User talk:Asabbagh

I prefer to keep messages of the same conversation on the same page. If you leave a message here, I will reply here.

Welcome, Asabbagh!

Hello, Asabbagh, and welcome to Wikipedia! I'm Anas, one of the many editors here at Wikipedia. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links you might find helpful:

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I hope you enjoy editing and being a Wikipedian! Please sign your name on talk pages using four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically produce your name and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Where to ask a question, ask me on my talk page, or type {{helpme}} here on your talk page and someone will show up shortly to answer your questions. I'm looking forward for your contributions! ← ANAS ^Talk 20:34, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

POV External links

I need some help.. I have a question about POV external links: Are they ok? and what if they are considered very harmful and very POV, and even false by some, do we keep them with a note regarding the fact that they are POV, or do we remove them? (This is about the article Syria, please see recent edit history. Thanks. Asabbagh 05:56, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

• Usually external links are thought to be a resource to go a bit deeper in the subject and to be a guide for people searching for more informations. In this respect an external link can be POV if it is rapresentative of some kind of important opinion on the subject (e.g. the link to the official site of a political party is doomed to be POV but is important on the page of the political party itself). The idea is that you can reach NPOV balancing and giving the same amount of importance to different POVs. On the other side this should never be abused in any way and it should never be en excuse to spam links around. If you find that you don't agree if a specific link should or should not stay on a specific page the best thing you can do is to start a civil discussion in the talk page of the article. Never start an edit war and always assume good faith from the other part. --J B 08:13, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject Syria

Hi there Asabbagh! I'm pleased to meet a Syrian (you're Syrian, right?) and interested Wikipedian. I've started this subpage in my user space and I'll look for users who might be interested in joining. If we end up with 6 or more, I'll work on starting this long due WikiProject. As for now, you can contact me whenever you need any assistance, and, if you like, we can collaborate on some project! All the best. - Anas ^Talk? 20:34, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! I've just joined. And yes, Syrian is one of the things I am. Asabbagh 20:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Great. I guess this makes you the fourth or fifth Syrian user around here, or at least one who has more than 10 edits! Just a heads up, people will usually expect you to reply in their talk pages; if you prefer replying in your own talk page, it is preferable to mention that in a note in the top of your talk page. Great job on those Syrian articles! See you around. :) - Anas ^Talk? 21:15, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

After the sixth member joined yesterday, I was considering preparing the project, but not launching it, not yet anyway. I'm afraid some of the members are not likely to offer much help at the time being, or the help when we need it. Meno25 is probably going to be away for a while due to his activity in Arabic Wikipedia and Orionist is on a what seems to be a never-ending wiki-break. I'll personally design the complete WikiProject page as soon as possible, and our first focus would be tagging and assessing Syrian-related articles. As for article writing, we'll need to wait for a couple more experienced article writers. - Anas ^talk? 09:10, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I've done a great deal of work on the project. I've spent 14 hours designing it so far. My brain — it hurts. I need you to add {{User WP Syria}} to include yourself in the participants category and to head to WP:SY/P and add your area of expertise/specialty or in layman's terms, what kind of help you are willing to offer to the project. Once you're done, I'd appreciate if you can complete the hierarchy of categories in Wikipedia:WikiProject Syria/Categories. I've already set the layout and listed the main categories and some of their subcategories (reached Geography of Syria — continue from there). Alright, I'll see you tomorrow. I've got to go chill a bit now. :-) Warmly, Anas ^talk? 20:52, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Aleppo images

I spent two hours to upload and modify these pictures due to low connection. However, I did not expect to remove these pictures in one second and advise me to make a gallery. You can make that gallery before ruining my modestly time-consuming work. In related to the name of pictures: this is Aleppo not Toronto, I mean Aleppo’s pictures are not useful except for Aleppo article. Finally I will make an update to no longer disputed article.Eyas Hajeh 18:49, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi Eyas, first of all, calm down. I honestly appreciate your efforts in uploading these images, and your contributions to this article. However, I wanted to turn your attention to the fact that too many images in one article, in an unorganized manner like it was, will actually bring down the quality of the article. I understand if it took you a long time, but if you aren't able to create a gallery yourself you could ask me! I gladly would create (and already have created) the gallery, it's really not that hard. As for the image names, instead of aleppoaleppo.jpg, I would have chosen aleppocitadel.jpg, i.e. a more descriptive name. I look forward to cooperating with you on improving this, and other articles on wikipedia. Asabbagh 20:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Assessment

