I don't have any sympathy with your attempt to make a legal case against Israel, since I can make a much stronger moral case against Palestinian Arabs and their Arab neighbors. But WP is not court of law and it is not up to us to make either a legal or a moral case against any person or groups of people. If you want to accuse Israel of the "crime of apartheid," I suggest you obtain a blog somewhere, write a book, or get a legal degree and find the appropriate court. This is not the appropriate venue. Stellarkid ( talk) 01:36, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan's comment seemed to be veering off topic for this mediation case, and yours seems even further off topic. Can we stick to the subject of what to call the article? Ryan Paddy ( talk) 02:46, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan had a whole section to himself and his prejudices. I think a few words from the other side is not unwarranted. Stellarkid ( talk) 03:04, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan is welcome to comment on my questions on my talk page, so as not to further clutter this generally anti-Israeli diatribe pretending to mediation. For that matter, looking above, I would argue that you would do well to follow your own excellent advice. Stellarkid ( talk) 03:07, 29 June 2010 (UTC)< reply

In fact, it looks to me that all this conversation has been entirely one-sided, since I am the only individual on the "pro-Israel" side that has commented here, am I not? Pretty, good, and first thing that happens is I am essentially told to shut up and stick to the topic. About par for the course, colleagues. Stellarkid ( talk) 03:13, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I'm not saying shut up, I welcome your presence - especially given that, as you note, the case hasn't attracted representatively diverse opinion yet. I'm not the mediator either, so my comment was just a suggestion. It's just that with this topic, it seems like there's a real risk of veering into discussing general Israel/Palestinian topics, rather than discussing the article title. You're probably right that I got sucked into discussing this above too, I was hoping we might squeeze some sideways relevance to the case out of Harlan's section. Will try to stay on topic. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 03:21, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

A pretty similar situation occurred recently at the Gaza Flotilla Raid talkpage. At 22:06, 26 June 2010 (UTC) I asked you a question about the legitimacy of Palestinians blockading Israel since, according to Israel, a state of war existed; I was politely told to shut up; I accepted that my question wasn't relevant to the talkpage; I dropped the question.     ←   ZScarpia   10:18, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Ryan, the original ARBCOM case was the result a wheel war over the scope and topic of the article. One of the things that we should clear-up at the outset in this moderation case is the scope of the article - so that we can dispose of the notion that Wikipedia can't have more than one article that discusses this topic, i.e. every mention of apartheid is another instance of "the analogy". I agree that the HSRC Study and the John Docker/Ned Cuthoys article address issues related to military occupation and colonialism that together with Jabotinsky's Iron Wall, and Pedersen's Twentieth Century Settler Colonialism should be the basis of separate article(s). I see no reason that Wikipedia can't have standalone articles on the HSRC and Barcelona studies. Wikipedia has related articles, e.g. like the Sasson Report, and etc., and MacMillan's "The Modern Encyclopedia of the Middle East and North Africa" has articles like the Karp Report (1984) [55]. harlan ( talk) 05:17, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

* I've just signed myself on as mediator for this case, and I want to step in and make three comments here:

1. it will be much better in the long run if all the participants make opening statements first in the section above, and save the discussion section for more structured questions later. We don't want this page to become a mere extension of the dispute on the article talk page.
2. I will be posting a set of discussion rules tomorrow later today, but in the meantime please try to avoid comments directed at other editors. Everyone in this mediation has their own opinion, obviously, but we don't want to focus on editors, we want to focus on issues.
3. Please keep comments contained within the scope of the mediation, which currently is on the article title. Obviously we'll have to consider the broader picture to a certain extent, and anyone can open a discussion here in the discussion section about expanding or changing the scope of the case, but it would be best to avoid wandering off into more general discussions as much as possible.

Thanks. -- Ludwigs2 09:26, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Table listing candidate titles

It may be helpful to use a concise table to list the candidate titles. A sample table is below. Perhaps if the mediator were the only person able to edit the "advantages" and "disadvantages" columns (after getting input elsewhere in this mediation page) that would keep it terse and minimize polemicizing. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:10, 29 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Candidate title	Advantages (mediator only)	Disadvantages (mediator only)	Editors that endorse/support
1) Israel and the apartheid analogy	point 1 point 2	point 3 point 4	Editor E
2) Israel apartheid analogy	point 1 point 2	point 3 point 4	.
3) Israel and the crime of apartheid	point 1 point 2	point 3 point 4	.
4) Allegations of Israeli apartheid	.	.	Editor B, Editor C
5) Israel apartheid allegations	.	.	.
6) Israeli apartheid (allegations of) / Israeli apartheid, allegations of	.	.	.
7) Israel and apartheid	.	.	Editor A
8) Accusations of Israeli apartheid	.	.	Editor D
9) Israel apartheid accusations	.	.	.
10) Israeli apartheid (Hafrada)	.	.	.
11) Israeli apartheid	.	.	.
12) Israel, apartheid, and the Palestinians	.	.	.
13) The apartheid analogy for Israeli governance	.	.	.
14) Apartheid against the Palestinian people	.	.	.
15) ... other ...	.	.	.

How about Accusations of Israeli Apartheid? Ronk01 ( talk) 20:46, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Okay, I added it to the table. BTW: anyone is welcome to edit the above table. -- Noleander ( talk) 20:50, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I think that Israeli apartheid allegations sounds less clunky and looks better (the emphasis is put on the word Israeli rather than Allegations) than Allegations of Israeli apartheid. Anybody know whether a precedent has been set for the use of trailing qualifiers in forms such as Israeli apartheid (allegations of)?     ←   ZScarpia   22:16, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I think Israeli apartheid allegations is not desireable because readers may think it means "allegations by/from people/government of Israel". As for Israeli apartheid (allegations of) ... I've never seen that in the encyclopedia, so it may be unorthodox. On the other hand, there is the precedent of Joe Smith (author) or The River (song) but that is - I think - only used to disambiguate multiple articles that would otherwise have the same name. In any case, the word "allegation" also has the downsides described above. -- Noleander ( talk) 22:36, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

Dropping the letter i, Israel apartheid allegations then? I would prefer the word allegations not to appear in the title. It's just that, if the consensus goes against that, I'd far rather see the apartheid allegations rather than allegations of apartheid form.     ←   ZScarpia   23:29, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I think some sort of summary structure like this table would be good. I reckon the advantages and disadvantages should be input into the summary by the mediator, with notes on the degree of consensus for each. We don't want to end up with edits and counter-edits to the summary by parties in disagreement. There could be a fourth column called something like "Support", that records the level of consensus support for each option as an acceptable title. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 22:24, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I added a fourth column, per that suggestion. I added some names as an example of how the 4th column could be used ... but not with the intention of starting a voting contest ... just to show how it could work. -- Noleander ( talk) 22:29, 28 June 2010 (UTC) reply

I think this is a good approach, but I think it needs to be tweaked some. for instance, in my position as mediator what I think are the advantages and disadvantages of each possibility is irrelevant. I mean, I can state the obvious - e.g. any title that involves the word 'crime' would be suspect, since there has been (to my knowledge) no UN or ICC ruling that Israel has committed an actual crime. titles of that sort would at very least need to add the word 'alleged'. i am happy to moderate any discussion about the pros and cons of each position, however, and will fill in the blanks if and as you all reach consensus about what the pros and cons of each are. maybe someone wants to start that discussion? -- Ludwigs2 05:00, 4 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Yeah that's how I imagined its use, with you facilitating us to reach consensus on the pros and cons and prefered names, and noting our consensus. Inevitably, in some cases unanimous consensus won't be reached, so you could note "consensus -1" or whatever. The table might be best somewhere at the top of this page, as a summary of progress, rather than bang in the middle where it is. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 10:03, 4 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Questions from mediator

ok, seems that things have gotten a bit quiet here, which may be good, or bad, or meaningless... But since it is quiet, let me throw out a few questions that have occurred to me for general discussion to see if they get us anywhere. -- Ludwigs2 07:37, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

What are the search keywords that need to be in the title?

An article title needs to do two things - it needs to describe the topic (briefly) and it needs to provide search keywords for readers on wikipedia. what are the search keywords that need to be in the title for effective searching? -- Ludwigs2 07:37, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Certainly "apartheid" and "Israel". Related words are "crime", "alleged", "accusations", "south africa", "analogy", "jimmy carter", "apartheid wall", "palestinians". I think the WP search function will look at words in the body of the article, as well as the title. My suggestion would be to de-emphasize the search aspect of the title, because adding additional words (such as "allleged" or "accustations") into the title has the effect of (1) limiting the scope of the article; and (2) biasing the reader as to what the sources on the topic say. -- Noleander ( talk) 11:49, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

It might be useful to mention that WP:RNEUTRAL provides that WP:NPOV does NOT apply to redirects. So key words, and even redirect page titles, like Israeli Apartheid, already exist. harlan ( talk) 05:30, 4 July 2010 (UTC) reply

"Israel" certainly. "Apartheid" probably, because it's the term commonly used, although I do have some reservations about its ambiguity as a generic term or the name of the historical SA system. "Palestinians", perhaps. Because of the nature of this article, no title will be one that everyone, or even a majority of people, would search for. But "Israel" and "apartheid" are probably the two terms that a big majority of people with an interest in the subject would use. Per WP:NAME (which I guess is recommended reading, seeing we're mediating the name of an article here), the key attributes are that the name should be recognisable, unambiguous, and consistent with English-language sources. Searchability, conciseness, and consistency with other names are desirable too. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 10:14, 4 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Notable topic or content fork?

I am torn whether to consider this article a notable topic in its own right or a content fork of a different topic (e.g. 'Israeli Palestinian relations' or some such). would this article be better off merged into or with a related article, just to balance the perspective? -- Ludwigs2 07:37, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

The article has been around for over four years, and has survived five (!) deletion proposals. Each deletion proposal contained extensive debate about whether the article was a POV fork, and every time the article was kept. Expanding this mediation to consider a Merge proposal may be steering the mediation into a direction the originators of the mediation did not contemplate - and there is a 100% certainty the result would be "dont merge". So - for purposes of this mediation - it may be best to just concede the result those AfDs, and limit the mediation to selecting a wording for the article title. -- Noleander ( talk) 11:54, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Granting that you are almost certainly correct about the outcome, I'll say that I've participated in deletion debates in the past, and as a rule they are not great examples of deliberation. I think this mediation would be a good place to discuss and clarify the issue in a reasoned way, so that we have clear statements about (a) what the article is, and (b) why the article needs to exist on wikipedia, which should forestall any future AfD discussions.

also, please note I said content fork, not POV fork. There are some good reasons to create content forks (usually having to do with article size), and if we can identify this article as a content fork of a broader debate we might be able to quell a lot of objections by adding a header that says, effectively, "This page explains one perspective in the broader debate about <...>. See that page for details." if you see what I mean... -- Ludwigs2 14:57, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

You are the mediator, so it is your call. I'm just pointing out that if this is expanded into a Merger proposal, it may get off-track and the original purpose of the mediation (a very specific question about what the best title is) may get lost, and we may all waste a lot of time with nothing to show for it. My 2 cents :-) -- Noleander ( talk) 15:01, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

The huge number of prominent & lengthy reliable sources specifically about whether Israel's actions amount to apartheid or not suggest this is a notable topic in its own right. If it wasn't it would be goneburger after the large number of AfDs, which attracted a lot of attention and were largely well-argued. It's only a content fork in the sense that every article about a country could be viewed as a content fork of that country's article: i.e. not in any useful sense. Not only is it very notable, but it's very involved and the length of the discussion would overwhelm any article it was merged to. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 19:49, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Have looked into this some more. Israel and the apartheid analogy is a spinout of Human rights in Israel, which summarises the article in its "Apartheid analogy" section. Per WP:CFORK, this is an acceptable article spinout from a parent summary-style article. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 22:49, 1 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I concur with Ryan Paddy, and would also note that the article is using the Template:Discrimination sidebar template. Also it can be viewed as as subarticle of Crime of apartheid. So there are a few paths a reader could follow to get to this article:

• Israel -> Human rights in Israel -> Israel and the apartheid analogy
• Template:Discrimination sidebar -> Israel and the apartheid analogy
• Crime of apartheid -> Israel and the apartheid analogy

But as far as splitting articles, indeed Human rights in Israel appears to be the parent article of Israel and the apartheid analogy. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:52, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Your analysis completely overlooks the actual events that took place prior to the last Arbcom case. The Wikipedia:NPOV tutorial describes the procedure that was employed: a "split can be performed in a POV way, for example by putting everything you don't like in a new article and then giving that article an un-common name, so obfuscating its whereabouts."

Articles and split-out material that were critical of Israel's policies and practices were labeled propaganda, de-linked, and targeted for deletion no matter how notable the topic or how reliable the sources they were based upon. One of the issues mediation should address in this case is the longstanding content dispute stemming from the contention that any (and all) references to Israel and apartheid are instances of "the apartheid analogy". That claim was usually followed by tag team deletions and reverts that established a firewall between articles using opposing shop-worn arguments, e.g. (a) "this page is not about the apartheid analogy", e.g. [56] - " Israel and the apartheid analogy is nothing but a propaganda tool" - "the comparisons some people choose to make, for their own purposes, are of little relevance." [57]; and (b) "(we're discussing the analogy (between Israel's actions and apartheid, not apartheid itself)" [58]

In another example, human rights groups won a decision in the High Court of Israel on the IDF's use of human shields. The article was AfD'd and delinked from Human Rights in Israel [59] The same group of users AfD'd Israel and the Apartheid analogy and many other articles, e.g. Hafrada. The Arbcom resulted from a renaming/delink/move/AfD war.

