World Jewish Congress: The Bias against Israel on Wikipedia

[rnu]

Jerusalem Post: Wikipedia English has anti-Israel bias after October 7, World Jewish Congress report says

The English-language version of Wikipedia hosted anti-Israel bias that perpetuated misinformation and negative stereotypes, according to a report by the World Jewish Congress (WJC) published on Tuesday.
The report said that the bias appeared in the form of terminology, the way issues and conflicts had been framed and failed to provide context in articles. These issues were particularly identified among articles published since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, the report said.
The WJC analysis of Wikipedia articles was carried out in partnership with Memetica. It was based on research, content analysis, and interviews with Israeli Wikipedia volunteer editors.

The report by the WJC is:
Shlomit Aharoni Lir: The Bias against Israel on Wikipedia
(The Jerusalem Post links to the wrong document. They link to a report about social media.)

See also: WJC: In October 7 Aftermath, Wikipedia Entries in English Show Anti-Israel Bias, Says World Jewish Congress Report

[The Garbage Scow]

Boo hoo, they won't publish our political POV.

[Sennalen]

The substance of the complaint appears to be that the following aren't NPOV:
Palestinian genocide accusation (T-H-L)
Nakba denial (T-H-L)
Zionism as settler colonialism (T-H-L)
Comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany (T-H-L)

Nakba denial for sure is a POV fork that should be deletemerged into Nakba, unless its just to document the phenomenon of anti-Semitic gaslighting by accusing people of Nakba denial.

[Jester]

(First post so formatting may be a tad off) That report is ridiculous, not that I expected much.

Details of violence against Israelis, the threats Israel faces, and the rationale behind Israeli
military actions are minimized or omitted from the entry. ... The entry is linked to the “Genocide” category,

-- Regarding the article Palestinian Genocide Accusation.
Why the hell would violence against Israelis be a central focus of an article on Palestinians being killed? Should the article on the Final Solution detail in-depth the nazis' killings of homosexuals or the deaths of Allied soldiers in battles?
An article on genocide is part of the genocide category. Pray do tell more.
The rest of the report is bad, though for the most part not quite as ridiculous.

[Sennalen]

The sources in the first sentence of Nakba denial (T-H-L) for the claim that the mainstream Jewish recollection of 1948 is a form of historical denialism are: a review of a book of poetry and a presidential decree by Mahmoud Abbas. Absolute garbage.

[rnu]

(First post so formatting may be a tad off) That report is ridiculous, not that I expected much.

Details of violence against Israelis, the threats Israel faces, and the rationale behind Israeli
military actions are minimized or omitted from the entry. ... The entry is linked to the “Genocide” category,

-- Regarding the article Palestinian Genocide Accusation.
Why the hell would violence against Israelis be a central focus of an article on Palestinians being killed? Should the article on the Final Solution detail in-depth the nazis' killings of homosexuals or the deaths of Allied soldiers in battles?
An article on genocide is part of the genocide category. Pray do tell more.
The rest of the report is bad, though for the most part not quite as ridiculous.

I've read through the entire report now and calling it light on evidence would be very generous. That this was written by someone working in academia and calling herself a "researcher" is disappointing. Are (some of) the concerns legitimate? Maybe. The report shows nothing of the sort. It's really embarrassing as a report. At best this is a very overlong opinion piece. A real shame.

[ArmasRebane]

Especially given how many POV forks Wikipedia tends to attract, I don't think it'd be hard to write an article about how biased X or Y page is on Wikipedia. But the article is so shockingly vague it really sounds like they're upset that Wikipedia is demonstrating that the Israeli military killing 20 Gazans for every Israeli might not be the most moral thing to do.

[Jester]

(First post so formatting may be a tad off) That report is ridiculous, not that I expected much.

Details of violence against Israelis, the threats Israel faces, and the rationale behind Israeli
military actions are minimized or omitted from the entry. ... The entry is linked to the “Genocide” category,

-- Regarding the article Palestinian Genocide Accusation.
Why the hell would violence against Israelis be a central focus of an article on Palestinians being killed? Should the article on the Final Solution detail in-depth the nazis' killings of homosexuals or the deaths of Allied soldiers in battles?
An article on genocide is part of the genocide category. Pray do tell more.
The rest of the report is bad, though for the most part not quite as ridiculous.

