The right's latest weapon: 'Zionist editing' on Wikipedia
'Idea is not to make Wikipedia rightist but for it to include our point of view,' Naftali Bennett, director of the Yesha Council says.
By Nir HassonFor years now, Wikipedia has been a fierce battleground between the Israeli right and left. One key battle was over the entry for Bil'in and whether the weekly struggle at that village near the security fence should be described as violent.
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Youths trying to extinguish a fire near the Jewish West bank settlement of Har Bracha on Monday July 26, 2010. |
| Photo by: Moti Milrod |
Another battle was over the description of the Ariel University Center. Was it "the largest public college in Israel"? Or should an institution in Ariel not be considered as being in Israel? So a compromise was reached: "the largest Israeli public college."
Now the Yesha Council of settlements and another right-wing group, Israel Sheli, are embarking on a Wikipedia battle: Zionist editing on the Web-based encyclopedia. The first course was held yesterday in Jerusalem.
"The idea is not to make Wikipedia rightist but for it to include our point of view," said Naftali Bennett, the director of the Yesha Council.
"The Internet is not managed well enough, and Israel's position there is appalling. Take for example the Turkish flotilla [to Gaza]. During the first hours we were nowhere to be found. In those first hours millions of people typed the words Gaza-bound flotilla and read what was written on Wikipedia."
The course was designed to teach how to register for, contribute to and edit for Wikipedia.
The organizers' aim was twofold: to affect Israeli public opinion by having people who share their ideological viewpoint take part in writing and editing for the Hebrew version, and to write in English so Israel's image can be bolstered abroad.
The Yesha Council also announced a prize for the "Best Zionist Editor" - the person who over the next four years incorporates the most "Zionist" changes in the encyclopedia. That lucky encyclopedist will receive a trip in a hot-air balloon over Israel.
Some 50 people took part in the course, nearly all of them religious and many from settlements. Ruthie Avraham, who lives in Beit El and works in media, said she already knew the subject of the first Wikipedia entry she planned to write about.
"The entry on Jewish family," she said. "The first sentence will be that the Jewish family is the ultimate response to the Western crisis of isolation and lack of affection."
According to Einat Bornstein, another participant in the course, "I came here to have an impact. I think people are afraid to write rightist responses."
She didn't hesitate when asked about the first entry she intends to contribute to: Hanin Zuabi, the Arab MK who took part in the flotilla. "And also about the Turkish flotilla and the settlements and the settlement enterprise."
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guys, no one takes Wikipedia seriously anymore, and if you look up a political subject on Wikipedia in the first place then your chances of influencing others is verrry minimal. besides, it won't be a battle of information, rather a battle of quantity [ of people editing], at the end Wikipedia will lock these threads.
It's pretty nauseating as it is.
..to combat the usual Lefty schlock of lies,revisionist history,moral inversion,blind to the facts and plain lazy ignorance ... Its a dirty job conteracting lefty gait-prop--but somebody has to do it!
You cerntainly dont have to be a "leftist" to think these settlements at stolen land are wrong. You just have to have a sense for right and wrong
to correct that entry. Arab sympathizers deleted all bibical references to Silwan and inserted political comments and made strategic omissions of current archeological actions and findings. The modern Arab references were deleted by someone else, I admit I never verified them as they seemed shallow and uninteresting. Wikipedia is unquestionably been used by historical revisionists to denigrate Israel, Jews and put a pro-Arab spin on history.
What on earth does the bible has any thing to do with it? It's just a book written by a couple of guys a loong long time ago and the Israelis has nothing in common with the IsreliTES, which were the people living in the old long gone Israel. Bilical references can only show why some religious fanatics thinks as they do, it is however no proof of anything at all
The so-called modern science of archaeology continues to prove the accuracy of Biblical declarations by verifying the places and characters mentioned in the Bible and Torah. Poor old atheist, don't confuse him with facts; his mind is already made up.
And yet you have no proof of your god. It amuses me a lot since it should be the easiest thing to proof for you if he was'nt mae up of your mind. The bible or torah are just two old books which gives no one any kind of rights. They arent valid for the modern man of today. Simple as that. But please go ahead and believe in unicorns aswell if you want to. But if you tell me that a unicorn told you that my country is your country then we will have a serious debate about your state of mind
Like I said before: Poor old atheist...
Using Wikipedia as a propaganda and ideology battleground trivializes it as a source of unbiased information. Having said that, it also shows us that it is possible to have more than one legitimate view of history. If you accept that premise, then the door is opened wide for holocaust denial and anything goes. Personally I don't want my recent history of the middle east written by some Israel fanboy or some Arab fanboy. I want it written by some boring athiest who makes some attempt at objectivity, although you will still end up with somebodys point of view.