There are hundreds of references to the crime of apartheid, racial discrimination, and racial segregation in the proceedings of the UN political organs; the International Law Commission Yearbooks; Law digests (e.g. The Israel Yearbook on Human Rights); the International conventions; the ICJ Wall case and its exhibits; and textbooks on humanitarian and human rights law, political science, and sociology. "The apartheid analogy" is a partisan political construct coined for use in Op-Ed columns, & etc. It is a separate political topic that receives scant, to no attention, in official and scholarly literature. Any editor who claims the written statement of Lebanon in the ICJ case is an instance of "the apartheid analogy" is violating WP:Synth.

Any ordinary user can usually create an article. Hwever, in the case of Israel and the crime of apartheid, the standing ARBCOM decision requires mandatory mediation regarding article titles dealing with apartheid. I've asked for a separate article [60] harlan ( talk) 04:09, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan, ok... One of the problems with mediating a case like this is the tendency for broad-ranging issues to arise. I do not doubt that there is a bit of a problem with these articles - I've seen enough cases on wikipedia of otherwise well-intentioned editors letting their POVs get the better of them to know that it happens. However, we are not in a position here to fix a problem that spans multiple pages; we can only work on this page. Now, if you and the other editors want to expand the scope of this mediation to include content problems, that's fine with me, but let's do it explicitly (i.e., let's start up a thread about it and get everyone to agree that that's what we're discussing here). It certainly sounds to my uninformed ear like the comparison of Israeli actions to apartheid is a notable topic, so it shouldn't be excluded (if that's what's happening). we just need to make it clear that this is a comparison made by activists and some scholars, not a statement of established fact under international law.

It seems to me like you are objecting to the term 'apartheid analogy' because 'analogy' doesn't reflect what you hold is actually happening in Israel, is that correct? If that's so, then we ned to consider the nature of this article - it should be on human rights abuses in Israel, and the apartheid analogy should only be one perspective on those abuses. but isn't that what the human rights in Israel article does? If this article is specifically intended to be a (valid) content fork of human rights in Israel dealing with the apartheid analogy as a discourse in that conversation, then the article ought to be titled something like "The apartheid analogy for Israel's treatment of the Palestinians". If this article is supposed to be something broader than that, what would that broader thing be? -- Ludwigs2 06:48, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Bear in mind that the objection to the term "analogy" as an adequate description of the complete subject matter is what prompted this case in the first place. The problem with "analogy" is that it suggests a comparison to the historical South African regime. This is a perfectly good way of describing some sources, they are making such a comparison. However, other sources are not making any such comparison. Those other sources are suggesting that Israel may be guilty of the "crime of apartheid" under international law. This cannot be described as an analogy, because the "crime of apartheid" is not identical to South African apartheid. It's also not an analogy because it's not a comparison being made, it's an argument that Israel's actions may meet the definition of the crime. The title "Israel and the apartheid analogy" is underscoped to include that notable aspect of the topic. Therefore we need a title that includes that scope - either as the title of a new article as Harlan suggests, or as a new title with a broader scope for the existing article, which I'd prefer. I'm not as concerned as Harlan that some sort of broader Wikipedia cover-up of Israeli human rights issues is happening here, but I do agree that sources discussing Israel and the crime of apartheid cannot be described as an analogy - although I took some convincing to reach that conclusion. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 09:37, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan: Thanks for educating me about your proposal for a new article dedicated to "Israel and the crime of apartheid" .. that clarifies things a bit. I agree with Harlan that the word "analogy" in the article's current title is not consistent with the fact that many sources describe it as an actual crime. The two solutions to this dilemma are (1) Create a new article on Israel and the crime of A, in addition to the "Analogy" article; or (2) re-name the current article to eliminate the word "analogy". Of those two paths forward, I think (2) is better for a couple of reasons: (a) solution 2 is less controversial than solution 1; and (b) solution 2 is the topic of this Mediation effort. So, I recommend that we focus - for the short term - on improving the article title. The article already has a section on the "Crime of .." right at the top. That section may (or may not) grow over time: when it gets too large, it can be split-off into a new "Crime" article as a legitimate content-fork. -- Noleander ( talk) 13:50, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

[out]Right. So we are having an article where Israel is accused of a crime against humanity, and every XXXXXX in the world's opinion will be brought to bear to convict her. Israel has not been accused of this in any court, so there are few if any lawyers that are working on a defense. Thus we will have an article that will essentially use a number of biased commentators to "prove" her guilt, and up to the rest of us to try to find RS that defend her. Since it has not been adjudicated anywhere, we will manage to be judge and jury right here on WP. The only thing that would be any better would be if we could be the executioner as well, lol. Stellarkid ( talk) 14:06, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Stellarkid: please note the fine line that wikipedia has to walk in cases like this:

• Wikipedia accuses Israel of the crime of Apartheid - ✗ bad editing, against policy, can't do this.
• Wikipedia reports that some reliable sources accuse Israel of the crime of Apartheid - ✓ good editing, supported by policy, can (even should) do this.

The second point will offend many readers and editors for any of a number of reasons, but per wp:NOTCENSORED, wikipedia does not remove encyclopedic content solely because it is offensive.

@ Ryan, Noleander, and Harlan: I'm still obviously coming to grips with the dimensions of this dispute, but it seems to me that most of the problems with the title are arising from confusions about the word 'Apartheid'. maybe we should consider a larger shift, to something like "Criminal allegations against Israel over human rights"? That seems to capture the gist of the debate without confusing comparisons to South Africa or implications about the truth of the matter. -- Ludwigs2 16:26, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

er... some reliable biased sources? Stellarkid ( talk) 17:11, 5 July 2010 (UTC)ps "Criminal allegations..." would be a dangling modifier." reply

Just for the hell of it, can we pretend that the allegations were against a single Jew as opposed to the Jewish state. Let's say that he has never been taken to court for this but that we can find a lot of people (some quite "reliable" such as Helen Thomas, Noam Chomsky, Mel Gibson, and more) who were willing to say that the Jew was guilty for this reason or that. Would that be OK? Is there a George W. Bush and allegations of crimes against humanity? Plenty of people thought so. Many "reliable sources" argued that he should be taken to court. Is there such an article here? — Preceding unsigned comment added by stellarkid ( talk • contribs)

Ludwigs: The title "Criminal allegations against Israel over human rights" may have the downside that it excludes a lot of content that is already in the article. The sources in the article discuss apartheid in relation to Israel in several different ways: some compare it to South Africa, some describe it as a violation of international law, some just use it to describe perceived discrimination. That suggested title would exclude all the non-criminal aspects of the discussion. You are touching on what Harlan is talking about: he says there are enough sources/content for an entire article on just the criminal aspect of the topic (i.e. sources that discuss the possible violation of international apartheid law) and your suggested title may be appropriate for that proposed article. But probably 90% of the sources currently cited in the article do not address the topic in the context of a crime. That is why I've suggested just keeping the title very short: "Israel and apartheid" so it could include all aspects of the topic. If we put any limiting word in the title like "analogy" or "crime" that means the article cannot include a large amount of the content that is already in the article. -- Noleander ( talk) 18:45, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Noleander: point taken. that seems to lead us back towards something like "Israel and allegations of apartheid" (allegation is stronger than analogy without being definite, and the phrasing is ambiguous enough to include SA comparisons, violations of international law, and perceived discrimination). would you have the same objections to that?

I could give you my opinion of that title, but I have a suggestion: could we try to use that table of candidate titles? That way we could approach the title issue in a systematic manner. Something like:

1) Get a comprehensive list of all proposed titles

2) Have participants in the mediation !vote for their favorite

3) Eliminate the titles that get no votes

4) Narrow down to 2 or 3 finalists

5) Solicit and discuss the pros and cons of the 2 or 3 finalists

6) Select the best one.

That process would have the benefits that it would include all the participants (vs. discussions within an obscure thread like this one); and also it would be defensible: in other words, after the decision is made, you could point at the step-by-step process as evidence that a structured process was followed. -- Noleander ( talk) 19:17, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I've been thinking about that, actually, but I'm not entirely happy with the current format. for one, the disadvantages/advantages sections should really be a matter of discussion, not something that's mediator only. for another, the 'single endorsement' format probably won't be very satisfying. give me the afternoon to consider it; I'll post a new section for a poll in a few hours. -- Ludwigs2 19:31, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Okay. The table was just a suggested starting point: of course you are free to modify it any way you want. The purpose of the phrase "mediator only" in the column headings was to indicate that only the mediator could record the consensus in that table (in other words: the discussion would take place outside the table, then the mediator would record the pros/cons in the table - but non-mediators could not edit those columns, to avoid an edit war within the table itself). Also, the endorsement column could be handled a few ways: e.g. each editor could vote for 2 or 3 of their preferred titles (although that could lead to "gaming the system" and abuse of the voting). -- Noleander ( talk) 19:52, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Stellarkid: Per wp:NPOV there is no problem with using biased sources, so long as the sources satisfy certain basic requirements and that sources' biases are clearly noted in the article and balanced by other sources. That's blue-letter policy. It's editorial bias we need to avoid.

with respect to your comments on GWB, see Bush Six, Legality of the Iraq War, and Opposition to the Iraq War for starts, and feel free to start another article if those are not sufficient.

You seem to be concerned that this wikipedia article not make Israel look bad (impugn its reputation) but that's not an encyclopedic issue. Wikipedia is merely supposed to report what authoritative voices on the topic are saying, and if some of them are saying things that make Israel look bad, that is the prerogative of the source; we simply attribute the comment correctly to that source so that it's clear where the opinion is coming from. I mean, it's not like this is the only place where there are unproven but harsh allegations being made in the world. see War in Darfur, Central African Republic Bush War, Human Rights Record of the United States, Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse, Human rights in Tibet, Black jails, and a host of other pages that have nothing to do with Israel. the vociferous political battles over Israel's international reputation (which will continue in the real world whatever we do) should not be fought on wikipedia, not from either side.

I want to make sure we're clear on this. it's very easy to unintentionally import real-world battles onto wikipedia, but we all need to have the self-awareness to recognize it when it happens, and the self-control to stop doing it and go back to what sources are saying. ok? -- Ludwigs2 19:06, 5 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I do appreciate what you are trying to put across. I realize for example that we have articles on the 9-11 truthers because they are out there and we are reporting what is out there. Accusations and allegations that Israel has an apartheid system are out there, but when we suggest (and try to make the case), or suggest as WP:TRUTH that Israel is involved in crimes against humanity by using legalese when there has been no indictment, no court hearing, I find it offensive. We are not here to make a mock court and to decide based on the numbers in a jury. I don't have much more to say about it. I have no interest in bringing real-world battles into WP; I think WP just doesn't "get it" when it comes to this situation. The numbers of pro-Palestinians, Arabs, fundamentalist Muslims, progressives and just plain anti-semites who would like to crush and wipe out Israel far far outweigh those of us who would like to see Israel get a fair shake. That's all I have to say about it. You can just consider me no longer involved. Thank you. Stellarkid ( talk) 02:21, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Questions for the mediator

What are the four points that you are noting in the table above, and how are editors labeled ie Editor A, B, C etc? For example, who is editor D in your list? Stellarkid ( talk) 03:21, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I think that table is just a suggestion from Noleander (who is not the mediator) on how to structure agreements reached during the mediation. The "Editor A" etc. are just examples of how the table could be used, not actual editors. The mediator hasn't commented on whether he wants to use the table idea yet. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 03:28, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I see, thank you. Stellarkid ( talk) 12:52, 2 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Straw poll on titles

Here is a straw poll on the titles we've gathered so far. Instructions are at right. Keep text within the poll to a minimum to keep it from getting excessively large; make any comments in the discussion section below. let's let this run for a few days and see what the short list of favored options is. -- Ludwigs2 03:50, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Straw poll

