Talk:Ancient synagogues in Palestine/Archive 2

Requested move 4 June 2016

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: No consensus. For increased clarity, a parenthetical disambiguator should apply to the entire page title rather than to just a part of it. Since this new title proposal was so obviously controversial, I am unable to rename to any other suggested titles made within this proposal. So this decision is made without prejudice, i.e., if anyone would like to begin a new RM proposal of a title suggested herein, such a proposal would be within the guideline, WP:RMCI, and is fine by me. (closed by a page mover) OUR Wikipedia (not "mine")!  Paine   05:09, 14 June 2016 (UTC)

Ancient synagogues in Palestine → Ancient synagogues in Palestine (region)? – To avoid confusion between the political entity State of Palestine and the region Palestine (region). These are distinct areas, the region being the wider of the two. The present article includes a multitude of synagogues in the wider region. The lead sentence of the article was recently improved to read "Ancient synagogues in Palestine refers to synagogues in the region commonly referred to as Palestine", after I urged the point, and I think it is important the title also reflect this.

I would like to stress a small technical point, because it has been misunderstood by some editors in the discussions on this talkpage above. This move is requested to avoid confusion, which I would call disambiguation. The term "disambiguation" as used on Wikipedia may be a bit more limited, but that does not detract from the point, which is the fact that some clarification needs to be added to the word "Palestine". In this regard, please notice that recently, many instances of the word "Palestine" have been made to link to either the state, the region or "Mandatory Palestine", and this is just another case where some clarification is needed.

On a note, I am open for alternative proposals along the same line, like Ancient synagogues in the Palestine region, for example. Debresser (talk) 18:43, 4 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Support as nominator. Debresser (talk) 22:55, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Support if paraphrased Ancient synagogues in the region of Palestine. Better than an everlasting argument between Israel and Palestine. The lead will say that "Region of Palestine today encompasses the State of Israel and Palestinian Territories".--Bolter21 (talk to me) 19:31, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Fine with me as well. But why do you need that phrase in the lead? Why wouldn't it be enough to simply link to Palestine (region)? Debresser (talk) 20:57, 4 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Reject. This is the third effort to destabilize a perfectly neutral title. Repeated recyclying of a complaint after it is turned down, each within days, is poor practice.Nishidani (talk) 22:28, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * This is my first official move discussion, as suggested above by Nableezy. and Whining is also poor practice. Debresser (talk) 22:54, 4 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Just to clarify for you what a native speaker of English understands by "whining". It means a nagging pertinacity typical of children in the face of adult refusals to placate the obstinately reiterated whimsies of the immature. Nishidani (talk) 19:55, 5 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, that is what a non-native speaker would be referring to as well. You couldn't have described your last few posts here in any better way. Debresser (talk) 21:03, 5 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Don't be silly, and inanely provocative. The reiteration of a turned down suggestion is in the record, and you with it. You are totally unfamiliar with any serious scholarship outside your profession, and I'll say this in Chesdovi's favour, that his personal religion never gets in the way of an omnivorous curiosity about, and respect for, secular scholarship. That is why, unlike yourself, he is useful to this encyclopedia, even if I often disagree with him.Nishidani (talk) 21:24, 5 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Insinuating that of my over 80,000 edits nothing was useful for Wikipedia is rather insulting, weren't it that it is patently incorrect. I doubt you have any way of knowing my attitude towards what you call secular scholarship. Suffice it to say that I have studied in universities in Europe and Israel. Debresser (talk) 22:01, 5 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Oppose - completely unnecessary and displaying a complete disregard for the language that modern sources use for the topic of the article, that being invariably "Palestine" and "Palestinian". The thing of this is that there are so many entangled POVs here that they overlap in somewhat surprising combinations. There are those that want to lay claim as being "in the state of Palestine" anything in the occupied territories, ignoring the crucial difference between a state and a country and just because one exists the other does not automatically follow, combined with those that want to remove any mention of "Palestine" as having been the place that Israel now largely occupies, either as lawful sovereign or belligerent occupant, so they go along with the X is in Palestine formulation in modern village articles in order to relegate the commonly used name of the place for the time period under discussion here. Then there are those that want to deny any existence of such a thing called Palestine, both present or past. What should be followed is something similar to WP:WESTBANK in which we use the terminology that sources use for a given time period, eg for antiquity we say something happened in Judea or some place was in Samaria, and for things past a certain point we again follow the sources. Sources refer to these synagogues having been built in Palestine. Full stop. There isnt any other meaningful destination topic for an article titled Ancient synagogues in Palestine, and as such no need to disambiguate. There is zero policy basis for this, and it should be rejected.  nableezy  - 06:22, 5 June 2016 (UTC)


