Talk:Naji al-Ali

Translation
I saw this on the Palestine portal page both as a request for translation and request for article, so I plunged in. The translation is very rough (doing it on the hoof with no dictionary) and the article could do with more info, which I am going to try and dig out of a book in the next couple of days.

Picture
Anyone have a picture of Naji al-Ali or of his grave in London, or know how to copy the picture of Handala from the Arabic article?Palmiro 19:28, 13 July 2005 (UTC)19:21, 13 July 2005 (UTC)

Murder and culpability
An anonymous contributor has added the following:


 * Under interrogation, the Jerusalem-born man, Ismail Sawan, said that his superiors in Tel Aviv had been briefed well in advance of the plot to kill the cartoonist.


 * By refusing to pass on the relevant information to their British counterparts, Mossad earned the displeasure of Britain, which retaliated by expelling two Israeli diplomats from London. A furious Margaret Thatcher, then prime minister, closed Mossad’s London base in Palace Green, Kensington.

While I've read this myself in a couple of places, I don't think it should go in the article without a reliable source being cited. Also, just referring to this end of the affair and not to the suspicions that Palestinian figures were behind the murder seems a bit parti pris. Palmiro | Talk 13:54, 23 June 2006 (UTC)


 * The IP insertion seems to be a direct copy of a passage mirrored on several blogs, and attributed on at least some of them to this Electronic Intifada page. The claim is dubious, and is contradicted by this NY Times piece, which says unambiguously that the investigation found the assassin to be a member of the PLO, which is the common narrative. What is more disturbing, perhaps, is that the IP behaved in a manner suggesting some familiarity with WP procedure.  Tewfik Talk 07:02, 12 August 2007 (UTC)


 * You are correct that Electronic Intifada has this passage, but it seems not to be the original source. This story has many variations and is confirmed by multiple sources. One example is this [Ha'aretz article]. Also Gideon's Spies by Gordon Thomas has long passage about mossad agent Ismail Sowan. NB! Those sources do not claim that Mossad ordered the hit, but simply it was in the know and did not inform friendly British authorities. The case is also notable, beacause it is one of only two cases where Israeli diplomats have been expelled from friendly countries. --Magabund 22:53, 24 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Just adding some additional reference to the aforementioned discussion. Apparently al-Ali, as notorious as he was for his stance against Israel, was also extremely vocal in his opposition to Arafat and his PLO movement.  Thomas L. Friedman's book, From Beirut To Jerusalem, states that Scotland Yard has always held the belief that "the assassin was dispatched by Arafat or PLO officials close to him".  It also ads that al-Ali had been "thrown out of Kuwait in 1985 - reportedly at Arafat's insistance".  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.68.54.203 (talk) 04:49, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

if this is true that Savan was PLO member AND Mossad agent than it would be noteworthy what happened to him after. In normal terms he would have signed hir own death sentence from the PLO and therefore he must have sought asylum in Israel. That would have been the only clue.--77.119.147.177 (talk) 02:33, 17 April 2009 (UTC)

Hi, just wanted to share my thought. I was reading the article and from it i came to an understanding that the murder was a mossad job. the article says sawan worked for PLO and mossad, thatcher was angry, mossad agents got kicked out of the country. all this points as if the mossad order the assassination but when i read the cited article (reference [10]), i discovered it ways that the mossad didn't order the murder but knew about it but didn't warn MI5. there a huge difference of course. the article implies direct connection to the mossad while its not there. not only that the same news article of the independent says that the murders were naji's countrymen. so mossad had nothing to do with it but they knew it was going to happen. IMO the wiki article is confusing, misleading and creates a false impression on the reader. i would suggest to edit it in such a way that will make the facts clear. who killed naji? PLO. who knew about the plot and didn't warn MI5? mossad. MrZaf (talk) 14:05, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That's an extremely strange reading of the sources since none of them say that. Viriditas (talk) 07:53, 23 July 2014 (UTC)

Unnecessary
"What follows is a Zionist whitewashing of both Naji Al-Ali's politics, namely his criticism of Israeli apartheid, and of Israel's role in the brutal occupation and oppression of Palestinians." -- Deleted. This doesn't add anything to the article. The best way to tackle an article you think is biased is to argue it on the discussion and change the the article content if it is biased or factually wrong.