Straw poll discussion

Before we start, I wonder whether it wouldn't be a good idea to group the suggested titles and then have editors specify their group order of preference. That would avoid the situation where editors expend their votes on variations of the same theme. Some of the natural groupings are: titles with the word allegation or accusation in; titles with the word analogy in; titles with the word crime in (so far, a group of one); titles which do not have words like analogy, allegation or crime in (that is: Israeli apartheid (Hafrada); Israeli apartheid; Israel, apartheid, and the Palestinians; Apartheid against the Palestinian people).     ←   ZScarpia   11:28, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I think that's a really good idea. Personally, I think the best titles are those in the first group you mentioned (allegations/accusations), but picking which of those words to use it quite a bit more nuanced. I'd also hate for the results to get skewed because of how many titles each group you mentioned has. Another option would just be to add up the votes for titles in the same group as votes for that group, but that might be a bit problematic as well. ←  George  ^talk 10:00, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

well, this is a straw poll, not a vote, so we don't need to get super-detailed with it. however, if you want to suggest which ones should be combined I'll fix it up. -- Ludwigs2 14:33, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Yeah, I think it may be a good idea to aggregate similar titles for the first pass: otherwise you could get distorted !vote counts. I agree with ZScarpia's proposed grouping into four groups: allegation/accusation, analogy, crime, & others. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:38, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

well, I could do that, but recognize that if I'm going to do that then it changes the nature of the vote entirely. Many of the complaints I've seen have been over minor differences - e.g. Israel apartheid analogy vs. Israel and apartheid analogy - and those kinds of differences will not be captured at all if we use groups. -- Ludwigs2 14:55, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Now that people have started filling in the table I accept that it would probably be better to carry on. I suspect, though, that, whatever happens, we're going to end up with a discussion of which variant of a title to accept. Say a title with the word analogy in ends up as the one with the most support at the end of the process, before finally accepting it, people preferring a different, previously rejected, variation will probably want to open a discussion just to confirm that the one that has come through the process is definitely the one with majority support. By grouping first, it might have prevented repeated discussion of which variation to accept. It would have also made life easier for characters like me by reducing the number of initial choices. But, let's see how things go!     ←   ZScarpia   10:49, 7 July 2010 (UTC) reply

well, part of the reason I used a 'choose three' setup is that it gives underdog options a bit of a better chance to make the first cut. once people have put in their votes here we can begin weighing the pros and cons of the three most-favored options. remember, this was never going to be decided by a vote, regardless - it can only be resolved through discussion. the vote is just to help focus and narrow the debate. -- Ludwigs2 14:38, 7 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I've only entered a first preference for "Israel and apartheid", none of the other options appeal at this time. If I were to come around to another option it might be "Israel apartheid allegations". However the last time a rename occurred there were objections that some prominent sources are not making "allegations", they are only making observations of a resemblence or raising the concern of a possible future direction that Israel might be heading in. However, if there's general agreement among the involved parties that apartheid is a generally disapproved-of practice, then I might be pursuaded that sources which state that Israel's actions resemble (or may soon resemble) apartheid can be described as making "allegations" without that editor inference constituting WP:OR. If apartheid is bad, then clearly by inference it's an allegation (in the lay sense, not in a legal sense) to state that Israeli practices may resemble it. Presumably, there might also be objections that it's not an allegation, it's a fact. However, I think the sources are against this framing: there is not enough concordance in the sources regarding Israeli-apartheid-as-a-fact for us as editors to frame it that way in the title. A review of the most prominent sources might be required if that point came into contention. I think the formulation with "allegations" at the end may be what's making me consider revising my opinion on this, "allegations" at the beginning gave it too great an emphasis. However, that's a lot of conditions, and even if they all came true I'd still find "Israel and apartheid" preferable. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 22:38, 6 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I've entered a second choice for "Israel apartheid allegations". If we're going to narrow the options for discussion, I'd like to have another option available that I consider workable. I think "analogy" and "crime" both give the wrong scope, but "allegation" could arguably have the correct scope. While many editors find the "Allegations of ..." formulation unencyclopedic, the "... allegations" formulation hasn't been tested in any discussions I've seen. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 23:01, 12 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I cannot in good faith participate in this straw poll. I am one of the original editors that lobbied zealously to delete the article. The only reason the article still stands is because of intensive and collaborative edit warring. In a perfect encyclopedia, this article would not exist. I still do not understand how editors manage to justify its legitimacy. If it were up to me this article would be sliced 99% and relevant information would be moved to apartheid. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 07:17, 12 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Wikifan12345: are you withdrawing from the mediation, or just refusing to participate in the straw poll? -- Ludwigs2 23:21, 12 July 2010 (UTC) reply

[redacted]I couldn't care less about whatever this cabal is trying to accomplish. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 12:55, 13 July 2010 (UTC) reply

50% response, so far

It seems like about half the participants in the mediation have responded. shall we give it a few more days and then move on with what we have? I'll bump people on it tomorrow, just to try to elicit a little more input. -- Ludwigs2 00:39, 15 July 2010 (UTC) reply

That sounds like a good plan. Many WP editors are busy in Real Life and don't have the luxury of checking every day, so waiting several days after a notification is appropriate. -- Noleander ( talk) 03:10, 15 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I voted in the straw poll, but this page is not very active (by more then a few editors), have you informed WP:Israel, WP:Palestine, and WP:IPCOLL to try to get the input of more editors? - Epson291 ( talk) 03:11, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Well, this is a mediation, not an RfC - while I don't object to the idea of importing new people, I'm leery of canvasing for new input (that tends to draw in random one-shot editors who have no interest in discussing the issue, or editors who do not know and are not interested in sticking by the mediation rules). I'd just as soon keep it to the signed-on parties. If you guys can come to a reasonable decision, it will probably stick on the page - few editors will challenge a decision they know was reached by consensus.

on the other hand, if there's no real interest in discussing the issue here but you just want to get a kind of massive vote going, then I suggest we pick out the three or four best/preferred choices from this straw poll, close the mediation, and then start a full-scale RfC on the article talk page - that you can canvass to high heaven, because the more people who participate, the surer you will be of the result. Ought to use the right tool for the task you want to achieve - mediation's only as good as the conversation it holds. -- Ludwigs2 03:28, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Malik Shabazz notified WikiProject Israel Palestine Collaboration, WikiProject Palestine, and WikiProject Israel about the renaming proposal. See the original straw vote announcement [61] CarolMooreDC and I both signed-on, and commented at the time, that the crime of apartheid is not an analogy. That is the reason this dispute won't ever go away. I made a good faith effort to include that content dispute in this mediation.

The crime of apartheid and the undefined term "apartheid analogy" are NOT the same subject. Official reports from experts with treaty based mandates and complaints from dozens of reliable sources with regard to Israel's apparent violations of the prohibitions against apartheid in the ICERD, ICSPCA, the Geneva Conventions, and the Rome Statute are not intended to be comparisons to South Africa. Including "the analogy" in article titles containing those reports and allegations is biased and violates NPOV (which is non-negotiable). harlan ( talk) 06:37, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

harlan, can you stop using this page as a WP:Soapbox? #1) It's intolerable #2) It reflects your sense of absolute self-righteousness which is incompatible with Wikipedia #3) You're further turning this into a WP:Battleground. I hope somebody will enforce this action. Plot Spoiler ( talk) 15:59, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan is making an important point about the title of the article: he is pointing out that the current title is not accurate because it limits the content of the article to sources that treat the topic as an analogy. Yet many sources (already documented in the article) do not treat the topic as an analogy. Therefore either the title needs to change to remove "analogy", or the article needs to be split into two articles. In other words, if the title is left alone ("Israel and the apartheid analogy") we need to perform a content-fork so the non-analogy content can be placed into a second article that does have a representative title. I think harlan has proposed "Israel and the crime of apartheid" as a title for this second article, but I differ with him there because some sources treat the topic neither as a crime nor an analogy. Perhaps we could have the non-analogy content (including crime) in an article "Israel and apartheid", and the analogy content could remain in "Israel and the apartheid analogy". -- Noleander ( talk) 21:27, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Plot Spoiler - please leave me to handle behavioral problems. please strike your entire post after the soapbox line, because it is overly-personal. I will if you won't but I'd prefer if you'd have the grace to do it yourself.

@ Harlan - please strike your entire your entire second paragraph (about wikifan and others), because it is overly-personal. I will if you won't but I'd prefer if you'd have the grace to do it yourself.

@ Everyone - please try to avoid arguing from primary sources. I know that's both tempting and natural, but it will simply produce endless debates. what you should be doing in these discussions is presenting arguments made by secondary sources, and then debating the prominence of those arguments in the literature. that will get us results.

There are two issues here that we need to keep separate

1. The analogy of Israeli governance to South African governance during the apartheid era.
2. The claim that Israel is guilty of violating the apartheid clause in the UN humanitarian rights statements.

Let's not get caught in the circular trap of supporting a given title because of one point while critiquing the same title because of the other point. That's just a silly language error that will get us nowhere in a long and painful manner. let's also not fall into the trap of trying to determine the truth of the situation in Israel. Sick to what sources say, and do not make arguments from your own beliefs. -- Ludwigs2 22:20, 17 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Roger dodger. Let's git 'er done. Plot Spoiler ( talk) 02:26, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

(outdent) Ludwigs2, in my opening remarks I stated that reliable published sources cited in the article explain that Israel's policies and practices do not have to be analogous to South African apartheid in order to satisfy all of the necessary legal elements of the crime of apartheid as defined in international law. A number of them go to great lengths to explain that they are NOT discussing any such comparison or analogy.

Earlier you warned me about WP:Synth when I was quoting verbatim analysis of an international convention from John Dugard's UN report. Now you are telling everyone to avoid arguing from primary sources. According to WP:PSTS, there is no policy against citing material from primary sources. I'm also relying on analysis and material from secondary sources: "Applicability of the Crime of Apartheid to Israel", by Karine Mac Allister; "Occupation, Colonialism, Apartheid", by the HSRC; "Apartheid Against the Palestinian People", by Coconi and Bondi; Cambridge University's International Law Reports; and other law digest articles. Those published sources do not represent my personal views.

I placed a POV tag on the article in July of 2009 and cited the NPOV tutorial to explain that the article title and content was a classic example of not allowing one view to "speak for itself", or refactoring its "world-view" into the words of its detractors. [62] The sources cited in the article do not contain any agreed-upon definition of "the analogy". Various editors simply decide, on an ad hoc basis, whether a published source is "using the analogy" or not. They also decide what does, and does not, constitute the analogy. They have frequently deleted relevant material regarding policies and practices of apartheid or the crime of apartheid. e.g. [63] [64] I've also tagged the article for original research, because the published sources do not actually mention the listed examples of "users of the analogy". Many of them do not make comparisons to South Africa at all. [65] [66] Those tags were removed by some of the participants here without correcting the problem. The ensuing discussions about Arbcom/Mediation and the article title and outline have always centered on those same WP:Synth and WP:NOR issues. [67] [68] [69]

The section above titled "What is the dispute?" did not originally mention those fundamental policy questions. Wikipedia does not address WP:NOR problems through straw polls. It is part and parcel of the WP:NPOV policy which is non-negotiable. For example, Section 9 of the article's table of contents, "Use of the apartheid analogy", "9.3 By the United Nations" is one of many examples of the WP:Synth and WP:OR application of "the analogy" subcategory which is not supported by any published sources. There is a massive amount of material from the CERD, the ILC, and the ICJ that is discussed in secondary sources including Adalah, ACRI, Al Haq, Amnesty International, Badil, B'Tselem, Habitat Coalition International, National Lawyers Guild and the International Association of Democratic Lawyers. [70]. It is not appropriate to add that material to the analogy subsection or an analogy article. Arbcom does not handle content disputes, but it can handle simple application of the WP:Synth and WP:NOR policies. harlan ( talk) 13:18, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Harlan, you're not following my logic, so let me try to explain myself better.

• Primary sources - primary sources are fine, but primary sources are almost always advocacy sources. Primary sources get written because someone wants to make an argument for a particular position or viewpoint. This is why Wikipedia prefers secondary sources, because secondary sources usually present primary sources in a balanced, overarching context.
• Argument - people love to debate things, and on a topic like this debate is unavoidable. I have no problem with that. However, for the context of Wikipedia (and this mediation to a higher degree), debate needs to focus itself correctly otherwise it will degenerate into squabbling. That means this:
  • ✗ Avoid using primary sources to make a point. When you "[quote] verbatim analysis of an international convention from John Dugard's UN report", you appear to be making an argument (yourself) by presenting a primary source. This will inspire other editors to argue the point with you, and the discussion (even if it is pleasant) can't be resolved.
  • ✓ If you want to make a point, find a secondary source that uses some primary source to make the point you want to make, and then debate the quality of the secondary source. That will inspire other editors to find competing secondary sources and dispute the quality of your secondary sources, but since secondary sources are generally more objective than primary sources or editors, that debate is far more likely to have a resolution.

what I am trying to do here is direct you all away from personal debates - in which you present your view and others present their views, and it all goes back and forth until the moon falls out of the sky or you kill each other (whichever comes first) - and direct you toward scholarly debates - in which you all weigh the various positions given by third parties in a detached, professional manner, so that you can present something that does no injustice to all the various positions.

I don't have an opinion on the outcome of this, I'm merely trying to maintain a certain kind of conversation. so if you would please:

• keep the conversation away from other editors' behavior, except at extreme need
• keep the conversation away from problems that have cropped up on other pages
• keep the conversation away from competition between personal viewpoints
• keep the conversation focused on secondary sources, and let them do all the arguing

So, to the point: what do secondary sources say about the use of the word 'analogy'? Do any secondary sources object to it, or is it just wikipedia editors who object to it? -- Ludwigs2 15:43, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Ludwigs2, it isn't clear to me if you are mediating the existing dispute, or if you are trying to generate a new one. The reason I'm signed-on is because some pro-Israeli editors have claimed that every reference to Israel and apartheid is "the apartheid analogy". At the same time, their tag-team partners claim that the article discusses the apartheid analogy, but NOT the crime of apartheid. The result is that we have a battleground article about semantics. The published sources provided so far do not say if the analogy ≠ the crime or the analogy = the crime. So, I naturally want to know if we (1) have a published definition of "the analogy" mentioned in your straw poll?; and (2) does it specifically include the sources regarding the crime of apartheid that I've been discussing on this page?