I've read through the entire report now and calling it light on evidence would be very generous. That this was written by someone working in academia and calling herself a "researcher" is disappointing. Are (some of) the concerns legitimate? Maybe. The report shows nothing of the sort. It's really embarrassing as a report. At best this is a very overlong opinion piece. A real shame.

Thanks!

[eppur si muove]

Looking at the WJC's website it features an Israeli flag and claims that "The Jewish World Stands United With the People of Israel"(sic). So it's not exactly an unbiased organisation itself.

[eppur si muove]

"The Jewish World stands united..." is, of course, related to the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. If you point out to right wing Zionist propagandists that there are Jews who do not support Israel, then they dismiss those Jews as self-hating or leftist extremists or a a bunch of meshuggeneh frummers like Neturei Karta. Then once these people have been dismissed, the Xionist propagandists will then assert that as a corollary all the Jews who count do stand with Israel. The hardcore Jewish antizionists are a small minority but the longer that Israel is controlled by the far right and the more civilians it shoots, bombs or starves to death, the more Jewish critics of Israel there will be. At least in the diaspora.

[rnu]

"The Jewish World stands united..." is, of course, related to the "No True Scotsman" fallacy. If you point out to right wing Zionist propagandists that there are Jews who do not support Israel, then they dismiss those Jews as self-hating or leftist extremists or a a bunch of meshuggeneh frummers like Neturei Karta. Then once these people have been dismissed, the Xionist propagandists will then assert that as a corollary all the Jews who count do stand with Israel. The hardcore Jewish antizionists are a small minority but the longer that Israel is controlled by the far right and the more civilians it shoots, bombs or starves to death, the more Jewish critics of Israel there will be. At least in the diaspora.

On that note:
ap: Trump says Jews who vote for Democrats ‘hate Israel’ and their religion

[Sennalen]

Looking at the WJC's website it features an Israeli flag and claims that "The Jewish World Stands United With the People of Israel"(sic). So it's not exactly an unbiased organisation itself.

To be fair, it's not their mission to be one, like it maybe supposedly ought to be Wikipedia's.

[Randy from Boise]

The substance of the complaint appears to be that the following aren't NPOV:
Nakba denial (T-H-L)

Nakba denial for sure is a POV fork that should be deletemerged into Nakba, unless its just to document the phenomenon of anti-Semitic gaslighting by accusing people of Nakba denial.

Let's go completely OTHERSTUFF:

Holocaust (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial (T-H-L)


t

[Sennalen]

Let's go completely OTHERSTUFF:

Holocaust (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial is a fringe theory that should be kept out of the overview article. "Nakba denial"the theory that rejecting Palestinian propaganda is a form of historical revisionism is a fringe theory trying to evade the overview article.

[greenday61892]

Let's go completely OTHERSTUFF:

Holocaust (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial is a fringe theory that should be kept out of the overview article. "Nakba denial" the theory that rejecting Palestinian propaganda is a form of historical revisionism is a fringe theory trying to evade the overview article.

Just gonna resize this text so you can't get away with this borderline islamophobia. If you're going to wholesale claim the entire situation as "Palestinian propaganda" say it with your whole chest not hiding it like a weasel.

[nableezy]

Let's go completely OTHERSTUFF:

Holocaust (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial (T-H-L)

Holocaust denial is a fringe theory that should be kept out of the overview article. "Nakba denial" the theory that rejecting Palestinian propaganda is a form of historical revisionism is a fringe theory trying to evade the overview article.

Just gonna resize this text so you can't get away with this borderline islamophobia. If you're going to wholesale claim the entire situation as "Palestinian propaganda" say it with your whole chest not hiding it like a weasel.

Solid example of Nakba denial in action tbh.

[Sennalen]

Propaganda isn't the total situation of course. The situation was that the Arab League sought to exterminate Israel and created a state of total war in the former territory of Mandatory Palestine. The effect on the civilian population from that war of choice was the Nakba, which was indeed tragic. The propaganda comes in when people describe the causes of the Nakba by starting by starting with Israeli actions, as if they just started rolling up on Arab villages in 1948 apropos of nothing.

