Revision as of 07:10, 16 July 2009

• recent changes
• purge this page
• view or discuss this template

No cases have recently been closed (view all closed cases).

Currently, no requests for clarification or amendment are open.

Requests for arbitration

Use of "disputed territories", "occupied territories" and related terminology in the context of the Arab-Israeli dispute

Initiated by Peter cohen (talk) at 12:33, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Involved parties

• Peter cohen (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), filing party
• Nsaum75 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), Invited by Peter cohen
• Supreme Deliciousness (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) named by User:Nsaum75, added also by User:Peter cohen
• Oren0 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Urban469 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Confirmation that all parties are aware of the request

• User:Supreme Deliciousness -
• User:Oren0

Confirmation that other steps in dispute resolution have been tried

• Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Israel_Palestine_Collaboration/Placename_guidelines#Occupied_territories This is an attempted proposal via IPCOLL where unfortunagtely only two other editors have joined the discussion.
• Talk:Golan_Heights#RfC:_Terminology_in_regards_to_the_Golan_Heights Attempted RFC in one article which generated suggestions during when open of violations of WP:MEAT, WP:SPA and WP:Canvass and a subsequent complaint against the appropriateness of the closing admin. (I also have issues with the conclusion, but will not raise content issues here.)

Statement by Peter cohen

There is a roving content dispute on the use of terminology regarding the Israeli-occupied territories. I have identified 20 threads spread over ten article talk pages where this or related terminology has been disputed this year. There are many older discussions too. (This search contains a high proportion of valid hits.)

I have previously started a thread at WP:IPCOLL to initiate a central discussion on the terminology but the level of participation there has been less than in several of the threads elsewhere. Although there is no currently unaddressed conduct issue in this area, the history of problematic behaviour over similar terminology is such that it is highly likely that things will reach a level where Arbcom intervention will be necessary at some point in the future. Further the related RfC at Talk:Golan Heights generated various accusations and suggestions of misconduct. I am therefore requesting that Arbcom take pre-emptive action and mandate that a centralised solution be created to the content issue along the lines of those being reached regarding the naming of Ireland articles and the use of "Judea and Samaria" etc.

Discussion pages where the "disputed" v "occupied" or related terminology has been discussed this year include:

--Peter cohen (talk) 15:02, 1 July 2009 (UTC), most recent post 00:15, 2 July 2009

As requested below, I have now made a formatted list sorted by last edit and have also added a brand new entry which ahs appeared wince this request was opened.--Peter cohen (talk) 00:57, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

I note the request below and elsewhere for aprties to be added. I was waiting for a reply to my question on the talk page here on whom to add and I have also been away from hte net for 50-60 hours. I've started adding people and will be posting notifications elsewhere tonight (UK time). More will be added tomorrow.--Peter cohen (talk) 21:19, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Apologies. my Misplaced Pages time has been limited over the last couple of weeks and I haven't tracked down potential parties. The motion would be acceptable to me.--Peter cohen (talk) 22:55, 15 July 2009 (UTC)

Statement by Nsaum75

I am the editor who opened the RfC on Golan Heights. The article had been subject to edit warring over terminology related to how the Golan should be described. Editors had been fighting over whether to refer to land area as "disputed" or "occupied" by Israel; there were also edit wars over whether or not to call the settlements established by Israel as "Israeli Settlements", "Jewish Communities" or "Illegal Settlements". In hopes of trying to create some progress in the debate, I felt that the RfC should be opened as to at least establish a consensus as to whether the land area should be referred to as "disputed", "occupied", or some other variation.

During the period of time that the RfC was open, a number of new editors (with little or no edit history) began making posts stating similar positions.

• Examples: ], ], ].

In addition to new editors, a significant number of IP addresses (with little or no edit history) began posting similar positions.

• Examples: , , , , , .

At this point, I became concerned that there may be possible WP:MEAT, WP:SPA or WP:CANVASS involved, so I placed a neutral notice regarding Misplaced Pages's policies at the top of the RfC., . I also approached ANI and requested input regarding my concerns about possible WP:MEAT, SPA and CANVASS.