The applicable international conventions are the primary sources. Prof. Dugard's commentary and analysis of those conventions at the UN Treaty Organization is a secondary source. [71] He explains that the Apartheid Convention was intended to apply to situations other than South Africa, and that the crime of apartheid in Additional Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions and the Rome Statute is one of a general denomination. The HSRC study is a 300 page tertiary analysis of the hypothesis posed by Prof. Dugard in the report he presented to the UN Human Rights Council in January 2007 dealing with Israel and the 1973 apartheid convention. It explains (page 17) that the definitions in the international conventions (ICSPCA and ICERD) are the appropriate legal standards. The HSRC study also explains that the conventions explicitly, and implicitly, included acts which were not applicable to the situation in South Africa. This Global BDS Movement page [72] says that Israel and the Crime of Apartheid is NOT an Analogy. Our Wikipedia article described that article as an example of the analogy. When I removed it for discussion I was reverted by an editor who cited Wikipedia. [73] "Applicability of the Crime of Apartheid to Israel", by Karine Mac Allister [74] says "this article is limited to the applicability of the crime of apartheid" and explains that, while the Convention was based on the South African experience, it was not limited to it. harlan ( talk) 18:19, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I take the view that sources can be primary or secondary depending on how you use them. If you're doing the synthesising, they're primary sources. If the synthesising has been done by the source, they're secondary sources. In support of you, it does sound to me as though you're using the Dugard Report in the latter way.     ←   ZScarpia   18:43, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

The AVL consists of contributions from eminent international law scholars and practitioners who recorded lectures, prepared introductory notes for the Historic Archives and contributed their scholarly writings to the Research Library. [75] Dugard's article for the Historical Archive was written in his capacity as a Professor of Public International Law at the University of Leiden, not as an advocate. [76] Additional Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions is not a UN instrument. Switzerland, not the UN Treaty Organization, serves as depositary. harlan ( talk) 19:09, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

@ Harlan. ok, excellent. you have given two sources which draw a connection between Israel and the UN definition of apartheid (which is not an analogy, but rather a description). They seem to be good, reliable sources. Now it is the responsibility of people who disagree with you to provide equally good sources which suggest a connection between Israel and South African governance in a way that makes it clear it 'is an analogy, otherwise your sources will preclude the possibility of using the word analogy in the title. That's blue-letter policy - The article title should reflect article content, which can only be based in what sources say. So, let's give the others a little bit of time to present a couple of sources that support the use of the word analogy in the title, and then we can look at the merits of the respective sources.

And I know this is hard, but please... do not refer to other editors as 'pro-Israeli' or use other labels of that sort. labeling does nothing except alienate people, and we're trying to get past the group-wise alienation and have an effective discussion. ok? -- Ludwigs2 20:43, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Haven't Harlan's sources not already made it clear that a title with the word analogy in is inadequate because the article is broader than that?     ←   ZScarpia   21:41, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

That's a matter for discussion, not a matter of fact. Harlan's sources make it clear that we cannot blindly refer to this as an analogy, but there may be a strong reason to do so regardless. let's see what others come up with. -- Ludwigs2 22:29, 18 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Several sources already in the article discuss apartheid in a sense other than as an analogy. This is not a matter of interpretation or opinion, it is a simple statement - in plain English - of what those sources are saying. -- Noleander ( talk) 15:06, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Straw poll results

Ok, I have picked out the suggestions that had at least three votes, and they break down as follow (in order):

• #6: Israel and apartheid - 9 first vote, 1 second choice
• #1: Israel and the apartheid analogy - 4 first choice votes
• #3: Allegations of Israeli apartheid - 1 first choice, 2 second choice votes
• #10: Israeli apartheid - 2 first choice, 1 third choice voted
• #9 Israeli apartheid (Hafrada) - 1 second choice, 2 third choice votes

Per harlan's sourced argument in the section above. we can exclude any title that uses the word 'analogy', so it looks like #6 is the clear leader here. However, let's go ahead an limit our choices to these four. look over the arguments for these four option given in the archived straw poll above, and see what you can make of it. -- Ludwigs2 15:33, 27 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I hate to make myself look awkward, but doesn't Israeli apartheid have three votes and Israeli apartheid (Hafrada) only two?     ←   ZScarpia   16:00, 27 July 2010 (UTC) reply

well, (hafrada) does have three, but I missed the three on the other. sorry, I am not (yet) perfect. corrected above. -- Ludwigs2 16:09, 27 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I knew I should have counted a sixth time just to be sure!     ←   ZScarpia   16:58, 27 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Ok, there's been no discussion at all in the last couple of days. again, I need to check if there is any further interest in pursuing this mediation. if not, should I mark it as closed? -- Ludwigs2 01:21, 30 July 2010 (UTC) reply

This straw poll does appear to be strongly in favour of "Israel and apartheid". Given the serious issue with "Israel and the apartheid analogy" ("analogy" doesn't describe some significant sources in the article) and also given that the analogy option ran a fairly distant second, I think this poll and the reasons given point strongly to a change to "Israel and apartheid". Ryan Paddy ( talk) 02:07, 30 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Agree with Paddy and see no reason why we just don't go ahead with the name change. Bjmullan ( talk) 09:53, 30 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Just as a note: it's probably best not to make any changes to the article title until the issue has been discussed and the mediation comes to some kind of resolution. otherwise things will get confused. -- Ludwigs2 10:33, 30 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I agree. The title "Israel and the apartheid analogy" will probably be retained as a redirect, since NPOV does not apply to such uses. "Israel and apartheid" already is in use as a redirect page for the article: [77] harlan ( talk) 12:15, 30 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I concur that "Israel and apartheid" is the best title. The word "analogy" in the title would be inaccurate and misleading, since many sources are not discussing it as an analogy. If some editors want to emphasize that some sources are treating it as an analogy, new material can be added into the article to address that distinction (for example: an entirely new section on "Usage of the word apartheid in relation to Israel" could differentiate the usage: crime vs analogy vs fact vs allegation, etc). -- Noleander ( talk) 13:42, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Weighing pros and cons of the five finalists

If I've understood correctly, we should now be "weighing the pros and cons" of the candidate titles, in which case, who wants to lead off?     ←   ZScarpia   14:33, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Here is how I weighed the pros and cons of the five finalist titles: I rejected the two titles that have the words "analogy" and "allegation" in them, since only some sources treat discuss the topic as an analogy or allegation (that is, those words would limit the article, and lead to confusion). That left only two titles: "Israel and apartheid" and "Israeli apartheid" (I consider the parenthetical "Hafrada" inconsequential). Of these two finalists, "Israel and apartheid" is better because (1) "Israeli apartheid" may give the impression that the state of Israel has been proven (by some judicial body) to have committed apartheid; and (2) "Israel and apartheid" is consistent with the WP article naming convention for "intersection" articles - and the article is an intersection article: containing all material related to Israel and apartheid. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:53, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Five finalists? #6 is the clear winning. Bjmullan ( talk) 16:38, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I think further discussion is warranted, for several reasons: (1) There were not a large number of participants in the !voting, so the !vote counts are not reliable from a statistical point of view; (2) decisions in WP are not made by voting, but rather by reasoning; and (3) this is a controversial article, so additional discussion is always a good thing (if for no other reason: to justify the change if/after it happens). -- Noleander ( talk) 16:55, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

I understand what you are saying Noleander but maybe the heading should be "Why shouldn't we use #6". Bjmullan ( talk) 17:39, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

The answer that occurs to me first is that it could be, after discussion, the consensus is that one of the other titles has better arguments for adopting it. But, in any case, the advice that we've been given is: look over the arguments for these four option given in the archived straw poll above, and see what you can make of it.     ←   ZScarpia   17:51, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

But is the article, properly speaking, an intersection article? What we are dealing with is apartheid-like conditions in Israeli-controlled areas. The main criticism made of the Israel and apartheid title is that it will lead a lot of readers to anticipate a treatment of the Israeli role in supporting South Africa during the Apartheid era. Isn't that at least a major part of what would be in an intersection article?     ←   ZScarpia   18:11, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

You raise excellent points. The topic "Israel's relation with South Africa's apartheid-era government" is already briefly discussed in Israel – South Africa relations (one key source is the recent book "The Unspoken Alliance: Israel's Secret Relationship with Apartheid South Africa" here). Although there is some potential confusion with Israel and apartheid, it is no more than hundreds of other similar title dilemmas in WP. I think the existing Israel and the apartheid analogy article should be a broad intersection article - and that is precisely why it should be renamed to Israel and apartheid in order to give clarity to the scope of the article. I think that Israel and apartheid should contain a brief discussion of "Israel's relation with South Africa's apartheid-era government" - at least have a see also link - just to help readers navigate. A similar situation exsits with Israeli apartheid week which has its own article, and yet is mentioned in Israel and the apartheid analogy article. In the future, if the Israel and apartheid intersection article gets too large, it may be subject to content forks, and there could be sub-articles on, for example, Israel and the crime of apartheid, etc. -- Noleander ( talk) 19:01, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

just as an aside, kep in mind two things as discussion points: (1) no title will adequately capture the real-world situation properly, so what we want is the best title for the purpose - the first line or two of the article itself can be adjusted to amplify the meaning of the title and eliminate misconceptions. (2) The 'vote' here was simply to get a sense for the best choices available and draw out some reasons for why those choices might be good or bad. That allows us to have a more focussed discussion of the issue. So don't think of the vote as having 'winners' or 'losers', precisely. -- {Ludwigs2, 31 July 2010}

I agree with Noleander's weighing up. Analogy is out, because some prominent sources are absolutely not making an analogy. Personally I could see an argument that there is an implied allegation in all sources even though some of them don't explicitly make allegations, however as editors inferring things from sources is best avoided if possible. That leaves "Israeli apartheid" and "Israel and apartheid". "Israeli apartheid" implies a greater degree of agreement that there is apartheid in Israel than is apparant from the prominent sources. The only credible objection to "Israel and aparthied" is that it is ambiguous. As others have mentioned, this isn't uncommon on Wikipedia, and the simple solution is a disambiguation link at the top of the article saying This article is about discussions of whether the state of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians resembles apartheid and whether Israel is committing the crime of apartheid. For relations between the states of Israel and South Africa during the apartheid era, see Israel – South Africa relations. So the only reasonable objection to "Israel and apartheid" is easily fixed with a DAB link, and it has the best advantages. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 20:25, 31 July 2010 (UTC) reply

Some editors would probably object to the title Israel and apartheid on the grounds that it implies that there is a definite connection between Israel and apartheid in the same way they might object to Israeli apartheid implying that that phenomenon definitely exists. My view is that, so long as the titles don't state rather than seem to be implying and so long as the article contents neutrally explain the opposing viewpoints, there isn't a problem. Conceivably we could have articles with titles such as Gold at the end of rainbows or Existence of fairies. Would we have to add the phrase Allegations of or rename them to Gold and the end of rainbows and Existence and fairies to satisfy editors who felt that the titles imply that the former exists and that the latter is a fact?     ←   ZScarpia   04:39, 1 August 2010 (UTC) reply

The word "allegation" in an article title is discouraged (see WP:Article Titles#Descriptive titles and non-judgmentalism, where it says "allegation" should only be in a title when it refers to a legal proceeding). There are a dozen or so WP articles with "allegation" in the title (e.g. Allegations of mass graves at Chemmani) but far more common are simple intersection-style titles that employ the word "and" such as United States and the Haitian Revolution. There are hundreds of article titles that follow the intersection-style "and" approach, and it works because it is so neutral. It works especially well when the topic is controversial or inconclusive, as in Nation of Islam and antisemitism or Nuclear weapons and Israel. Those examples show the advantages of the Israel and apartheid candidate. -- Noleander ( talk) 18:09, 1 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Yes, some editors have objected to both Israel and apartheid and Israeli apartheid on the grounds that they imply the existance of apartheid in Israel. This is a reasonable objection in regard to "Israeli apartheid", as that term is synonymous with "the apartheid that Israel is engaged in". However, it is not a reasonable objection to "Israel and apartheid", because the latter does not presuppose any specific relationship between the two subjects under discussion. It's not just the existence of objections that matters, it's whether the objections are reasonable. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 22:54, 2 August 2010 (UTC) reply

As ever Ryan you make it clear why the only option is "Israel and apartheid". Bjmullan ( talk) 17:15, 5 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I've just re-read ZScarpia's post above, and realised I didn't fully address the concern that "Some editors would probably object to the title Israel and apartheid on the grounds that it implies that there is a definite connection between Israel and apartheid". The answer is that this title does not imply a definite connection between the two subjects (whereas my previous post regarding how the title doesn't suppose any specific relationship makes a similar, but subtly different point). If they did, then Race and intelligence would not be allowed to continue under that name, because the existence of a definite connection between those two subjects is extremely controversial. Rather, in cases such as this one and "Race and intelligence", the two words appear together in the title because there is a notable public discourse regarding whether there is an association between the two subjects. The only "definite connection" between the subjects is the existence of that notable public discourse, and that notable public discourse is the subject of the article. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 01:53, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I think we have a consensus here. While there are a few editors in favour of a title that (in my opinion) under-associates the subjects of Israel and apartheid compared to the reliable sources, and a few editors backing a title that (again, in my opinion) over-associates the subjects, there is also a very large middle ground of editors backing the title "Israel and apartheid" that neither over-associates nor under-associates the subjects and which only has one reasonable objection that can be easily fixed with a DAB link. I'm surprised how large the middle ground is given the volatility of this subject, so I'm finding this consensus much clearer than I expected it to be, and also much clearer than in any previous renaming discussion for this article. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 02:01, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

well, I'm not seeing anyone disagreeing with you, but I've only seen a handful of the editors involved in this respond. let me try to get their attention over the weekend. If you make the change without something like broad support, it will just turn into a page-move war, and that won't do the article any good. -- Ludwigs2 02:07, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Don't worry, I'm keeping my hands in sight and not making any sudden moves. I personally probably won't be doing any eventual article move that's decided on anyway, I don't want to deal with the technical complications. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 02:12, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Although I think that some editors would object to both Israel and apartheid and Israeli apartheid on the grounds that they imply too certain a connection, I accept that the implied degree of association is less in the former case and so would probably raise fewer objections. I think that Ryan's suggestion of including text saying This article is about ... is a good solution to the ambiguity problem of the Israel and apartheid title. However, one of the reasons given for using that title is that the article should be an intersection, dealing with anything connecting Israel and apartheid, including Israeli support for South Africa's apartheid regime. So, as far as including disambiguation text is concerned, there appears to be a difference of opinion over what the article is about which would need to be sorted out. Is there anything in the rules and guidelines which encourages the use of and-form titles in order to minimise objections? For me, that would firmly clinch the argument over which title to use.     ←   ZScarpia   12:18, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I was the editor that mentioned the possibility of treating Israel and apartheid as an intersection article, but I tried to make it clear (I guess I failed :-) that it was just a suggestion, and - for example - the "support of South Africa" could be present in the article as merely a link down in the "See Also" section. I agree with ZScarpia that it is okay to not treat it as a broad intersection article. I concur that it would be useful to have an {{about}} template at the top of the article explaining the article's scope. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:35, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Oh dear! Apolgies for misinterpreting.     ←   ZScarpia   23:24, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

An article titled "Israel and apartheid" could reasonably be regarded as an intersection of the subjects of Israel and the general concept of apartheid in relation to Israel, not especially an intersection with historical apartheid in South Africa which is a specific instance of apartheid. The disambiguation link will make the distinction clear. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 01:44, 8 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I seriously doubt that there will be a page move war. After all, there is still the matter of the existing ARBCOM remedy which requires the interested parties in naming disputes regarding apartheid articles to enter into mediation. [78].