I guess that means justifiying how they shoot the rightful owners of the land, how they rip out their olive trees, and steal their property.
I believe Israel offers a wealth of counter-examples.
He says that Israel's "position" on the internet is appalling -- I don't know whether to laugh at him for his attempt at playing thick, or pity him for him actually being thick. He might not be very familiar with AI, HRW or even the UNSC... or maybe they're all inherently anti-semitic.
Don't the organizers detect any irony in their contet prize? "That lucky encyclopedist will receive a trip in a hot-air balloon over Israel. "
The new media was the hope for those whose voices were not being heard. Instead, it has become a majority dictatorship as usual. The fact is that Wikipedia already has a very strong bias in favor of Israeli policies. If you look at the articles, you can see a handful of people are spending long hours every day to prevent the truth from being distorted by hundreds of those pro-zionist vandals. Wikipedia is not a medium to "include your point of view". In fact, one of the core policies of Wikipedia prohibits any POV to be included in the articles.
As a Jew, I try to be a.model for our people. I try to show that we as a people are caring and progressive. The extremist right are tarnishing our image more every day with their selfish backward thinking. W should be contributing to the betterment of mankind. That is being holy. A group of 2 million in a world of 6 billion yet they think ill of anyone who doesn't agree with their idealogies. So they stay the course breeding hate and discrimination because the on ly cause that mattera is their own. And the fact they use God's name to justify selfishness and lawnessness is beyond shameful.
Only people who are afraid are against open discussions.
Whatever happy ideas you have about working things out with words don't really apply when the enemy is avowed to your destruction.
Hundreds of people every day try to influence articles on the English Wikipedia to their point of view, which is why there are hundreds of editors scouring the place and reverting anything that isn't the neutral point of view. It's slightly sad that they took to all this (albeit disgusting) effort yet all their actions will be reverted with as much effort as it takes to rid of an ant.
I doubt most of them are from Israel. As far as i know most of them are "imported" from other countries. In what way do they have any kind of right to the land belonging to the Palestineans?
How can theft be a matter of any kind of point of view. Thefts of land, cars, clothies, money and so on are allways thefts no matter point of view. The rest is nothing but semantics. There is nothing that defends 1. theft of land 2. opresssing the rightfull owners of the land 3. to risc the life of your own children by moving them to a battle zone which the settlements are. 4. to make the life of the rest of the Israelis less secure by the provocation of stealing land, opressing the people nad so on. The Settlers at palestinean land are the biggest reason for the never ending conflict with the palestinean. That's the reason why so many Israelis dislike the settlers
Yes indeed. What point of view is this? Are you going to add those point of views are write over the existing ones? We'll see.
good.
It certainly reads as though it were written by a government agency. It's very thorough but certainly biased to the official Israeli version of events. Wikipedia is open to manipulation by parties with time and resources.
I mean, let settlers tell the world the complete picture about themselves!
For years Wikipedia items related to Israel and Jews have been distorted and given anti-Jewish twists by a team of communist and anti-Semitic Wikipedia "editors" - the worst being British Stalinist anti-Semite Roland Rance. This counter-action is long needed.
That's the only way of restoring Israel's image in the world.
and a very high gallows
So John of London who contributes to Wikipedia will be subject to the laws of Israel? See your problem?, and the idiocy of your statement? The Internet doesn't belong to Israel you cannot control it''s content. Even in the UK as long as you don't call for death and destruction or deny the holocaust you can type more or less what you want. Paedophilea is out as are snuff movies, depictions of rape and necrophilia, beastiality and fisting, but that is pretty much it. And even then you can host a website in the United States which is covered by the First Amendment, and which isn't subject to British law, you can't have links on a British based website though which is problematical, but you can by pass it by providing a link hosted again in the States which then sends you to the website.. The only way Israel can affect the Internet is to do like north Korea and China and put up firewalls preventing Israelis accessing it. The genie is out of the bottle. And it will never be put back in.
When it comes to PR, Israel is ten times better then the Palestinians, thats why they have managed to keep world opinion in their favor despite tens of years of occupation. But I am afraid the PR machine have been milked to death by Israel. There is so much that PR can do, because eventually actions speak louder.
Settlers, instead of spending your time on the Internet, living in illegal settlements on illegaly occupied Palestinian land and living it up thanks to Israeli taxpayers' money, why not move to Israel and look for a honest job like all decent Israeli citizens, so that you can build the country?
they don't want to go anywhere else
Thieves usually don't want to give back what they have stolen. So what?
No matter the amount of propaganda settlers try to incorporate onto internet, settlements are illegal under International Law and will remain so.