After the RfC had been posted for a week, I made another post to the AN requesting a neutral, 3rd party administrator check over the RfC and close it. This was met with disatisfaction by some editors, as the closing Admin had userboxes on his page that he was Jewish and supported the existance of an Israeli state.(see: Talk:Golan_Heights#I_do_not_support_the_actions_and_views_of_Oren0_as_3rd_party) It was argued that since the editor was Jewish and supported the existance of Israel, he "can not be considered neutral to this subject, of course he is gonna side with Israel."

The debate degraded to the point where there was an argument over whether or not the Arabic or Hebrew name for the Golan Heights should come first in the lead. (see: Talk:Golan_Heights#Arabic_text_before_Hebrew). There was a further issue raised with one of the main contributors to RfC, User:Supreme_Deliciousness, because of several anti-Israeli and pro-syrian viewpoints expressed on his userpage.

In my opinion, as things currently stand, it has become next to impossible to find a fair and equitable balance between editors and sourced information, on both sides of the issue. Debate is always good, as it helps to improve articles by making sure all information is questioned and researched; and everyone is inherently bias to some extent (even if they do not realize it) however strong nationalistic viewpoints expressed by a several editors have unfortunately made it difficult for a consensus to be reached regarding balanced terminology in this and a number of other Arab-Israeli related articles.

Statement by Oren0

I became involved in this dispute when I responded to an AN post asking for a neutral administrator to close an RfC regarding whether the Golan Heights should be referred to as "occupied", "disputed", or something else. This RfC was flooded by new and anonymous editors, many of whom replied very similarly, starting with "reply to RfC" even if they were in a totally different section ( ). There was very likely some meatpuppetry going on there. I closed this RfC, stating in a nutshell that claims of "occupation" or "dispute" should be mentioned in the context of who is making them (e.g. "Syria considers the land to be illegally occupied by Israel") provided such claims can be reliably sourced, and that Misplaced Pages shouldn't be in the business of making blanket statements regarding the status of lands where sources and nations may disagree (e.g. "the land is occupied"). I stand by this closure as the only WP:NPOV way to handle the matter, and another uninvolved administrator has indicated that he was going to close the RfC the same way but I had beaten him to it.

User:Supreme Deliciousness subsequently opened a talk page section questioning whether I could be considered uninvolved given that I have userboxes on my user page indicating that I am Jewish and that I support the existence of the state of Israel. I find the assertion that a Jew could not fairly close an RfC to be mildly offensive, though I do welcome the question regarding whether my support for the existence of Israel may taint my judgment. My response to this is that the vast majority of the western world supports the existence of the state of Israel. Especially in the United States, the opinion that Israel as a state has no right to exist is considered very rare. I don't believe that holding such a common opinion should disqualify me from being neutral. To the more general point of my involvement in Middle East-related articles, I have done very little editing in this topic area. Looking at my top 100 articles edited, the only two that show up in this field are Golan Heights, all of which occurred subsequent to the RfC closure, and Gaza War (#60, 8 total edits, most recently in February of this year). My talk contributions are similar.

I completely stand by my own neutrality at the time of this closure and maintain that it was really the only way for that discussion to be closed in accordance with WP:NPOV. I believe that read independently of who wrote it my RfC closure was entirely fair and reasonable. As for the larger issue at hand, this is a content dispute that hasn't risen to the level of needing ArbCom involvement IMO. There has been some edit warring and at least one block (User:Supreme Deliciousness for 3RR on a semi-related article) but nothing that requires ArbCom attention. I have also placed a warning on the talk page pointing users towards WP:ARBPIA and I think that's all that needs to be done here. In short, I see no compelling reason for ArbCom to take this case. Oren0 (talk) 22:44, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved user Jtrainor

I think it would probably be a good idea for Arbcom to jump on this before it turns into the usual shitstorm that all I/P related arguments end up as. Jtrainor (talk) 15:59, 4 July 2009 (UTC)

Comment by uninvolved user Sm8900

Hi. I am reading this proceeding with interest. i suggest that all parties try to seek a compromise solution. There is no need for this to degenrate into an edit conflict requiring action by ArbCom. I have been an active member of WP:IPCOLL at various intervals. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 20:31, 6 July 2009 (UTC)

Clerk notes

This area is used for notes by non-recused Clerks.