 * “ignoring the crucial difference between a state and a country”


 * Country, state and nation state are all interchangeable in common usage. Nation can be used in an ethnic sense but I have never heard state used this way. You hear of stateless peoples or stateless nations but countryless states is an oxymoron.Jonney2000 (talk) 01:36, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * A country controls its territory, a state is a political entity that other states say is a state. Thats the primary difference.  nableezy  - 08:22, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Reminds one of 國 guó which in Chinese refers to all three: country, nation, state. But in the ancient chronicles describing China’s periphery, it was the reflex term for all sorts of entities, from tribal centres to ethnic aggregates controlling a territory. Modern scholars now understand it in those con texts as meaning what it meant etymologically, any walled town or set of towns (vs. 城 chéng, inner wall) controlled by local chieftains opposed to Han/Wei dynasty expansionism.Nishidani (talk) 09:26, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * The state has very limited recognition. Note, even those who say that certain areas are not Israel, do not automatically recognize a Palestinian state. The country also has limited control over its territory, more policing than in the sense a sovereign state controls its territory and defends it against foreign powers. Historically, neither ever existed. So all POVs aside, Nableezy, the single most neutral term available to us is "Palestine (region)"/"region of Palestine". Debresser (talk) 14:09, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * That isnt true. 136 states recognize Palestine. The rest of your comment makes absolutely no sense to me, as it is seemingly a completely disconnected set of thoughts that dont really have anything to do with the comment your responding to. All that said, no, it isnt (see I can just assert things and say its true just like you!).  nableezy  - 16:06, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * 1. That is an unsourced statement. 2. That is still not all 3. The UN does not recognize Palestine as a full member state. 4. Which begs the question, as what do those 136 states (claimed) recognize Palestine. 5. Where are all those 136 embassies? 6. If so, what is the relevance of that "recognition"? 7. What does all of that mean for us on Wikipedia? Debresser (talk) 13:47, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * 1. Heres 135, ill find the 136th lol. 2. Who said all. 3. Who cares. 4. As a state. 5. Not relevant. 6. The relevance is that they say its a state. 7. That its a state, not necessarily a country. 8. None of this has anything to do with this article, and I have no idea why it is youre badgering me over it. My point above that Palestine is a state, not a country, meaning it doesnt actually control its territory so places arent "in Palestine" as a modern country. So when we say "in Palestine" it means the region by default. Even more so for an article like this where any other use or any other word would be anachronistic, much like the Judea /Samaria or West Bank guideline.  nableezy  - 16:05, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * That still leaves the considerable number of 57 states that do not recognize Palestine. Including Western Europe and the Northern America. Also take into account that there are 22 Arab countries and 48 Muslim-majority countries (overlapping), whose opinion on the issue is rather predictable. Debresser (talk) 22:10, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * What exactly does that have to do with anything at all?  nableezy  - 23:58, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * All of these points were made in the preceding 2 discussions, so repeating them is pointless, except as an exercise in mnemonics, if one needs to learn by rote.Nishidani (talk) 15:47, 6 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Nope. This is an independent proposal, so there is nothing pointless about any part of this discussion. Don't try to diminish this proposal, please. Debresser (talk) 13:48, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia policy on disambiguation is what diminishes the "proposal".  nableezy  - 16:09, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * As I showed above, that point is incorrect.
 * Why the parentheses ("proposal")? This is a proposed move. I don't appreciate the attitude. Debresser (talk) 18:03, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * You have not shown any such thing above. You make an unsupported assertion and act like that makes it so WP:DAB doesnt apply here. Wikipedia disambiguates titles when a title may have two separate titles. That doesnt apply here. As for your last line, I cant really say I care. But they were quotation marks, not parentheses.  nableezy  - 19:11, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Please note that I never claimed WP:DAB applies. All I said is that the title is ambiguous, confusing, and in need of clarification. Debresser (talk) 21:53, 7 June 2016 (UTC)
 * I said it applies, and I said based on it this title as it stands is fine. And I say it is not ambiguous, not confusing, and not in need of any clarification. I actually said you said it doesnt apply based on a series of unsupported assertions, so your comment doesnt make a whole lot of sense to me. Hey look, there are those unsupported assertions again.  nableezy  - 21:18, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * My point has been well argued, and you have nothing substantial to say against it, and resort to attempts at sarcasm. I will stop here replying to this now useless polemic, and hope other editors will join the discussion. Debresser (talk) 21:41, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Not really, you say we should include a disambiguation for a place that is routinely used in scholarly sources, including the sources of this article. That isnt an argument, it is an unfounded and unsupported assertion. I wasnt even being sarcastic. Facetious yes, but sarcastic no.  nableezy  - 22:48, 8 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Oppose, per all of the above arguments, Huldra (talk) 21:44, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * New Proposal. Ancient synagogues in the Southern Levant. It is accurate, NPOV and cuts this wearying argument off at the knees. I am talking to both "camps" here. Irondome (talk) 21:54, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * No fierce opposition, but the term "Southern Levant" has recently been discussed at Categories_for_discussion/Log/2016_March_16 in relation to Category:Southern Levant, which in the end was emptied and turned into a soft redirect, and one of the arguments against using the term was the vagueness of the term. Also, I don't disagree that "Palestine" was the historic term to refer to this region, so I see no reason to avoid it, and I think that finding evasive terminology is not a solution. Debresser (talk) 22:02, 8 June 2016 (UTC)