First I want to thank Haaretz for this article. I'm from Germany, interested in Israel and always look on websites of Isrealic newspapers to get an Isrealic point of view. It's well known, that Wikipedia isn't correct sometimes. This is because of it's democratic construction. That means everyone can write articles there. The idea is, that others could correct the wrong things or at least there will be a compromise. Although I often don't like the behaviour of the jewish settlers in the West-Bank and I'm not glad about the politics of todays Israelic government (for example, that someone like Liebermann could get Foreign Minister), I think the settlers have the right to share their opinion and point of view on wikipedia, because some so called peace activists who denie any violence from the palestinian side also use wikipedia to influence public opinion.
This simply confirms the widespread belief (outside of America) that Israel is all about spin and propaganda. This sort of exercise tends to be self-defeating, as it fuels debate, and a country with so much to be ashamed of as Israel really doesn't need more informed debate about it.
On my screen is an ad for a Republican Gubernatorial Candidate for Wyoming. Why does he need to raise funds in Israel? Why should Israelis care about who is Governor of Wyoming? Is it legal for him to accept foreign campaign contributions? And why would he be trying to peddle influence in Israel?
The most obvious but probably not most significant reason is that Haaretz is read beyond Israel, specifically by a large number of Americans. Far more significantly, websites like Haaretz use your IP address to figure out where you are browsing from and deliver targetted advertising. That means you and I get USA advertising, while a Tel Aviv site visitor probably gets local and national ads targetted for him/her. If you can truly "stealth" your browser, you may get bland national Israeli ads.
At www.dealtime.com, Israeli girls are apparently for sale, right now. Does Haaretz screen its ad content at all?
indeed ... i don't think there's another country in the world that understands and plays the game of propaganda and public opinion youtube, wikipedia etc will be the new lobby tools of the future ... one detail though , as an inhabitant of the 'outside world' i can tell that it's not working like planned
Realistically, there are lots of people that refuse to accept the TRUTH.
but which version of the Truth do you want me to believe?
Realistically, there are lots of people that refuse to accept the TRUTH.
I hope these wonderful people include entries on vandalizing mosques, burning innocent persons' trees and crops, shooting elderly persons, calling Ethiopian police and soldiers "n-ggers," violating Israel's own laws and other important matters.
And I hope these people will also show how the Arabs, in Ramallah e,g Murdered two Israelis,dipped their hands in the Israeli blood & showed the whole world.It was shown on World-wide TV network. Perhaps this 'wonderful' 'Samuel was asleep at that time...........In Pakistan the Muslims there chopped off Daniel Pearl's head in front of the TV. he was Jewish ish.A . .....newspaperman
I'm pretty far left, yet I also believe strongly in hearing all sides (I have spent significant time talking to settlers). I think for a while in my life I had never actually heard settlers' POV, so I at least agree that there is a lack understanding among liberals about what many settlers believe. To give examples, after meeting with settlers, it's started to dawn on me that there were Jews living in the West Bank before 1948 (or 1929), and that many areas very holy to Judaism are there. That being said, I still am against Palestinians being controlled without suffrage, having severe restriction of movement, being violently attacked by the more extremist of the settler movement, etc, and I also believe Palestinians simply deserve a homeland of their own, even if us Jews also view some of those areas as holy. But this is why, I think, even as a leftist myself, I think hearing the other side can help enrich your viewpoint. If you're worried that they will put false lies/propaganda supporting the settlements into Wikipedia, that's stupid to worry about, because us leftists will come and get the admins to edit it out of Wikipedia.
....BEFORE editing anything.
Wikepedia is not an informed source.. it is merely a "homemade" collection of often poorly written and researched articles
when it comes to the IP conflict, unfortunately the Hasbara already reigns in it's usual distorted manner
Why, if that were possible or allowed, could we compete with a billion Arabs? That would be the end of Israel...Just look at this Talkback!!! At the number of thumbs against Israel !!!!
Let them have their fun.. They will soon realise that 30 people trying to influence the content of the Internet is like pissing into the wind. Much easier to modify the behaviour of the IDF me thinks.
It will fail because they are trying to defend what is morally indefensible. This is a parrelel to the National Front Party of Jean Marie LePen in France trying to defend French colonialism in North Africa, especially Algeria. They will convince no onae excepat those already in the right wing zinonist extremist groups.
the settlers are the root cause for israel. but i find it hard to believe or side with a bigoted anti semite like you.
Poor david---keeps coming back for more---even though he hates Haaretz--he keeeps adding to the bottom line.
You have no idea what anti-semite means do you? Get education before posting nonsense here!