Azymuthca 18:26, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Error in the Article?
"Handala, after the Israeli Srulik, is the most famous of Naji al-Ali's characters." after the Israeli Srulik? Srulik was drawn by Dosh (as written in the Article about Srulik), not by al-Ali. 15:32, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

I noticed this as well, so Im deleting the Srulik reference as this sentence is incorrect. Mhicaoidh (talk) 23:36, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

palestine did not exist in 1938
british mandate of palestine did. stop the silly fact twisting. 109.66.17.64 (talk) 03:55, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

Ofcourse Palestine did exist. How are the people of the land known as Palestenian then? Why are the people who were living there long before the zionist movement started Al-Nakba, called palestenians? You need to get off the silly brainwashing set youve been on, for all your life probably. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 195.229.235.38 (talk) 16:08, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Palsentine as a state or as any kind of political entity as a matter of fact did not exist and never existed. It is a well documented historical fact that the name was given to the region by the Romans in the 1st century. Prior to that it was known as Judea. Palestinian was not a well established nationality at the time. if you live in the coast of the US you might be a called Appalachian but does not imply anything about your nationality. What i just said is fact, just in case you want to call me brainwashed as well. By the way, may i remind you that nowadays Jordan was part of the British mandate, and was actually a part of Palestine (70%-80% of the territory). [Now comes a personal thought] How come the Palestinians don't demand that territory as well? why do they accept the rule of foreigners (Hashemites) ? Well, thats just food for thought. Being a history fan such as yourself i'm sure you'll be interested with the question. MrZaf (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 13:52, 8 March 2012 (UTC).

Please explain
Brewcrewer, you added a cn tag to a sentence bout where Ali was born. Just to be lear, are you suggesting he wasn't born in Shajara, or that Ilaniya is not now built over Shajara or what?  T i a m u t talk 19:27, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

This article has issues
The preponderance of reliable academic sources indicate that Naji al-Ali was assassinated by the PLO for criticizing them. However, this article appears to have completely whitewashed that fact and predictably (although indirectly) blamed Israel, contrary to the sources. Viriditas (talk) 07:34, 23 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Having looked at the sources in use in this article and those available online, it is clear that several editors deliberately altered what the sources said. Viriditas (talk) 07:40, 23 July 2014 (UTC)
 * Per the above and the continuing concerns by other editors on this talk page, I have added a NPOV tag. The entire article needs to be rewritten to remove POV and to insure accuracy. Viriditas (talk) 07:52, 23 July 2014 (UTC)

About the involvement of Israel the article says that police arrested Sowan, which confessed to be a member of the PLO and an agent of the Mossad, and that the Mossad had advance knowledge of the killing. All this agrees with the sources.--109.54.139.69 (talk) 20:34, 11 January 2015 (UTC)

External links modified
Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just added archive links to 2 one external links on Naji al-Ali. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20150922141124/http://www.najialali.com/ to http://www.najialali.com
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/20160127212802/http://najialali.hanaa.net/ to http://najialali.hanaa.net

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.

Cheers.—cyberbot II  Talk to my owner :Online 18:49, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

Handala
Section lacks any reference to the more controversial comics, such as this or this (showcasing territorial claims) and this or this (showcasing antisemitic imagery). -- 31.16.248.117 (talk) 01:33, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

Location of bullet wound
There are several different statements about where he was shot. The lead says neck (with a source, but the source says face). The section "Assassination" says right temple (no source). The section "Commemorative statue" says left eye (no source).

This article isn't protected, but there's that big warning at the top of the talk page, so I'm gonna err on the side of respecting the IP editor prohibition. But I figure someone should probably address this. --98.109.27.187 (talk) 07:43, 23 May 2020 (UTC)