Hi, I noticed you've got access to the tool. Before rating the articles (which doesn't need the tool anyways), let's add the banner. This will make the process much easier, and will allow others (members and non-members) to rate the articles themselves. Here's the step-by-step directions:

1. Run the program, login.
2. Edit this page and copy all the contents to a notepad text file. Save the file.
3. In "Make list", select Make from text file. Click on make list and choose the file. This is a filtered list of all the articles except some other category articles (those in cat. like Assyrians, Umayyad Empire), which need article-by-article search (to see if they're in-scope), we'll do those later.
4. In "set options", uncheck everything in "General", and in the "Skip if contains" field, enter {{WP Syria
5. Go to the more section, and enable prepend and enter {{WP Syria |class= |importance=}} in the field.
6. In Start, change the summary to "Added [[WP:SY|WikiProject Syria]] banner; article will be rated later".
7. Now, start the process. Do as much as you can. The program will skip articles with banners and add them to those missing them.
8. After you're done, save the list (in "Make list") and overwrite the text file. Copy the contents and paste it in my sandbox, so that when I continue, I continue from where you left.

OK, I have to take a break now. My eyes are on the fritz. Good luck! - Anas ^talk? 01:33, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Done that list. Note that there were a lot of out of scope articles, ones I've noticed, and some that others took the WP template off of. I have a list of all those if you want. Reason I thought you got these from a watchlist was the peculiar fact that so many Kenyan and Ethiopian related articles were on the list, and I don't know how those would be in a Syrian category. Asabbagh 10:14, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Thanks so much, man. I added all the subcategories of Category:Syria in AWB, one by one, and some like Category:Great Rift Valley (subcategory of Geography of Syria) went unnoticed. I think I added about two other wrong categories too, including Category:Assyrian settlements. My bad, I guess. :/ - Anas ^talk? 10:36, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

WP Syria

Hi there Asabbagh. Good work on adding WP Syria templates to articles, but just to let you know - you are including a few non-Syrian ones by accident (Druze Party, Gulf of Aden, Gulf of Aqaba and Kiryat Shmona - I have removed it from all these). Number 57 09:06, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Hi, and thanks. Yes, the list is (I think) extracted from a watchlist, and there are some pages that have been missed. We will go over all of our articles with time, and whatever non-belonging article which hasn't been reverted already, we will do that ourselves. Thanks. Asabbagh 09:10, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

It is actually extracted from the categories and subcategories of the parent Syria category. Please feel free to revert any similar edits. Regards, Anas ^talk? 10:06, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Paul Anka

Hi. I see you have added a Project Syria tag to the Paul Anka article talk page. I wanted to point out to you that, for the purposes of the article, the reliable sources I have found (including his official home page) support the statement that Anka is of Lebanese, not Syrian, descent. Of course, I understand that the distinction may not have great geographical or historical meaning, and it may not be relevant to the Project. But I would ask that you not edit the text of the article to claim that he is of Syrian descent without providing proper attribution. Thanks.--Vbd (talk) 17:36, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

FYI, I've responded in Vbd's talk page. - Anas ^talk? 19:48, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Um, sorry about that little typo.. hides his face in shame. - Anas ^talk? 10:23, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Lol, no worries. Asabbagh 19:14, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

Xbox Live

Just wanted to say thanks for reverting my edits, I must have accidentally reverted it to the wrong revision. Thanks! Tim.bounceback ^{(talk • contribs • count)} 00:29, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

You're welcome. Asabbagh 01:21, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Barnstar

		The Working Man's Barnstar
		For helping in the tedious, behind-the-scenes, not-so-glorious task of assessing articles, for kicking in and helping with article writing and for being a truly dedicated member of WikiProject Syria, you absolutely merit this Working Man's Barnstar. Thank you so much for your efforts! —Anas talk? 13:13, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Just letting you know I appreciate your efforts. ;-) —Anas ^talk? 22:33, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Aleppo

Hello, Asabbagh. Your edits of the Aleppo entry are obscene. While there is no need to be actively derisory of the city of Aleppo, the facts remain. The city was the site of savage violence and repression against the Jewish community. People of all ages were beaten and killed. Synagogues and homes were burned. Even an orphanage. To call this a "civilized response" is an obscene whitewash. Desist from this.