It is extremely doubtful that Wikipedia policy prevents spin-out articles on the subject of "Israeli Apartheid", "Israel and the crime of apartheid", or "Allegations of Israeli Apartheid".

• There is a well-known international political movement that has labeled Israel's policies and practices as Israeli Apartheid. The movement has local chapters in most Western countries and they observe an annual "Israeli Apartheid Week" i.e. [79].
• The major human rights groups in Israel have pursued several Supreme Court cases in which the government was charged with the crime of apartheid. For example, the order forbidding Israelis from driving Palestinians inside the West Bank was canceled after the groups filed a petition against the government and the OC Central Command stating that the order sought to apply an apartheid policy, discriminated between people on an ethnic/racial basis and attempted to thwart the work of organizations assisting Palestinians. The petition further stated that the order violated core provisions of international human rights law, international criminal law and Israeli constitutional and administrative law. The prohibitions against apartheid in the 1973 convention, the Additional Protocol to the Geneva Convention, and the Rome Statute were specifically cited. [80]
• Similar charges regarding the crime of apartheid were made in the Highway 443 case. The President of the Court responded by describing the plaintiffs complaint as a "comparison" with the crime of apartheid. Although she cited Israel's security concerns, she held that the closure was illegal and that the IDF had exceeded its authority. [81] Article III of the Apartheid Convention provides that international criminal responsibility arises regardless of motive. [82] Akiva Eldar wrote about the ruling and noted that members of the judiciary no longer stand at attention when they hear the magic word security. See Are Israel and Apartheid South Africa Really Different? [83]
• The petitioner's attorney in the 443 case has subsequently complained that the Court's ruling contained loopholes that allow the IDF to continue doing business as usual. See Route 443: The Legal Illusion, July 23, 2010 by Limor Yehuda at the Jewish Quarterly [84]
• The international conventions on genocide, apartheid, and torture recognize the principle of complicity by those who encourage, cooperate, or abet others. Legal scholars have published a number of articles noting that the Israeli judiciary has been complicit in facilitating grave breaches of international law during the occupation while performing judicial reviews of legislation; in ordering evictions, deportations, and house demolitions; and in condoning targeted killings, mistreatment of prisoners, & etc. See for example "The Legacy of Justice Aharon Barak: A Critical Review", by Nimer Sultany, 48 Harvard Int'l Law Journal Online 83 (2007) [85] and "Apartheid at the Israeli High Court", By Uri Weiss (translated and reprinted at Counterpunch) [86] harlan ( talk) 20:00, 7 August 2010 (UTC) reply

What do we do next? I don't have anything else to add in making the case for using Israeli apartheid as a title. And nobody is coming forward to make the case for any of the others. Although I still have a preference for using Israeli apartheid, its a pretty slight one; I could easily live with the conjoined use of Israel and apartheid and disambiguation text.     ←   ZScarpia   12:45, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

We could give anyone who prefers not to use 'Israeli apartheid' or 'Israel and apartheid' another couple of days to come forward with good, policy-based reasons to use one of the other finalists, but at this point I think we're fine to proceed with a move to 'Israel and apartheid'. -- Andrensath ( talk | contribs) 13:06, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

We started discussing the finalists on 31 July. A notice was posted on the Israel and Apartheid Analogy Talk page on 2 August ("Please note that the informal mediation at Wikipedia:Mediation_Cabal/Cases/2010-04-14/Israel_and_the_apartheid_analogy regarding the title of this article is still proceeding, and we're now discussing a shortlist of preferred titles following a straw poll. Ryan Paddy (talk) 22:08, 2 August 2010 (UTC)") That notice reached a rather large group of editors. The moderator, a few days ago, said they wanted to wait one more weekend (over the weekend of Aug 7/8) and that weekend has passed. There are several participants that have not commented recently, but they all have this page on their Watchlist, so I presume that means they have nothing to add to the conversation (that is, they concur with recent trend in the discussion). -- Noleander ( talk) 15:59, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Why don't we do this: I'll start a new thread below, suggesting that we close the mediation in favor of the title "Israel and Apartheid", based on this discussion. Give a few days for people to register opinions, and if nothing negative arises we can go ahead and do that. -- Ludwigs2 16:54, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Per the discussion above, a consensus seems to have developed to use Israel and Apartheid for the article title, with a brief disambiguation text to remove any misleading implications. Should we accept that as consensus and and close the mediation? Please sign with a Y ({{ tick}}) if you agree, or sign with a N ({{ cross}}) and a brief explanation if you object to closing the mediation with this conclusion. -- Ludwigs2 17:02, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Y The discussion on "pros and cons of five finalists" started 11 days ago (since 31 July). Notification was given to the large group of editors that watch Israel and the apartheid analogy nine days ago. The discussion above on the five finalists seemed sensible and rational. The discussion has died down, indicating that no more input is forthcoming. Everyone has had an opportunity to participate. Even editors that were on a 7-day vacation had opportunities. Although several participants in this mediation did not comment in the "pros and cons" discussion, that may simply indicate that they are content with the direction that discussion took. -- Noleander ( talk) 17:04, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Neutral - I'm pretty much of the same mindset that I was when I argued to stick to "Israel and the aprtheid analogy" title. However, reading above I acknowledge that this conversation has been given due process, and I respect the will of the majority. NickCT ( talk) 17:22, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y I have been following the discussion, but didn't feel like I had much to add which hadn't been said / was being addressed. I agree that the process was constructive. Big thanks to Ludwigs2 for his considerable and considerate mediation effort! Unomi ( talk) 17:36, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y harlan ( talk) 19:15, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y Thank you to the mediator, Ludwigs2, for his assistance and patience. —  Malik Shabazz  ^Talk/ _Stalk 19:45, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y The consensus seems as clear as it's likely to get in a case like this, and there has been plenty of opportunity for editors to input. Thanks for the mediation. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 20:15, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y "Israel and apartheid" definitely most NPOV while being generally descriptive. So hopefully we'll see that change asap. CarolMooreDC ( talk) 17:27, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y I don't know that Israel and apartheid is the best possible title, but it's better than the current title. I support its use, provided that we also include something like the disambiguation text Ryan Paddy mentioned earlier (This article is about discussions of whether the state of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians resembles apartheid and whether Israel is committing the crime of apartheid. For relations between the states of Israel and South Africa during the apartheid era, see Israel – South Africa relations.) ←  George  ^talk 20:44, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y     ←   ZScarpia   21:11, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• (N) Consensus cannot take precedence over guidelines. When it comes to an article like this you'll find the vote will split right down the middle. If we're going to move I support "Allegations of Israeli apartheid" or "Apartheid in Israel controversy" or at least a title with a qualifier that infers that Israel and Apartheid is not a definitive reality. The article is basically a collection of POVs that debate whether Israel is an apartheid or not, it needs to reflect that fact. A title like "Israel and Apartheid" is not a fair representation of the content. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 21:32, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

You chose not to participate in this mediation by your comments here [89] and [90]. -- Noleander ( talk) 22:36, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Policies are not guidelines ( WP:LOP as opposed to WP:GUIDELINES). Also, consensus can take predence over guidelines, per WP:IAR. -- Andrensath ( talk | contribs) 22:49, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Note: "A qualifier that infers that Israel and Apartheid is not a definitive reality" is the POV of one of the parties to the conflict. WP:ARBPIA requires that the views of all the parties to the conflict be fairly represented. Some editors said that, like all analogies, the apartheid analogy could be either true or false. A few editors disagreed with that argument. They "inferred" that "the analogy" meant apartheid was not a definite reality. Those editors deleted sourced content about the crime of apartheid, and claimed the article was only about "the analogy". See for example: [91] We are trying to avoid that in the future. harlan ( talk) 02:12, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply

please, no squabbles. let's let it things be for a bit and see what we see. -- Ludwigs2 22:53, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply

We are not here to debate the merits of the article itself, only of the title.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Ludwig messaged me Noley. IMO this article shouldn't exist. No other encyclopedia would carry it. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:18, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply You've been pushing this deletionist song and dance since (literally) your first edits to this project, but it is simply never going to happen. Time to accept reality and move on. Tarc ( talk) 01:13, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply The article is the product of intense POV-pushing. No other encylopedia would consider this acceptable. These sorts of situations are the symptoms of wikipedia's editing criteria (A place where anyone can edit!!!11") How many AFDs has this gone through? 7? Wikifan12345 ( talk) 03:04, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply WP:CONSENSUS, which you are on the wrong side of. Good day. Tarc ( talk) 12:43, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Y -- Andrensath ( talk | contribs) 22:49, 11 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y, though I'd prefer "Israeli apartheid" as that is what the actual subject matter is about. Tarc ( talk) 01:13, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y This option has always got my vote and is the only one that makes sense. Bjmullan ( talk) 12:14, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• (N) I completely agree with arguments by Wikifan12345 . And I don't think we have consensus on this name. Marokwitz ( talk) 14:25, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply

See WP:NOTUNANIMOUS. -- Noleander ( talk) 14:41, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• I strongly protest the censoring of my opinion by Ludwigs2, I am a participant and have every right to add my opinion . Marokwitz ( talk) 17:08, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply
  • my mistake, I misread the list. box removed. In the future, however, you don't need to make a public protest - soapboxing is irrelevant. just leave a note in my talk and I'm more than happy to correct any mistakes I make. -- Ludwigs2 18:17, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply
• Y Did I have to participate in the mediation to vote? I don't love Israel and apartheid as the title, but anything would be an improvement over Israel and the apartheid analogy, which is probably one of the top five worst article titles in all of wikipedia. john k ( talk) 14:39, 12 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Comment* I would support an uninvolved 3rd party admin with no history in the I/P conflict to weigh in. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:00, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Comment* I would also support your input as it seems like you have thought about the subject before voting. Yes I & A isn't prefect but I & T A A is really bad! Would love to know your top 10 :-) Bjmullan ( talk) 00:08, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• just as a general principle, I don't mind non-participants adding comments to a mediation, so long as those comments are well-informed and help to create or strengthen consensus. I really only object when outsiders start injecting a bunch of unhelpful "Me Too!!!" comments, or re-raise old polemical points without checking to see what was said about them in earlier discussions. -- Ludwigs2 00:15, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Comment: The problem with this "consensus" Ludwig is it's just like an AFD. Editors will vote based on their own POV. Nothing sinister about it - I/P is a very polarized and by far most war-like area on wikipedia. IMO I don't think this is an honest way to determine a better title. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 01:33, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

  well, either the mediation will develop some kind of consensus or it won't, and either way you will all go on to do bigger and better things. Frankly, if some editors are not interested in even trying to reach consensus then mediation probably was not a good idea in the first place, since all mediation can do is help people talk to each other properly. I understand the problem, believe me - there are always some editors on wikipedia who are so stuck in their viewpoint that no discussion or compromise is ever possible with them. If there are only one or two of them on an article, then other editors can work around them to reach some sort of consensus in spite of them; if there are a lot of such editors on a given topic, then they will inevitably clog up the system until the problem gets sent to ANI or arbitration and people get spanked. sad, but true...

  The entire idea behind wikipedia is that people are mature enough to talk through tangled, emotionally difficult problems and create decently objective, informative compromises. Mediation helps with that, but only where people allow it to help. It's a bit like group therapy that way. so, how are we all feeling today? -- Ludwigs2 02:23, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Fine thanks. A good next step would be to ask Wikifan12345 and Marokwitz how they'd like to take the mediation forward?     ←   ZScarpia   10:03, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Also, note that probably some of us might have been fine with "Allegations of." But (assuming I read the above correctly) if people refuse to participate in mediation and argue for that or other alternatives, and then later when it's pretty much done come by and say "this isn't consensus," pardon those who roll our eyes. Also thanks for link to WP:NOTUNANIMOUS which was not familiar with. CarolMooreDC ( talk) 15:47, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I do not consider wikifan's or Marokwitz's opinions valid at this point. Although they nominally registered in this mediation (by placing their names in a list) neither one contributed one iota to the "pros and cons" discussion that lasted 11 days. It is not good faith to remain silent for 11 days, then say "Sorry. I'm veto-ing the entire thing". They are not good faith participants. Consensus has been achieved. -- Noleander ( talk) 16:01, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

(EC) I am delighted that this discussion has been policy-based and dispassionate, I will not vote as I have been involved in the I-P topic area (like the editors mentioned in Noleander's comments just above). Appreciate neutral editors venturing into this difficult terrain. RomaC ^TALK 16:09, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Totally agree with Noleander. Consensus has been reached, all we need now is for someone to close this and do the change. Bjmullan ( talk) 16:10, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

So far, we have 14(+1) out of 22 participants commenting. I suggest we leave it through sunday evening to give the Weekend Warriors a chance to comment, and then close the mediation (unless there's some pressing desire to keep it going).