Arbitrators' opinion on hearing this matter (0/5/1/4)

• Comment I am leaning towards accepting this case, although wondered whether amending the previous West Bank/J&S case would be more helpful to facilitate finding a solution to the naming of the Golan Heights, which is technically not covered by the former case. To clarify, Peter Cohen asked me a couple of days ago for my opinion, and upon looking at the recent RfC was struck by its lack of clarity and structure compared with the soon-to-close Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Israel Palestine Collaboration/Placename guidelines. Given there has now been a RfC on the Golan Heights, I suspect this is the port of final call (?) Addendum, depending on other arbs' views on the situation thus far, another outcome might be a motion for one or more neutral admins to chair a new and structured Request for Comment on the disputed naming guidelines on the Golan Heights within a two month time-frame. Casliber (talk · contribs) 14:31, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
• Recuse. Newyorkbrad (talk) 14:47, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
• Query. I clicked on two of those discussions mentioned by Peter, and they were concluded prior to (or as a consequence of) the W&S case closing. I think it would be important to understand how many of those discussions mentioned by Peter occurred after the W&S case, and post W&S discussions are the ones we would want to review more closely. A chronological list, or table with start and end of the threads, would be very helpful. John Vandenberg 15:51, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
  • Decline. I dont see community consensus to open a case, nor do I think that there is an obvious need for one. Another RFC would help, provided it is very well prepared with input from both sides. Formal mediation also would help. If there are user conduct problems preventing resolution, they need to be outlined to us. John Vandenberg 08:45, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
• Questions. Have the content noticeboards been used to draw some outside input? (Specifically, I am considering the NPOV and ethnic conflicts noticeboards.) If not, I suggest noting the disagreement (with discussion links) at both, asking for outside input and the attention of uninvolved administrators. Are there extensive conduct issues involved? If so, can these be handled on the community level? If so, what method would be best? If not, why not? Are you asking for a requirement that certain naming disputes related to the Israel/Palestine topic area be discussed centrally at the IPCOLL page? Or, are you perhaps suggesting that a centralized request for comments be utilized? If not, what exactly are you requesting? On the matter of topic, are you asking that this one specific dispute be bound by such a requirement or that all naming disputes meeting certain criteria be so bound? If the latter, what benchmarks would you suggest? --Vassyana (talk) 10:38, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

• Also noting that the parties involved in this dispute should be notified of this request. --Vassyana (talk) 10:41, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

• Reject. Try a Centralized Discussion as was done in ARBMAC2, Misplaced Pages:Centralized discussion/Macedonia — Rlevse • Talk • 22:59, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

• Comment - agree with Casliber that a good approach would be: "a motion for one or more neutral admins to chair a new and structured Request for Comment on the disputed naming guidelines on the Golan Heights within a two month time-frame". Carcharoth (talk) 23:09, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

• Reject. Not ripe for a case, now. Try again now with a RFC style discussion. I would like to see if the Community can design and run a discussion that will result in a semi-binding result before we get involved. FloNight♥♥♥ 18:48, 8 July 2009 (UTC)
• Decline Wizardman 03:11, 10 July 2009 (UTC)
• Decline: Agree that this is not yet ripe for arbitration, and support the motion below. Risker (talk) 15:17, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Motion

The arbitration committee advises that one or more neutral admins chair a new and structured Request for Comment on the disputed naming guidelines on the Golan Heights within a two month time-frame.

Support:

1. Casliber (talk · contribs) 22:29, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
2. John Vandenberg 23:43, 11 July 2009 (UTC)
3. Should be a standard response to protracted naming disputes. But please, don't let's have all the naming disputes rushing to ArbCom. There must be a demonstration that previous attempts have been made to resolve the dispute, and preferably the mediation stages of dispute resolution would have the facilitation of such naming discussions as a standard part of their services. Carcharoth (talk) 00:11, 12 July 2009 (UTC)
4. --Vassyana (talk) 00:50, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
5. It certainly is worth the attempt. — Coren  13:35, 13 July 2009 (UTC)
6. Wizardman 05:27, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
7.  Roger Davies 08:15, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
8. FloNight♥♥♥ 11:25, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
9. Cool Hand Luke 14:22, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
10. Risker (talk) 15:18, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

Oppose:

Abstain:

Recuse:

1. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:31, 11 July 2009 (UTC)