Here are some links you can read and digest before using such language:

http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/mediterranean_quarterly/v014/14.3roumani.html#FOOT78 http://books.google.com/books?id=WpbKxrYZ4G0C&pg=PA82&lpg=PA82&dq=aleppo+1947+orphanage+jews+syria&source=web&ots=R2rxXYex3C&sig=zw-swGju0ddpPKayzvVIpify0G4#PPA82,M1

Hello, ip user. No, my edits are not obscene. It is important to maintain neutrality when conveying information in an encyclopedia. Exaggeration when describing such events is definitely not maintaining neutrality. I don't know what you mean by "using such language". I have read and "digested" the second link you gave me, I don't have access to the first one. The image the article drew was not of beatings and killings, and it did not mention anything about an orphanage being burnt down... The only thing I read in there was that there were requests for immigration that were denied. Hardly comparable to the savage violence you speak of. Regardless, this is just a book someone published, it doesn't automatically gain reliability. Finally, and this is where you should pay attention, read what you added to the article:

"This other point of view, however, can only be held by those who insist on pretending Syria's decades long record of violence, repression and demonization against Jews never happened."

How can this possibly belong in there? The article already mentions both points of view, and your addition does nothing but add a POV tone to the article. So, I kindly ask you, desist from this. Asabbagh 22:16, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Well then here is a quote from the first link:

Between 1945 and 1948, Jewish quarters in Damascus and Aleppo were ransacked, most synagogues and property, including homes, schools, and an orphanage, were destroyed, and scores of people were killed and wounded by bombs.

You call this living unharmed? The 1947 pogrom in Aleppo is a fact. To deny it is obscene. But let us continue down the article:

The worst, however, was yet to come. Since Jews were suspected of being spies for Israel, the authorities forbade them from having contacts with foreigners. Checkpoints were placed by the army in Damascus and in Aleppo where Jews lived, and "the agents who patrol these neighborhoods harass the Jews and allegedly engaged in extortions, bribery and rape." 78 The mistreatment of Jews by the Syrians reached a new height when, in 1984, an Aleppo Jewish woman named Lily Abadi and her children were brutally massacred and their bodies mutilated. 79 In the face of this kind of atrocity, Jews tried to escape and paid the price with their lives. One such case was the capture of four women who, in their attempt to escape Damascus via the Lebanese border, were betrayed by their smugglers, taken to a cave near the border, and murdered by them. 80

Want more? there is lots more. The best thing to do with the "other point of view" according to which none of this happened, is to delete it.

Templates

Dear Asabbagh, If you are ok,
I want to develop Syria-city template and to transfer it from User anas salloum page to wiki. Please check; Template:Infobox Town TR, and Template:Infobox Province TR
Also please check Template:Districts of Turkey which I can modify it for Syria. Comments?Any other helps needed? Must.^{T C} 09:13, 9 April 2007 (UTC)

I think your question has been answered on Anas's talk page. Thanks, maybe we can discuss on the WikiProj talk page, so everyone is in the know. Asabbagh 07:45, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Dispute on Israel's infobox

Perhaps you'd want to contribute to the discussion on Template_talk:Israel-InfoBox#Request_for_Comment:_Israel.27s_area_figure_in_the_infobox, which is related to the Golan Heights.--Doron 10:39, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

I've been away for a couple of weeks and I apologize I couldn't reply earlier. I will take a look at it. Asabbagh 09:52, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Human rights in Syria

I added to the page, using Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International stats. I thought we might remove the neutrality dispute tag. MarkB2 06:16, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Hi, I've been away, so I just was able to check the changes. I thank you for your efforts, but the article is still far from neutral. Not only do we have to make sure to differentiate between facts and opinions, and attribute these opinions to those who hold them, we also have to make sure that the article isn't one sided. The opinions expressed, while some cited properly, are still mostly the American view on things. I will attempt (in the near future) to help neutralize this article. Your help would be appreciated. Asabbagh 10:03, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

WP:SY

After your little wiki-break, I sort of took one too, so you haven't missed much. Right after working on the districts, I suggested taking an article to GA/FA status. Since I'm quite busy, I think I'm not going to be able to do that, so I think we'll keep this till, say, early June. Right now, my main focus is on getting maps for the districts and with the maps I will be able to create infoboxes for the districts. Another available task is the creation and completion of the Syrian diaspora articles. There is a template I created which might be missing some other countries with a notable Syrian population, so if you know of any, please add them. There are some, or maybe many, red links in the template, so it would be nice to turn them blue. Maybe you can create stubs with general information and statistics if you can find any. The article on Syrian people is important too; if you like, there is a perfect source I can provide for the article. I am currently working on an article for Syrian Americans, which I might be able to take to GA status. —Anas ^talk? 13:27, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