As far as what should be done next, I suggest the following: Take the mediation results to the article talk page, saying something like: "The mediation consensus was to change the article name, adding an appropriate disambiguation line to avoid any misinterpretations of the title (X in favor, Y against, Z abstaining). The new name will be 'XXX' and the proposed new disambiguation line will be 'YYY'." Then give people a few days to comment on the disambiguation line and refine it; this would probably be a good place to work in the 'allegations' issue. I think if you refocus the issue on the tweaking out of a proper disambiguation line, then the page move itself will prove unproblematic. -- Ludwigs2 16:25, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

If we are going to have a discussion about whether to use the proposed solution or to use Allegations of Israeli apartheid, I, for one, would prefer that we do it here, while we're still in mediation, rather than back on the article talkpage.     ←   ZScarpia   19:48, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

We already had that discussion. The "Allegation" candidate was one of the five finalists, and it was discussed during the 11-day "pros and cons" discussion above. Unless there is some new, unheard-of information about the "Allegation" candidate, there is no reason to reset this mediation process. I agree with ZSCarpia: the Talk page is not the place to re-open the mediation: this Mediation page can be viewed as a break-out page of the Talk page, and the entire point of the Mediation was to have a discussion focused on the article title. The article's Talk page has been proven to be an unsatisfactory venue for resolving the title issue. -- Noleander ( talk) 20:18, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

consensus seems to be against using 'allegation' in the title (see the arguments above). but I think it would be useful to use a disambig line such as: "This article is about allegations made by various organizations that Israel is in breech of UN guidelines on Apartheid, and about comparisons made with the Apartheid system in South Africa." or something like that... that would clarify that the title is not accusatory. -- Ludwigs2 20:35, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I agree with Ludwig2. The disambig statement is the first thing that readers will see in the article, so it can be used to ameliorate the concerns expressed by wikifan and marowitz. -- Noleander ( talk) 20:46, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Although the Allegation candidate was one of the five finalists, nobody came forward to present a case for using it. I think that it would be better to give Wikifan12345 and Marokwitz the opportunity to fully present their case now (and for anybody who wants to to put the counter case). That way, nobody will be able to say later that a proper opportunity to present the case wasn't given and we should hopefully leave mediation with the clearest possible demonstration of what the consensus here actually is, what the consensus is having been questioned.     ←   ZScarpia   01:31, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Marokwitz and Wikifan12345 had eleven days to present a case, and looking at their contribs were editing right through that period. I don't think we can justifiably view their waiting until only two days ago to raise concerns with the generally-accepted new title as acting in good faith. -- Andrensath ( talk | contribs) 01:56, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Perhaps Marokwitz and Wikifan12345 would like to comment on whether they would like to argue for the Allegations title or whether they're prepared to go with the proposed title and enter a discussion of what the disambiguation text should be?     ←   ZScarpia   02:09, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

The purpose of the mediation is to decide a title for the article. Therefore once we are finished discussing we should leave this mediation with a clear statement regarding the consensus on the title that has arisen from the mediation, otherwise we will forever hear "the mediation didn't result in a decision", despite that not being true. I interpret your (EDIT: Ludwigs2's) suggestion as being in agreement that there should be a clear statement of the result of the mediation in regards to the title, you are only suggesting that the disambiguation line should be up for discussion. There are two scenarios 1) the disambiguation line is just content, so we can just slap anything on the article and let it be edited as normal, and changes could be discussed on the talk page as normal. 2) The disambiguation line is tightly linked to the title under discussion, so we must refine the disambiguation line as part of this mediation process over the title. I'm happy either way, but I'm not happy to come out of this mediation with a mandate to continue the discussion on the talk page, as that will be misinterpreted (in fact, it already has been), as an indication that the mediation has not reached a conclusion and needs more input. As for the disambiguation line, I'm not especially attached to the version I suggested earlier, will be happy with anything that covers both aspects of the article (the allegations and the comparisons), and am happy to let normal editing of the article refine it. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 21:07, 13 August 2010 (UTC) reply

A participant in the straw poll noted that WP:ALLEGED would limit the scope of the article to allegations made in Court cases. That title would not be applicable to material about casual comparisons. The material in the existing article would end up in a content fork. Although the article has never contained any material regarding the formal allegations, the content on comparisons and the out-of-court allegations has been "notable" enough to survive several AfDs. I provided citations to several Court complaints and some written submissions from the ICJ Court case, and can supply several more examples. I've explained the reasons that I am reluctant to trivialize reports of serious crimes by burying them at the bottom of an article about "the analogy". harlan ( talk) 02:42, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

The mediation was stacked from the get-go. The article has already gone through 6 or 7 AFDs and I spent a good 10 hours in talk discussion and collaborating in the article about a year ago. I've spent way more time on this article than most of you here. People are confusing "consensus" with voting. This isn't a democracy. I was unaware the mediation was about the title - perhaps I wasn't paying too close attention. I don't have time to engage in endless discussions about a title. In the end editors will side with their personal POV, I'm not going to deny it. Like I said before it would be nice to have an uninvolved, 3rd party administrator without history in the I/P conflict weigh in. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 03:21, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I believe that the other participants in this mediation are participating in good faith, and are using rational means to arrive at the best title. I see no evidence of bias or emotion in the pro/con discussions above. To the contrary, the evaluations of the various candidate titles were marked by objective analysis. I'm sorry to hear you are cynical about the process, but please understand why the mediation must proceed in spite of your personal views on the article. As Harlan and others have pointed out in the discussion above: including the word "allegations" in the article title is not reasonable, accurate, or sensible. -- Noleander ( talk) 03:40, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Wikifan12345, would it be true to say that your cross means that you object to the conclusion reached, but not that you have any objection to the mediation closing or any desire or intention of belatedly presenting a case for your preferred titles? It looks to me as though the proposed title that has emerged from the mediation has been chosen mainly because a large proportion of the editors involved here feel, contrary to your view, that it is the most neutral title. Various objections to the use of the word alleged have been made. You are concerned about what the title may imply. Perhaps some editors may feel that your choice of title also implies something objectionable. As Harlan has said, that Israeli apartheid is not a "definitive reality" is a point of view (as is the opposite point of view, that it is), so that adopting a title which implies it is not may be seen as point-of-view pushing. When you mentioned a qualifier, did you mean disambiguation text or a clause in the title itself? Also, as a matter of interest, when you made a comment right up at the top of this page, what did you think this mediation case was about?     ←   ZScarpia   00:17, 16 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Like I said, mediation is stacked. The only editors concerned about the title are those who want to change it. I won't question the faith of the editors here, but it would be dishonest to say most are not motivated by their own POV. If you find the right pool of editors you can manage a consensus on anything. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 04:20, 17 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Y The consensus is indeed superior to the current title. Shoplifter ( talk) 04:06, 14 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Unproductive quibbling
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The consensus is stacked POV-wise. The title has been fine for more than a year - now a group of editors are bent on changing it to reflect the current Israel-is-an-apartheid movement? If anything, the article should be gutted and moved to racism in Israel and apartheid. the last thing the article needs is a name change. Can you find a policy that supports the name change anywhere? No, all we have is a "consensus." Wikipedia is not a democracy. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 12:47, 17 August 2010 (UTC) reply It is very late for you to now want to be involved in this discussion. When the straw poll over the name started over a month ago, you responded "I cannot in good faith participate in this straw poll. I am one of the original editors that lobbied zealously to delete the article." That straw poll included and was followed by a detailed discussion of the pros and cons of the various titles, which you did not take part in. The existing title received heavy criticism during that process that made it very difficult to keep, and you weren't there to defend it. The problem with the existing title is that it only describes comparisons to South African apartheid it doesn't include notable allegations that Israel is committing the crime of apartheid. That problem is why this mediation started, and it's why the current name of the article has been debated vigorously on the talk page of the article pretty much since it was put in place - it hasn't been "fine" at all. The title that we have consensus for is better supported by policy, because policy demands that the title of articles should describe their contents. The existing title fails to do this, it only describes a subset of the contents. As for your other comments - this mediation isn't stacked, it was widely notified, all parties including yourself had plenty of opportunity to participate. The rest of what you're saying is basically "I hate this article", which as you originally noted isn't a great qualification for discussion of the title. Finally, if you think that consensus is a bad reason to do something on Wikipedia, I think you need to pay closer attention. WP:Consensus is a policy. Your last-minute arguments are belated, they have no substance and they display a complete lack of understanding of policy. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 20:08, 17 August 2010 (UTC) reply I'm not disputing how the mediation was formed. But it doesn't change the fact that this "mediation" is stacked from a POV perspective. If you find the right pool of editors, anything, no matter how absurd, could be confirmed through "consensus." This is why we have guidelines. Wikipedia is not a democracy. As far as I can tell no compelling argument has been made to change the title other than editors here who think it doesn't reflect the content of the article. Reading the article, it's pretty obvious Israel is not an "apartheid" in the sense South Africa was. We know this because the article is a collection of arguments from a variety of perspectives. It is not a history of apartheid, nor has the state been subject to internationally-sponsored boycotts by sovereign nation because it is said to be an apartheid. The article consists of reliable figures who draw analogies or parallels to apartheid. IMO, editors who want to force a title change are doing so to further a POV that is not supported by today's standards. Exploiting legitimate dispute resolution methods such as "mediation" cannot be a substitute for guidelines. Even if I did spend as much time as some of you here pushing for a different title, I would still lose according to the most of you because I would be in the minority. How many times do I need to say - wikipedia is not a democracy? Wikifan12345 ( talk) 22:27, 17 August 2010 (UTC) reply Your reading of the article ignores the sources stating that Israel may be committing the crime of apartheid. Those are significant sources from a government body, a UN representative, a historian, etc. They cannot be described as an "analogy", which is the main driver for this change. It is redundant to discuss this again with you, it's exactly the point that this whole mediation that you declined to take part in was centered around, and your comments are adding nothing new. You are also misinterpreting the mediation process. It has progressed through reasoned consideration of the content of the article in relation to Wikipedia policy, not through partisan politicing. Experienced editors do not take into account unreasoned opinions, and a straw poll is not about finding a majority (i.e. it's not a democratic process), it's about uncovering reasons for and against and community support for that reasoning. As WP:Consensus says, "The quality of an argument is more important than whether it comes from a minority or a majority." In this instance the arguments against "Israel and the apartheid analogy" (and other options that were considered) and in favour of "Israel and apartheid" have convinced a number of editors that the latter title is more appropriate, and the straw poll reflects that. We have a consensus after a well-reasoned discussion. Moving to change the name now would be in keeping with the consensus policy, and your "filibustering" of the consensus with ongoing, rambling discussion that fails to acknowledge the discussion to date is unconstructive and contrary to policy. I hope that the mediator can make a clear statement to this effect and we can move on. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 23:01, 17 August 2010 (UTC) reply Your ignoring my comments. A) I'm not disputing the consensus. B) I'm not disputing what many editors here are arguing. I'm simply stating the obvious: this "consensus" is stacked, POV-wise. I could just as easily initiate another mediation and recruit however many pro-Israel editors I need to force a consensus in my favor. Editors continue to rely on the belief that votes take precedence over guidelines. I have yet to see a compelling argument that supports a title change. Just because a dozen editors don't like it and use a false-mediation, when the majority of recruited editors already want the title changed from the very beginning, doesn't somehow negate the reality of the article. This is by far one of the most controversial articles on wikipedia so it should take more than a selective-pool of editors to change the title. I didn't participate in the mediation because it was based on a false premise. We need 3rd party, uninvolved editors in addition to more editors from the general I/P arena to weigh in. A comprehensive consensus is necessary. Saying 12 editors who obviously lean in the same direction ideology-wise (let's not deny it, we all have our own beliefs) can create a fair, honest consensus is more than dubious. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:13, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply It sounds like you're misunderstanding how this mediation came about (as well as continuing to fail to engage in discussion about the main reason the existing title is inappropriate). The involved parties were not "recruited". There was a discussion on the talk page of the article regarding whether the title should change. That discussion led to a straw poll in which a number of editors gave opinions. The result was mixed, and it was suggested that mediation might be a good course of action to resolve the issue. This mediation page was created, and every single editor who had commented on the talk page discussion was added as an involved party to this mediation. There was no selectiveness, so no way to "stack" the mediation. Notices were posted periodically on the article talk page to remind editors about the mediation, and editors were welcome to add themselves as involved parties and contribute. This was a completely open and well-publicised process. Many of the editors involved, myself included, have expressed ambivalence over the various options for the article title and wanted all the pros and cons laid out and discussed cogently. I'm happy to say that happened, and the discussion did not display the kind of ideological bias you're suggesting. The resulting consensus is for a title that does not lean in any direction, promote any ideology, presuppose any conclusions, or unduly limit the scope of the content. It was a good process, and it's a good result. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 00:33, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply You're repeating yourself Ryan. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:49, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I recommend that the mediator close this mediation now, and that the title of the article be changed to "Israel and apartheid", and that a dis-ambiguation statement be placed at the top of the article stating something like: "This article is about allegations [or "claims"] that Israel is practicing a form of apartheid, about alleged violations of the crime of apartheid, and about comparisons made with the Apartheid system in South Africa. For Israel's support of South African apartheid, see Israel – South Africa relations." I make this recommendation based on: (1) the !votes above for closure were 13 to 2; (2) The two !votes against closure suggested the title "Allegations of apartheid in Israel", but no rationale or justification accompanied the suggestion (even after prompting for such). (3) WP:NOTUNANIMOUS, (4) there was no argument provided in favor of "Allegations of apartheid in Israel" during the 11-day pros/cons discussion, and (5) the weekend has now passed, and so editors that participate in WP on the weekends had an opportunity to provide input. -- Noleander ( talk) 17:14, 16 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I second the motion above. 13 for, 2 against, 1 abstain is about as strong as consensus gets on I/P issues. NickCT ( talk) 20:39, 16 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Unomi ( talk) 20:43, 16 August 2010 (UTC) reply