[greenday61892]

Calling it the "former" territory of Mandatory Palestine is disingenuous at best, considering by the time Israel even first declared independence an entire quarter of the Palestinian population had already fled. But I'm not furthering this argument past this point because I don't have the mental capacity to try to argue with a warped timeline.

[Sennalen]

Calling it the "former" territory of Mandatory Palestine is disingenuous at best, considering by the time Israel even first declared independence an entire quarter of the Palestinian population had already fled. But I'm not furthering this argument past this point because I don't have the mental capacity to try to argue with a warped timeline.

I called it former territory of Mandatory Palestine because I don't know the best terminology for the area under control of factions that rejected the 1947 partition plan. I'd be happy if you can enlighten me about that. Formal external intervention only happened after formal withdrawal of the mandate, although the British abdicated de facto control before that date, and organized Arab irregulars were operating in the territory beforehand as well.

[nableezy]

Propaganda isn't the total situation of course. The situation was that the Arab League sought to exterminate Israel and created a state of total war in the former territory of Mandatory Palestine. The effect on the civilian population from that war of choice was the Nakba, which was indeed tragic. The propaganda comes in when people describe the causes of the Nakba by starting by starting with Israeli actions, as if they just started rolling up on Arab villages in 1948 apropos of nothing.

I feel like you either do not know what propaganda means or do know what it means and are very good at it. My money is on the latter rn.

[jf1970]

The situation was that the Arab League sought to exterminate Israel...

You mean "prevent" Israel, it didn't exist yet.

The effect on the civilian population from that war of choice was the Nakba...

Weird how the effect (Nakba) happened before the cause (Arab League's war of choice).

...as if they just started rolling up on Arab villages in 1948....

You mean 1947.

I called it former territory of Mandatory Palestine because I don't know the best terminology for the area under control of factions that rejected the 1947 partition plan.

It was called "Mandatory Palestine" until May 1948.

[Hemiauchenia]

This appears to have been largely a dud. Only non-Jewish source I can find covering this is The Spectator Australia https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/03/th ... wikipedia/ , which was written by a Israeli -Australian guest author who's only contributors to the publication have been to complain about Wikipedia's coverage of the current war over the last few months

[Randy from Boise]

If I were writing a book Wikipedia for Dummies, I think I could summarize the House POV pretty succinctly: Wikipedia is anti-religious extremist, anti-racist, and anti-genocide.

If you're reading the Israel–Palestine coverage any other way, it is time for some serious self-reflection.

t

[rnu]

[...]
Wikipedia is anti-religious extremist, anti-racist, and anti-genocide.
[...]

Or as the right would say "woke".

[Randy from Boise]

I bumped into this golden oldie on my WP user page...

Guy Macon on Wikipedia's biases

"What we won’t do is pretend that the work of lunatic charlatans is the equivalent of 'true scientific discourse'. It isn’t." --Jimmy Wales

So yes, we are biased towards science (T-H-L) and biased against pseudoscience (T-H-L). We are biased towards astronomy (T-H-L), and biased against astrology (T-H-L). We are biased towards chemistry (T-H-L), and biased against alchemy (T-H-L). We are biased towards mathematics (T-H-L), and biased against numerology (T-H-L). We are biased towards cargo planes (T-H-L), and biased against cargo cults (T-H-L). We are biased towards crops (T-H-L), and biased against crop circles (T-H-L). We are biased towards laundry soap (T-H-L), and biased against laundry balls (T-H-L). We are biased towards water treatment, (T-H-L) and biased against magnetic water treatment (T-H-L). We are biased towards electromagnetic fields (T-H-L), and biased against microlepton fields (T-H-L). We are biased towards evolution (T-H-L), and biased against creationism (T-H-L). We are biased towards medical treatments that have been shown to be effective in double-blind clinical trials, and biased against medical treatments that are based upon preying on the gullible. We are biased towards NASA astronauts (T-H-L), and biased against ancient astronauts (T-H-L). We are biased towards psychology (T-H-L), and biased against phrenology (T-H-L). We are biased towards Mendelian inheritance (T-H-L), and biased against Lysenkoism (T-H-L). --Guy Macon on Jimbotalk 8:04 pm, 24 October 2018