Israel's actions are quite dependable and usually a reaction to Palestinian terrorism and aggression. Civilian casualties in conflicts are the result of Terrorist organizations attacking from civilian populations, despite Israel's groundbreaking methods of minimizing such casualties (far more than NATO tries). If anyone is morally indefensible, it is the Palestinian terrorist organizations who openly advocate the destruction of a modern state and the genocide of 6 million jews while they preach global islamic supremacy to children via micky mouse customs
David, 1. Settlers are a not root cause for Israel. Long term, they harm its security. 2. Use the words "anti-semite" with more care. Don´t confuse it with criticism of the settlers and rightwing Zionism. The victims of real anti-semitism deserve more respect.
Israel's actions are not merely a reaction to "Palestinian terrorism and aggression". Israel is contining an almost half century occupation. You may not see it as such but the world does and is supported by international law and opinion. You can counter by saying: "screw international opinion and international law". Most if not all who argue with your line take this position and are contemptuous of international law and opion and you use the Hococaust to defend your obstructionism. Your thinking is: "The world did nothing to save us from the jaws of the nazi beast, so we owe them nothing and will not be dicated to in our morality". That is your position. Israel has a peace treaty with its two major Arab neighbours. They have not tried during that time to push the Jews into the sea. Your defense of the IDF and their struggles to minimise civilian casualties is unsupprted by the evidence. You have only propaganda to support your claims. Again, you and your ilk will counteer that any and all of the human rights organisations that have documented cases of abuse over and over are simply not credible and that they are anti-semitic. That is the tactic constantly employed by the zionist right. Adovocate the genocide of 6 million Jews is nonsense and part of your need to fall behind paranoia as your justification. As for mickey mouse customs and divine right usurping the rights of all people I suggest you look into the yeshivas of the colonies and find yoursel f in the mirror, as to what they are inculcating in their youth.
They label you anti zionist. Narrow minded self centered thinking. This is NOT what being Jewish is about.
Wiki is at the top of the information food chain. All the confusing fluff and spin has been filtered out, and only the essential information and bare facts remain. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_there_be_light
Nothing wrong with that. Wikipedia invites editing by knowlegeable people. It requires foot notes and citationsof various points and if they are not provided, Wikipedia inserts its own comments statinf that such are needed. Go get them! Its high time to edit the left.
a pity you don't ask the same of that bible you put so much stock in
The Bible is the inerrant, literal word of God passed down through the scribes, prophets and Apostles to mankind. His Words are absolute. Let God be true and every man a liar.
these authors created the footnotes
you can grow up and let the children keep the fairy tales.
How do they intend to call the ones in charge of this new spin machine? Ministry of Truth? It would be highly appropriate.
means Irgun and Stern have references to their being terrorist groups removed. Happens all the time.
means that Palestinian suicide bombers and other war crimes are "the legitimate right to resist the occupation". Leftists think that right wingers (especially settlers) do not have "human rights", and that Palestinians are not subject to international laws.
You are not in any position to name names. Look at your own country's behaviour instead of posting rubbish.
Go right ahead we have already won a court battle with Google Earth and the arab names of towns are included in maps of Israel. You are just opening another front where 5 million Jews will rail against 1.5 billion moslems. Swimming against the tide comes to mind, particularly if it becomes common knowledge that Right wing Jews are trying to censor the Internet. I suggest nobody will see any discernable difference in the content of the Internet, but hey if it keeps you amuse and you are not humiliating Palestinians by taking their photograph whilst they are bound and blindfolded because you are to busy on the Internet go for it.
So Ivor, you seem to think that might is right and that 1.5 billion Moslems will do what to 5 million Jews? Kill us all? Ethnically cleanse us from the middle east? As for censorship, why are the Palestinians calling for the total censorship of Israeli academics with their demand for an international boycott of all Israeli universities? What are they so afraid of hearing from university professors? What is your goal? It seems to be the eradication of Israel and a world wide victory of Islam over everybody else. Is that what right-wing Moslems are trying to do?
Cute... As for Israeli territory.... http://wp.me/pDB7k-tM
?
Nah, I just think that attempts to censor the Internet to show one side is right over another is never going to work. It is not Israel's message that isn't getting out, it is the fact that information about Israel's behaviour is getting out. As the storm over Eden Avigdil's photographs have shown.
They have the Right to obey International Law and get off the stolen land they live on, and return to Israel.
I'm not American.
Before any man-made laws. G-D is more important than man made "international" laws. Anyway what are you a communist? One world, one order? It is forbidden by Jewish law to go to non-Jewish court and court systems. (that includes the secular Israeli court system as well, becuase the people who control and run them are athiests and don't keep Shabb-t.