There has been plenty of time for editors to comment. I would welcome the mediator summarising the consensus from the !vote and closing the mediation. The wording of the disambiguation line can be figured out by normal editing. There is no need for another !vote here. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 21:57, 16 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I concur that the wording of the disambiguation template should not be finalized here. The disambiguation text I presented immediately above was intended to satisfy the commitment (expressed in the course of the mediation) that the article - at its beginning - must contain a clear statement of the allegation aspect. The exact wording can be fine-tuned in the future, outside this mediation. -- Noleander ( talk) 22:05, 16 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Oppose. The "allegation" issue was discussed at length on prior occasions. I would wait for a better consensus, that does not include the typical POV pushers from both sides of isle, before making drastic changes to change a title that was agreed upon after long discussions.-- brew crewer (yada, yada) 00:25, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

The "analogy" title was the result of far less comprehensive and considered discussions that those that took place here. It came after a relatively brief discussion on the talk page. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 00:35, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

And it wasn't challenged for years. Brew is right - there aren't enough editors here to justify an extreme move. A more comprehensive consensus is necessary. A dozen editors simply isn't enough. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:48, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Wikifan and Brewcrewer: This mediation is the next step after Talk page and RfC fail to work, so it is meaningless to say "this was discussed on the Talk page before". Citing the fact that the "Analogy" title has been in place for a few years is meaningless: that title was always considered somewhat inadequate by many editors, and - more importantly - new material has been presented in the past year (the crime of apartheid) that definitely made the "Analogy" title inaccurate. If either of you have a strong argument why the "Analogy" or "Allegation" title is better than "Israel and apartheid" please present the argument here (and present it in the context of the pro/con arguments above). Your vague hand-waving at the 11th hour is disruptive and indicative of bad faith. -- Noleander ( talk) 01:15, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

The change to "Israel and the apartheid analogy" was made in June 2008, after some talk page discussion. In the two years since it's been challenged here, here, here, and finally here (leading to this mediation). So it was challenged regularly, about twice a year. This mediation demonstrates that the consensus has now changed to "Israel and apartheid" as the preferred title, a title that had not been given significant airtime in previous discussions. Mediation was the right course of action to resolve this issue, as ARBCOM has stated that "Editors of articles concerning apartheid are directed to negotiate in good faith appropriate article names using relevant policies and guidelines. If negotiation is unsuccessful, interested parties are required to enter into good faith mediation regarding the matter." This mediation was well announced, well attended, and well argued. This consensus was therefore achieved by the most appropriate means. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 01:21, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Oppose. Sorry, but no consensus was reached. A straw poll is not substitute to well argumented, policy based consensus where the concerns of both sides of the dispute are met. The arguments given for the change were weak, and this is not a vote. The title "Israel and Apartheid" is unacceptable since it seems to convey that there is some relation between Israel and Apartheid, contrary to the article which says that some have used the word apartheid as an analogy, or accused Israel of committing Apartheid, while others have contested this analogy or accusation. As written in the charter above, the main argument against Israel and apartheid is that this title may be prejudicial, implying that Israel is guilty of apartheid. Nobody convinced me that this issue was resolved. The correct title would be "Allegations of Israeli apartheid" , "Accusations of Israeli apartheid", or "Ethnic segregation in Israel" and if we cannot reach consensus on these, then keep the present title. Marokwitz ( talk) 07:46, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Strongly Support. Consensus has been reached. This needs to be actioned and closed and we need to move on. Bjmullan ( talk) 08:09, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Strongly Support. The last-minute objections are the very same arguments that were voiced by Users Drork, Stellarkid, Wikifan12345, et al in lengthy article talk page discussions; in the RfC; and here in MEDCAB. They were given a through discussion in each case and failed to convince the other participants. Repeating them in serial tag-team fashion does not make them any more compelling. harlan ( talk) 09:53, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Strongly Support. This is one of the more thorough mediation cases I've seen. Extensive debate, solid consensus. Shoplifter ( talk) 10:06, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Support. Evidently the naysayers have had their final say without convincing anyone. If wikipedia processes are to have credibility, thorough mediations that reach a consensus can't be overturned by people who have refused to participate at last minute. CarolMooreDC ( talk) 14:22, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

• Oppose. In my opinion, just a POV push to change the title to suit the ideological needs of certain editors. This is not of benefit to Wikipedia or the broader Wikipedia community - only of benefit to a certain ideological stripe. Should not be changed based on limited straw poll w/out participation of broader Wikipedia community. It's just the usual suspects here. Yawn. Plot Spoiler ( talk) 14:11, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Strongly Support. We have a surprisingly strong consensus, which is not affected by a few editors who have declined to participate in the discussion but turn up at the last minute to complain about the outcome, using the same discredited arguments that have already been discussed at length. The support and reasoning behind this name change is stronger than what occurred for any other title this article has had, including the current one. There isn't even a need to poll this again, but here we are. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 20:12, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Y Strongly Support. For all the reasons discussed above. Several times. Over and over. There is no need to have another (this) !vote. -- Noleander ( talk) 20:40, 18 August 2010 (UTC) reply

We get it, you all support the change. The mediation is stacked POV-wise. I challenge any of you to dispute this. A controversial article like this must be approached with a comprehensive, strong consensus from a variety of editors. IMO the consensus is being dominated by editors who blatantly advertise their anti-Israel bias. There is a reason why the title change was rejected every time. I guess if you push enough eventually you'll get a result. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:19, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Mediator comment: Here's what's obvious to me, as mediator, from watching what's happened on this page.

• There are a small number of people on both sides of the debate who refuse to accept or discuss any position except the one they already hold. This is neither unusual, improper, nor unexpected; it is a topic where no one will ever be entirely satisfied and someone will always be entirely unsatisfied. It's just the way of things here.
• There is a strong (if imperfect) consensus among the active participants in this mediation to change the title to Israel and Apartheid, as demonstrated above.
• There are good reasons per policy not to use terms like allegation or allegory in the title, as demonstrated above.

Mediation is not a tool to impose a ruling of any sort on the topic. it is simply designed to allow people to talk through a problem and come to some sort of reasoned compromise. It is only effective to the extent that participants treat it seriously. Unless those editors noted in point one are willing to explicitly commit themselves to full and proper participation, then further discussion of the issue here is unlikely to be fruitful.

So, unless everyone wants to make a statement re-commiting themselves to this mediation and to proper participation in it, I suggest we close the mediation with exactly the results we see - a strong but non-unanimous agreement in favor of a title change and added disambiguation line. Note, however, that no one is particularly bound to respect the outcome of the mediation. You may feel free to try making the page changes, but if the minority of opponents choose neither to continue the mediation nor accept its results, it may be necessary to move the issue on to formal (binding) mediation or arbitration.

I'll wait a day for comments, and if none are forthcoming will close the mediation then. -- Ludwigs2 01:54, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Sounds like a good plan. I think there is strong, well-reasoned support for changing the title, so I'm sure that the re-name will be done. If the editors that objected here wish to dispute the re-name, that is their right (although I hope they will provide some rationale next time :-). The next step in the dispute resolution process is Formal Mediation, and we may all see each other there soon :-) -- Noleander ( talk) 02:01, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

This is the only reasonable outcome of this process. Ryan Paddy ( talk) 02:23, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

What policies? What guidelines? No one is disputing the consensus - but consensus at this point is irrelevant. The mediation consists of a strong concentration of like-minded editors. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it is dishonest to justify a name change under "consensus" when the consensus is not comprehensive. No one here has managed to refute the issues highlighted by Brewer, others, and myself. This article has gone through numerous title-change attempts and all have failed - why? Nothing has changed since then, the quality of the article is roughly the same, and the content is not hugely different. The only thing different is this time we've managed to pool a small group of editors who have managed a "consensus." I am not convinced. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 02:14, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Wikifan - consensus on wikipedia is (idealistically) a function of stronger arguments, not a function of stronger numbers. Some of your first comments in this mediation were that you weren't going to participate because you thought the deck was stacked, and you have said and done little else since. That's fine - really, it is - but it is not an argument, and it is not good-faith participation. Everyone understands that you explicitly reject without discussion any conclusions that are reached here; we get it, and there is no sense all of us sitting in the mediation trying to discuss things with you when all you do is repeat that you reject everything. It's time to move on with life. Now, I have given you the opportunity to say "Wait, yes, I really want to talk about this in more depth, so that we can reach a better consensus." if you really want to discuss the issues then I think everyone here would love to talk about them with you. But if you just want to stick with your blanket rejection of any and all consensi then all we can do is tip our hats to you in acknowledgement and do the best we can with what reasoned discussion was made.

I mean seriously: this is 'sh%t or get off the can' time. Either decide to participate seriously in the mediation, or let the issue go and go back to fighting it out on the talk page. Plugging things up here when you have no intention of ever considering any resolution is just a waste of time. -- Ludwigs2 02:48, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Take your own advice Ludwig: "Wikifan - consensus on wikipedia is...a function of stronger arguments, not a stronger number." Yes, I completely agree. The fundamental problem here is the current "consensus" is predicated on stronger numbers, not necessarily stronger arguments. Just because I chose to recuse myself from the mediation does not somehow negate what I've said in this discussion. You are the one that messaged me and asked for a comment - I provided several, and you have yet to respond. Here, I'll simplify my POV by asking questions: A) Do you believe the present consensus consists of a fair number of editors? B) Do you see the consensus to be comprehensive, that is - editors outside of the general I/P conflict, or at least users who don't openly advertise their political affiliation? C) Do you believe the half a dozen failed attempts at changing the title has any effect over the current mediation - considering the article's overall theme has not changed over the last few years? I am not disputing the consensus by numbers nor do I oppose the objectives of mediation. But as far as I can tell the results of this mediation was decided well before it began. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 03:29, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Wikifan - I'm the mediator, it's not my place to make judgements (and personally I don't care one flying fig about the outcome of the mediation - as far as I'm concerned you could all rename the article 'Pete's Purple Pantaloons' if you could make a decent case for it). I didn't ask you to comment, I asked you to participate, which requires a far greater level of thought and commitment to the process than mere commentary. Again, this isn't about saying "me like!" or "me no like!", this is about working with people to make sure that everyone's concerns are satisfied. to your points:

(A) Yes, anytime you get 14 people to agree with anything, I'm impressed.

(B) Time will tell. I assume as a matter of principle that people are trying to be fair, and I know (as a matter of statistics) that if everyone in a small group is trying to be fair, the collective agreement will probably come out close to the mean population perspective. I'd be more confident of that if you were involved in the consensus too, but...

(C) Don't care - mediation is supposed to be the place for you all to let that kind of history go and discuss the issues with a fresh attitude.

You've stepped into this process with the presumption that it won't work, which means you've implicitly stepped into the process determined to keep it from working. That's your business: If you want to waste your time signing up for mediations where you have no interest in even trying to work with the other participants, I won't stop you. But please note that I'm not getting rewarded to mediate this, I'm just trying to help you all get your heads on straight as a matter of civic responsibility, and that has its limits. There comes a point where we all have to recognize that any consensus involving you is impossible and accept that as a fact. Unless - as I said - you want to re-commit yourself to actually working towards a meaningful end-goal, the mediation will just have to do the best it can with the results of those people who choose to participate in it seriously.

Simple fact, Wikifan: the mediation is going to close, sooner or later (and preferably sooner). It's here to be used as a discussion forum, not as a simple comment board for people to blindly register their opinions like cable news pundits, and since there is no longer any serious ongoing discussion there's really no use for it any more. In my view the other participants have done the best they can trying to incorporate the objections you've made (over your objections) and short of you trying to help directly that's the best the mediation can hope for. What happens next is entirely up to you: you can suggest some improvement to the current consensus and make a case for it; you can determine not to accept the mediation and go back to squabbling fruitlessly on the talk page, or you can continue sitting here complaining about the mediation without trying to improve it. Note, however, that the third is not particularly useful, and if that's what you choose then the mediation will quickly close with (as said) a strong but imperfect consensus. ok? -- Ludwigs2 04:20, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

You haven't responded to my points. I don't dispute the consensus, I don't dispute how the mediation works or your status as a mediator. If you haven't gotten it yet I've been saying the mediation process was flawed from the get-go. I had no idea the destiny of this article's title would be decided by the colossal figure of 14 wikipedia editors, a majority of whom blatantly belong to a single political agenda. How you are impressed by this accomplishment makes me suspect your integrity as a mediator. Anyone who knows anything about I/P arena in wikipedia would know it is more than easy to find 30 editors to agree with one side or the other. It's the most black and white, polarized, and occupied verse occupier zero-sum game on the internet. You say in your original comment that wikipedia guidelines value the strength of arguments, not numbers. And yet, the conclusion you cite is a "strong but imperfect consensus." Again, a consensus was already established before the mediation began. It was pretty obvious the deck was stacked - the title was going to be changed regardless, because there already was a "consensus" to change it. Every step in this mediation has been predicated on democracy - no matter what arguments I make it will still be a minority opinion, and in the eyes of "consensus" not relevant. Fortunately, wikipedia is not run by the laws of mob rule. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 04:59, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

I understand what you're saying, but you are misunderstanding the purpose of mediation. you all are not here to decide the destiny of anything. You are (supposedly) a group of editors who are having a disagreement over a matter of content and have sought mediation in good faith in order to work it out (assumedly because you are having trouble working it out in talk space, without guidance). Even if all of you came to an agreement, it still wouldn't 'decide' the issue - some other editor could show up to question the result at some future point. All mediation does is (hopefully) give reason and common sense a chance to work past entrenched differences, and give the editors involved the right to say "The bunch of us sat down and hashed it out, and that counts for something."