*Support. I find Debresser's opening statement compelling. I take on board also the statement by Nableezy (06.22 5/6/16). The precision of Debresser's proposal would be useful. In talking of a region it is actually attempting a more NPOV approach. Irondome (talk) 22:41, 8 June 2016 (UTC)
 * I really dont understand the NPOV argument. The common English name of the place is the name of the place. Now, based on how Ive read Wikipedia policies and articles over the past decade, would see a Wikipedia article titled Ancient synagogues in Palestine (region) and think that there is some region by the name of Ancient synagogues in Palestine. Because thats how and why we disambiguate titles. Compare this with the guideline on when to use West Bank and when to use Judea and/or Samaria (WP:WESTBANK). For the time period that modern sources refer to the area there as Judea or Samaria or whatever, our articles do the same. We dont qualify it because theres a modern Israeli district by the name of Judea and Samaria Area, we dont downplay it. Todays sources will refer to something that was built in ancient times as having been in Judea, and we do the same. They also refer to these things as being in Palestine, and we do the same. How is this any different?  nableezy  - 03:59, 9 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Indeed Nableezy. Article lead specifically links to Palestine (region). I withdraw my support, and am beginning to wonder why we are actually having this conversation, if all concerns appear to be met. It would appear that we have a broad cross-party consensus here. Simon. Irondome (talk) 16:08, 9 June 2016 (UTC)
 * @Irondome The claim that the region is always called "Palestine" is factually incorrect in academic literature from after 1948. The lead does link to the region, but that is a relatively recent improvement, and one that editors are likely to try to revert, if the title isn't changed as well. In addition, the title should be unambiguous, and at present it isn't. Also, per Nableezy's argument, the article should be called "Ancient synagogues in Syria Palaestina", which is what the region was called when these synagogues were active. Nableezy is just trying to oppose a perfectly logical nomination with whatever argument he can think of, without checkeing if they actually make sense. Debresser (talk) 15:56, 13 June 2016 (UTC)
 * You are wrong, and 'academic literature after 1948? is frankly, bizarre, unless one imagines that by 'academic literature' you are referring to the adoption of 'eretz yisrael' in Hebrew texts in the new state. That's understandable, but it is not what 'academic literature' in the non-Hebrew speaking world uses: there, 'Palestine' is still the default term for all scholars, Jewish, Israeli or otherwise, for the land from the Paleolithic down to modern times, esp. when discussing the history of the country, of which 'ancient synagogues' is an integral part.Nishidani (talk) 16:26, 13 June 2016 (UTC)
 * That is flatly untrue, as even a quick read at the sources cited in this article will show. You have repeatedly said untrue things in this move request, with the apparent expectation that nobody will call you out on it. From 2012 used Palestine, full stop. Also 2012, uses Palestine, full stop. Kindly stop making false claims.  nableezy  - 17:31, 13 June 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Alternative proposal
Since the above previous proposals don't seem to gain much consensus, I (now formally) propose the following to remove any real or perceived ambiguity. The latest discussion shows at least some support for this title although so far not all editors have commented on it or indicated if they would support such move as an alternative or second choice.--TMCk (talk) 18:42, 20 June 2016 (UTC)

"Ancient synagogues in Palestine" - - - > "Synagogues in ancient Palestine" (Note: No template b/c of bot problem.)