I guess I'll work on an article for Syrian Canadians. Tomorrow. Asabbagh 10:58, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Nice. You're Canadian too, eh? ;-) Where from? I've been working really hard to find maps for the districts of the 13 governorates (excluding Damascus) and only found 3! I've contacted a bunch of ministries, but I don't trust I can get any feedback. Do you think you can get your hands on any of them? I've got Idlib, Aleppo and Hama, and I've created dynamic maps for them all with the help of User:Rarelibra, who created the source maps. If only we can get similar maps for the remaining governorates, man, that would be great. By the way, I'll leave my reply on the diaspora there. —Anas ^talk? 11:16, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Yea, Canadian is one of the things I am. I've searched for district maps all over the net, but couldn't find any. I wasn't surprised... I might be able to actually buy physical maps in a week or two, if I can find them. I've done a little bit of reading for info about Syrian Canadians, and have started the article here, but I think I will need you to copyedit the final version (not done yet). And the dynamic maps look great! Asabbagh 06:45, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Don't worry, I got all the maps! I was very lucky, if I do say so myself. Check my talk page. I'm just waiting for Rarelibra to make the maps, which should have been finished yesterday. Leave me a message when you're done with the article. I've done a good deal of work on the Syrian Americans article. —Anas ^talk? 07:02, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Syrian Canadian

Just did a thorough search and found nothing useful. I think the article by Salloum (ha!) is a perfect source. It contains a good deal of information and a lot of references and footnotes, which is all what you need really. You can take the names of some of these books and look for them in a library, though I think it is unnecessary. I think if you just rewrite that article and use the same references, we can have a GA or even an FA here! You can use a similar structure for the references to the one I am using in my article: add the references and then in the footnotes just use the author's name and the page number. Alternatively, you can add a "Footnotes" section (with auhtor, page number), and below it (or above it) a "References" section. Salloum has used a similar style. When you're done with the rewrite, I can copyedit the article and submit it for peer review, and then maybe nominate the article. All the best, Anas ^talk? 11:52, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Consensus

It's clear from discussions on Persian Gulf that finally a mutual compromise was agreed upon by the Arab and Iranian users to end the dispute, but one or two editors on both side wish to drag this on forever, the article can't be indefinitely tagged and "disputed". The consensus should be enforced by the level-headed contributors on both side, and that includes Arab editors like you. All the best. --AlexanderPar 11:04, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

I think we agreed the proposal by Mardvich.. but we request minor logical modifications.

1. Name like الخليج الفارسي is not a recent name neither officially nor academically in any Arab states (no Arab country using this term, not a univeristy, academic geographic society..) so we request to remove the name الخليج الفارسي from modern names in Arabic language as it is untrue.
2. Other Arabic historical names like خليج العجم، الخليج الفارسي، خليج البصرة، خليج العراق، خليج البحرين، خليج القطيف are all old and extinguished names, thus it should be moved to the section of Etymology and Historical Names within the article but not in the intro as it is cheap manipulation.

That was the points we requested, but it was ignored and jumped over to fabricate that we reached a NPOV. Till now, I request the article to be tagged with Neutrality tag as it is still biased and has a political intro Ralhazzaa 16:39, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Invitation

Would like to join us on Arabic wikipedia . We have a lack of very important articles and of serious contributors and I think that your experience on wp:en can help us a lot to make wp:ar better . Sorry for my English and if you can pass this message to any interested contributors i would be very grateful .ar:user:Omar86

Unspecified source for Image:Hafez_al-assad.jpg

Thanks for uploading Image:Hafez_al-assad.jpg. I noticed that the file's description page currently doesn't specify who created the content, so the copyright status is unclear. If you did not create this file yourself, then you will need to specify the owner of the copyright. If you obtained it from a website, then a link to the website from which it was taken, together with a restatement of that website's terms of use of its content, is usually sufficient information. However, if the copyright holder is different from the website's publisher, then their copyright should also be acknowledged.