In short, the only way a mediation can be 'flawed' is if the participants are not willing to hash it out reasonably. Numbers only matter if people aren't taking things seriously; if people are taking it seriously, then it only takes one person to make one good point to change the nature of a mediation result. It's my job as mediator to make sure that one side does not drown out the reasoned arguments made by the other side; that job is only meaningful when the other side is trying to make meaningful arguments in the first place.

If there was a consensus to change the title to begin with, then they should have just changed it and not bothered with mediation, because it is not a 'democratic' process here, it is a 'consensus' process. Even now, you haven't been outvoted (even though I know that's the way you feel); you've just tried to generate a stalemate. you have entrenched your position so that no agreement is possible, and the consensus discussion has had to go on in spite of you. If you were making arguments and participating in the discussion (both listening and offering compromises), I would be obligated to help you incorporate your ideas into the final result and prevent your position from being overwhelmed by mere numbers. do you see how that works? But I have nothing much to work with here, and see no point in sitting with the stalemate in the hope that (at some unspecified point) you might be open to discussions. -- Ludwigs2 05:43, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Ludwig, I am not disputing anything you have written above. Not one word. As I said before, the process of mediation is not being debated - the way this specific mediation was carried out, and the reliability of the "consensus" is where problems begin. And again, you still can't face the cold-hard fact that the consensus is made up of a small collection of editors who sit on the same aisle. Let's stop treating the issue with kid-gloves. I have plenty of ideas and criticism of the process, but as far as I can tell whatever I say is still a minority opinion, and your philosophy as a mediator revolves around a democratic-based consensus, rather than an honest resolution. I can't debate math. If 13 out of 14 editors want to change the title, what can I do? The fact that this article has been through so many bureaucratic methods makes it hard to take any addition processes seriously. You cannot expect uninvolved, 3rd party editors to look at the mediation roster and see the conclusion as fair and balanced. I've encouraged a much more comprehensive consensus predicated on guidelines, not the political philosophies of editors. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 05:53, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Alright, if you want to stop treating this with kid gloves, let's do that. Here's what I see: we have X editors who may very likely have similar views on the topic discussing the correct title for the article. We have Y editors who likely have their own set of similar views (albeit different than the first X): they are not discussing the correct title for the article, but spending their time objecting to the conclusions the first X editors are coming to. And they are not even objecting on reasoned grounds (which would be useful) but are objecting on procedural grounds (which is pointless). If you don't like the conclusions that the other X editors are reaching, you have it in your power to offer new suggestions and to support those new suggestions with reasoned arguments; you have it in your power to contribute and cooperate and convince. If you choose to abrogate your power, then it's very possible that a biased result will be the outcome, and you will have absolutely no one to blame but yourself.

You have it stuck in your head that this is either going to go your way or their way, and you are currently pulling a major 'sour grapes' episode because you think it's going their way. what I have been trying to convince you to do is to give up that senseless presumption that this is a binary situation: if you work together to find something that none of you like and all of you can tolerate, then you stand a chance of resolving this (incredibly stupid) dispute. If you don't, then all of this mediation time will have been wasted, and you will go right back to the talk page and resume spitting on each other, and likely continue doing that until one or all of you get yourselves banned from the encyclopedia. Now maybe that's what you want - you don't give a fig about the article, you just want an excuse to beat up on people you think are Jew-haters/Jew-lovers/whatever - and if that's the case then please be more aggressive about it so that you can get banned from the encyclopedia more quickly. I have no use for people like that. But if there's one damned bone in your body that's interested in the encyclopedia as a repository of abstract undifferentiated knowledge (as opposed to a playing field for your own varietal of political mind f%cks), then sit up and start playing right.

You do not get the right to complain, you earn the right to complain by trying very hard to create something you don't have to complain about. I acknowledge your desire to tear down the consensus you see here, but I'm having a hard time respecting it because I have yet to see you try to do anything constructive. To hell with this minority/majority bull - that's just another 'sour grapes' cop out. Stand up for what you think, speak your mind, and use your reason. People who don't use reason are hopeless - they will never change anyone's mind about anything. People who do use reason sometimes convince others and sometimes get convinced, but sooner or later they reach a consensus, and that's what we're after.

That's all I have to say on this matter. As I said, I'm not here to judge the quality of the outcome; I'm only here to mediate the process. Anyone who looks at this page is not going to be concerned about the list of editors - they are going to read the arguments made in the sections above and judge the result by the quality of the discussion. I suggest you do the same, because if you do that maybe you will find a positive, constructive contribution to make, and I would like that very much. but if you choose not to, well... at least do us all the courtesy of not repeating the same old complaint you've already made a dozen times. As I said, we get it, but there's not a damned thing we can do about it if you refuse to participate. -- Ludwigs2 06:57, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Are you suggesting my arguments are not reasoned? I've provided extensive reasoning, and a blatant alternative - but instead you attack me. I've been more than cordial throughout this discussion but it seems my views are in the minority. I know how mediation works and what it is designed for, and the mediation is not a judge and jury process.

Either you are naive or being sarcastic: "if you work together to find something that none of you like and all of you can tolerate, then you stand a chance of resolving this (incredibly stupid) dispute." There is no "work together." 90% of the participants here, all of whom clearly agreed with each other prior to the mediation (title change), will trump (and have trumped) differing POVs. That's how it works in Israel/Palestine.

You seem to take great offense at basic observations: That the premise of this mediation was flawed and history behind has been ignored. Calling a spade a spade doesn't mean I'm "beating up on people" as you grossly infer. Language is also a problem - quite problematic for a neutral mediator.

What am I doing now, not participating? I've been more than explicit about what I think and I believe my comments are supported by guidelines. A POV-heavy consensus > wikipedia standards? A series of editors don't like the title, so let's force a mediation to legitimize our dispute? I'm not a rejectionist, rather, I'm one of the few here who hasn't decided to join the bandwagon and the "consensus" - therefore I must be a "sour grape" as you say. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 07:51, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

In fact, I am suggesting precisely that. you have made only one 'substantive' comment in this entire debate - [92] - and you did not develop that thought when other editors tried to find some compromise with that position. every other comment you have made in this mediation has been either an objection to the existence of the article in its entirety (which is fine, but not the subject of this mediation) or an objection to the mediation discussion itself (which is as pointless as walking into a town hall forum and screaming out 'democracy sucks!'). and no, you are not participating in the mediation now - that would involve you engaging other editors to try to create a mutually satisfactory outcome - you are having a debate with me (the mediator) in which you are trying to defend your perspective that the mediation is inherently worthless. Your understanding of the nature of mediation is flawed (as evidenced by your continued use of phrases like "let's force a mediation to legitimize our dispute"), and you are failing to listen or respond to my counterarguments; what do you expect me to do with that? Don't get me wrong, I love those kinds of debates and can engage them all day long, but that has nothing to do with mediation.

I am merely pointing out the fact that you have consistently refused to participate meaningfully in the debate to create a new title. Other people did participate meaningfully, you could have (and still can) participate meaningfully, but to date you haven't. That is your right, but it's not a thing you can use to hang up the efforts (however flawed) of those people who did try to participate meaningfully. This is not a situation where you get to take the ball and go home: either you stand up and make your play or sit yourself on the sidelines and watch.

Again (and I'lll say this for the fifth time), if you don't like the mediation outcome, no one is insisting that you respect it. go back to the talk page and back to the same petty fighting you were doing before the mediation started. You had a chance to resolve the issue here, you chose not to use it - that's fine (or at least I don't really care). If you don't get the fact that this process was entirely contingent on you all and your collective desire to resolve a problem then there's nothing I can do to make you see it, and if you have no such desire to resolve the problem in the first place then I can't help you at all. There is nothing authoritative in this process whatsoever except the mutual recognition of collective respect, and that's something you have to give freely. do you understand? -- Ludwigs2 16:35, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

What am I doing here Ludwig? I've provided plenty of comments in this mediation - you ignored most of them, and continue to dubious say I have failed to participate. I provided my POV in the original mediation, what more do you want? I must spend 10 hours pushing a POV and battle with the majority? You still haven't been able to deny or refute the fact that the mediation is predicated on a false premise and unfair majority. What you consider "meaningful" participation is grounds for debate. Certainly cussing out opposing POVs as you did numerous times doesn't exactly compel others to join in on the fun. This process reads more like a mob-rule than anything else. I've been very, very very explicit about the way I feel - most editors here simply concur with the title, hardly constitutes "participation." I don't think there is anything sinister about demanding a more comprehensive consensus with a strong emphasis on guidelines. Since we clearly cannot come to an agreement, and everything I have said has been shouted down ad-nausem, I propose we momentarily move this dispute to I/P collaboration and bring in a neutral, uninvolved 3rd party administration. If the consensus and quality of the mediation is so strong, then obviously further input from editors beyond the anti-Israel/pro-Israel background shouldn't damage what has happened here. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 00:16, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Wikifan: I've gone through every comment you made on this page - there are 14 of them to date - and only the one I noted above was relevant to the topic. go look through them all yourself and tell me I'm wrong (please provide diffs - I'm happy to be wrong if that's the case, I just want to see the diffs I missed where you contributed constructively).

The mediation is not "predicated on a false premise and unfair majority", because as I have explained, those terms are absolutely meaningless to mediation. you can keep saying that, but repetition does not make it any more meaningful.

If you want to take up this dispute somewhere else, you are more than entitled to do so. However, since you have not stated that you wish to engage this mediation properly and extend the debate, then this mediation will close this evening with precisely the result that it currently shows. There is no reason to do otherwise. You may feel free to dispute that result wherever and with whomever you desire. God speed to you, and if there are any questions for me have whomever leave a message in my talk.

Now, I have to go meet some friends for dinner. When I come back (and before I go out for the evening) I will close this mediation - that is, unless you've had a change of heart and want to discuss the matter seriously. -- Ludwigs2 02:09, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply

You continue to say I refuse to participate in the mediation but this is simply not the case. I am participating right now, more than any editors here. I don't support the consensus, and I explained why. I have provided an alternative to the consensus, I explained why. I propose a 3rd party non-involved administration that does not swear at editors to weigh in, and perhaps refer this issue to a larger group of editors. I think this is a reasonable step. How can you as an honest mediator reject such a request if you think the consensus is so solid? Maybe because the consensus is not concrete, and it is concentrated on a small group of editors that advertise their anti-Israel narrative openly. I'd appreciate it if you stopped reducing everything I have by inferring I am not participating "seriously." I am very serious. Wikifan12345 ( talk) 02:36, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply

<sigh...> I never said the consensus was solid, I said it was as solid as it was going to get, since you refuse to add your opinions to it. so let's take your points one by one:

• "I don't support the consensus, and I explained why." yes, we know, and that will be noted in the closure.
• "I have provided an alternative to the consensus, I explained why." Proposing is not the same as discussing. You gave an opinion in the diff I presented above, and the rest of your edits are complaints about the process.
• "I propose a 3rd party non-involved administration [...] to weigh in." This is informal mediation. if you want a binding decision by an administrator review you should open a case at Wikipedia:Mediation Committee for formal mediation.

You're just being contrary now. Your first comment in this mediation was that you weren't going to participate; now you've swung around to not allowing the mediation to close even though you still don't want to discuss the issue with the other participants. Silliness...

There is sufficient consensus to close this mediation, and so I am doing that now. In deference to you, I will do so with a recommendation that the case be taken up in formal mediation by the mediation committee. There is simply nothing left to talk about here. If you'd like to pursue this side discussion further, please take it up on my talk page. -- Ludwigs2 05:47, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply

My god this discussion seems like flogging a dead horse. Ludwigs2 needs to be praised for extraordinary patience. NickCT ( talk) 20:34, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Please, let's not make this personal. I'll handle this discussion myself
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
(outdent) Wikifan, while this mediation was on-going you refused to participate and started fidgeting with the wikilinks at the Crime of Apartheid article to make them read "Israel and the apartheid analogy". [93] [94] You were also advising folks on the NPOV noticeboard that material regarding Israel in a law journal article concerning violations of the legal prohibitions of apartheid in areas outside Africa belonged in the "Israel and the apartheid analogy" article. [95] You have actively participated in the process of creating an article about the controversial intersection of the two subjects. ARBCOM does not handle content disputes. But NPOV is a non-negotiable policy that editors must comply with when they are selecting an article title. Israel has been charged with the crime of apartheid in several national [96] and international court cases. [97] [98] The protocols and statutes that were cited in those cases are not limited to the conventions that mention Africa. They categorize the crime of apartheid as a general denomination war crime or crime against humanity - without any geographical references or limitations, e.g. [99] Many sources are quite adamant that they are not discussing an analogy, but only a generic violation of international law, e.g. [100] You better have your ducks in a row before you generate any more editorial conflict. The next step isn't likely to be MEDCAB, since the existing title is a rank violation of basic NPOV policy. harlan ( talk) 05:37, 19 August 2010 (UTC) reply

Cheers Ludwig. Thanks for your time, effort and patience. It was good to make your acquaintance.     ←   ZScarpia   11:27, 20 August 2010 (UTC) reply