Support/oppose

 * Support as an alternative - As previously indicated, this title would address voiced concerns and is still within the scope of usage in reliable sources.--TMCk (talk) 18:42, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Id support this over any other choice, but I still dont think its necessary.  nableezy  - 19:58, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * As per Nableezy. It's not necessary, but it is solidly grounded usage, even if less common.Nishidani (talk) 21:05, 20 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Oppose Reason 1: "synagogues in Y" so far referred to Y as a location, not a time period, and I think it should stay that way. Compare Synagogues in India, Synagogues in Omaha, Synagogues in Washington State etc, but never a time period. Reason 2: by the same token the article might as well be called "Synagogues in ancient Israel". Reason 3: inferior to the proposal above. Debresser (talk) 21:12, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Please also note that the proposal above is still open, and has more support than opposition, so I don't think it was prudent to open this proposal at the time it was opened. Debresser (talk) 21:15, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * It does not have more support than opposition. Looks like its 5-4 opposed, 4-4 when you wrote that, to me.  nableezy  - 22:48, 20 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Support: name clearly reflects the topic of the article and is actually a name used in reliable sources. Ebonelm (talk) 21:01, 21 June 2016 (UTC)

Discussion
How is this different than Synagogues in Ancient Israel which would make even more sense? Sir Joseph (talk) 18:45, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Ancient Israel would be anachronistic. Sources use Palestine as the place name for this time period, so to should Wikipedia.  nableezy  - 19:57, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Not necessarily, Israel is today and ancient Israel is the same place in ancient times. Sir Joseph <sup style="color:green;">(talk) 20:05, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Oh good grief!Nishidani (talk) 21:02, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Which Israel or kingdom are you referring to? Not that it would make any difference tho. + I thought we go by sources while avoiding ambiguity and not trying to add some?--TMCk (talk) 20:23, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Without the "good grief", please. I agree with Sir Joseph, and that is one reason I think this proposal is inferior to the one above, because both "ancient Palestine" and "ancient Israel" can be argued. Debresser (talk) 21:11, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Good grief, because anyone who makes Sir Joseph's proposition has never opened a serious book on the history of Palestine. Ancient 'Israel' was never coterminous with 'Palestine'. That is kindergarten level basic knowledge.Nishidani (talk) 21:28, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Since the obvious is not obvious to some, let's parse what you Dovid, assent to without grasping its inanity, with the appropriate grammatical correction.
 * "Israel (is) today and ancient Israel is the same place in ancient times."
 * Sir Joe is stating that 'ancient Israel' (the northern Kingdom of 'Samaria', when Israel does not refer, as often, to the community of worshippers wherever they dwell) was situated within the recognized territory of the modern state of Israel, and not on the West Bank. Do you guys ever think?, equating modern Israel on the traditional territory of Philistia and the Phoenicians etc. in good part, with the area in the hills of Samaria in the northern West Bank?  This kind of nonsense makes me blasphemously religious, as I expire for the evening muttering 'Jeezus!'Nishidani (talk) 21:35, 20 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Debresser, when you write something "can be argued" that is close to meaningless. I can argue that rainbows are made of marshmallows and that clouds are just giant pillows for angels to sleep on. We on Wikipedia however use reliable sources for arguments, and they, in the English language, overwhelmingly use "Palestine" for the territory during this time period. So yes, you can argue whatever you like, but good grief is a perfectly acceptable response to that argument or to one in which somebody says a rainbow tastes delicious. <small style="border: 1px solid;padding:1px 3px;white-space:nowrap"> nableezy  - 22:53, 20 June 2016 (UTC)

Suggestions
Please forgive me, as you did nothing wrong. It's just that the RM bot can only handle one open RM on a talk page. One suggestion would be to make the above title suggestion as a variant proposal to the open move request and make it within that request preferably in a subsection for easy readability. Another suggestion is to wait until the open request plays out, then go from there. In any case, it was a bot limitation and only a bot limitation that required the above discussion closure. What's in your palette?  Paine  00:34, 21 June 2016 (UTC)


 * As an involved editor you realy shouldn't have touched this at all + the sincere thing would've been to simply point out to me what is nothing more than a simple bot problem. Please don't do this again, but of course I do forgive you.--TMCk (talk) 14:00, 21 June 2016 (UTC)


 * That's two opinions that I was wrong (the first was expressed on my talk page), and since I really don't know the time constraints as to how long before the RM bot has a problem after a second RM is opened, there may have been time for me to ask you to withdraw and turn your formal request into an informal discussion as has been done above. Thank you for your consideration in this matter, and I will try to be more considerate myself in the future.  What's in your palette?  Paine   02:18, 22 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Appreciate your response.--TMCk (talk) 03:14, 22 June 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.