As well as adding the source, please add a proper copyright licensing tag if the file doesn't have one already. If you created/took the picture, audio, or video then the {{GFDL-self}} tag can be used to release it under the GFDL. If you believe the media meets the criteria at Wikipedia:Fair use, use a tag such as {{non-free fair use in|article name}} or one of the other tags listed at Wikipedia:Image copyright tags#Fair use. See Wikipedia:Image copyright tags for the full list of copyright tags that you can use.

If you have uploaded other files, consider checking that you have specified their source and tagged them, too. You can find a list of files you have uploaded by following this link. Unsourced and untagged images may be deleted one week after they have been tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If the image is copyrighted under a non-free license (per Wikipedia:Fair use) then the image will be deleted 48 hours after 23:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC). If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you. Abu badali ^(talk) 23:03, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

The Hafez Assad picture

Hey, I think you need to write a "non-free media fair use rationale" for the picture, otherwise someone is going to delete it. Here's an example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Basil_assad.JPG Funkynusayri 15:27, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Hafez_al-assad.jpg

Image Copyright problem

Thank you for uploading Image:Hafez_al-assad.jpg. However, it currently is missing information on its copyright status. Wikipedia takes copyright very seriously. It may be deleted soon, unless we can determine the license and the source of the image. If you know this information, then you can add a copyright tag to the image description page.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them at the media copyright questions page. Thanks again for your cooperation. Abu badali ^(talk) 16:41, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Image:Hafez_al-assad.jpg listed for deletion

An image or media file that you uploaded or altered, Image:Hafez_al-assad.jpg, has been listed at Wikipedia:Images and media for deletion. Please see the discussion to see why this is (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry), if you are interested in it not being deleted. Thank you. Abu badali ^(talk) 17:25, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Central Synagogue of Aleppo

Hello ASabbagh, my name is David, and I have Syrian ancestry. Are you from Aleppo? That is where my family is from... I started an article on Friday entitled Central Synagogue of Aleppo. Would you be able to contribute to it? Also, do you know any people from Aleppo that speak English and that have access to Wikipedia? I would like to hear about Aleppo today.David Betesh (talk)

help!

Hello, I don't know who I should speak to about this important matter. The Golan article has been taking over by Israelis and they have removed everything mentioning an occupation and changed it to "disputed" They have also removed the "the neutrality of this article is disputed" that was on top of the article while it is written in a completely pro-Israeli way. Please do something about this! —Preceding unsigned comment added by SwedishArab (talk • contribs) 19:52, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

Danny Abdul Dayyem

I started a discussion on the Talk after performing my edits, but you continue to revert changes without justification. Please refrain from vandalizing until consensus is reached on the Talk page. Thanks! Roamingkurd (talk) 23:34, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

ArbCom elections are now open!

Hi,
You appear to be eligible to vote in the current Arbitration Committee election. The Arbitration Committee is the panel of editors responsible for conducting the Wikipedia arbitration process. It has the authority to enact binding solutions for disputes between editors, primarily related to serious behavioural issues that the community has been unable to resolve. This includes the ability to impose site bans, topic bans, editing restrictions, and other measures needed to maintain our editing environment. The arbitration policy describes the Committee's roles and responsibilities in greater detail. If you wish to participate, you are welcome to review the candidates' statements and submit your choices on the voting page. For the Election committee, MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 16:33, 23 November 2015 (UTC)

Asian 10,000 Challenge invite

Hi. The Wikipedia:WikiProject Asia/The 10,000 Challenge has recently started, based on the UK/Ireland Wikipedia:The 10,000 Challenge and Wikipedia:WikiProject Africa/The 10,000 Challenge. The idea is not to record every minor edit, but to create a momentum to motivate editors to produce good content improvements and creations and inspire people to work on more countries than they might otherwise work on. There's also the possibility of establishing smaller country or regional challenges for places like South East Asia, Japan/China or India etc, much like Wikipedia:The 1000 Challenge (Nordic). For this to really work we need diversity and exciting content and editors from a broad range of countries regularly contributing. At some stage we hope to run some contests to benefit Asian content, a destubathon perhaps, aimed at reducing the stub count would be a good place to start, based on the current Wikipedia:WikiProject Africa/The Africa Destubathon which has produced near 200 articles in just three days. If you would like to see this happening for Asia, and see potential in this attracting more interest and editors for the country/countries you work on please sign up and being contributing to the challenge! This is a way we can target every country of Asia, and steadily vastly improve the encyclopedia. We need numbers to make this work so consider signing up as a participant! Thank you. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 01:14, 20 October 2016 (UTC)