Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Criticism of Israel


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   no consensus. I won't bore you, it's fairly obvious on reading this which way it has to be closed. We can always discuss this again later, but this debate has failed to reach any consensus. Courcelles 23:58, 12 January 2011 (UTC)

Criticism of Israel

 * – ( View AfD View log )


 * Delete. WP:POVFORK from the already povforked Anti-Zionism. Don't need another WP:COATRACK for everyone to hang their preferred antisemitism anti-israel, anti-zionism, etc. Notice of course that we don't have Criticism of Saudi Arabia, Criticism of Sudan, Criticism of South Africa, Criticism of Germany, etc.   brew  crewer  (yada, yada) 20:44, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Just noticing that the person recommending deletion made other articles one of his main arguments. So it seems relevant to note that there are BOTH a Criticism of Islam and a Criticism of Islamism article and neither has been suggested for deletion. That easily could be seen as a POV fork of Islam. Do you see this deletion as a precedent for those? Let's at least be consistent. CarolMooreDC (talk) 21:15, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Carol, you are surely aware that you are comparing a religion, a theologically inspired political movement and a sovereign state? In other words, there are no forks, and the articles are not epistemologically related. Although the scope of the later article is yet to be clearly defined, so there may be some analogies as it develops Koakhtzvigad (talk) 11:42, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
 * The fact that wikipedia defines Israel as "a Jewish and democratic state" also makes the religious angle relevant. However, to make another argument using article comparisons, if those two criticism of Islam articles exist, plus Criticism of Judaism and Criticism of Christianity articles, how can there not be an article criticizing this or any other state, assuming sufficient WP:RS? CarolMooreDC (talk) 11:59, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
 * What are you trying to say? You suggested that a deletion of this article should be a precedent for deleting articles criticising Islam and Islamism. At that rate there will be established an effective regime of censorship against any criticism of anyone and anything.
 * Now you are arguing that there should be articles offering criticism of any other state, and for that matter political philosophy or religion?
 * Aside from the controversial nature of the assumption there are "three Abrahamic religions", there should not be any impediments to articles describing valid criticism of anything, provided logical approaches and methods (criticism is a form of logic) are used; for example Criticism of MacDonalds Corporation, or Criticism of Hollywood film content, etc. The Arts has a slew of such articles under Arts criticism: Architecture criticism, Visual art criticism, Dance criticism, Film criticism, Literary criticism, Music journalism, Television criticism, and Theatre criticism. Then there are more intra-disciplinary articles such as Criticism of American foreign policy, Criticisms of Salvador Allende. Which is why I find the attempt to delete this article rather strange Koakhtzvigad (talk) 13:11, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Sorry if I was confusing. Just making clear that using the lack of other criticism articles to excuse deleting a criticism article ridiculous, when there are criticism articles about more sensitive topics (with obviously overlap with Israel in the Criticism of Judaism case). And looking at Abrahamic religions, I see there are more than three; my error. Yeah, wikipedia for teaching me something everyday!! CarolMooreDC (talk) 21:17, 10 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Strong Keep. Criticizing Israel isn't equivalent to thinking it shouldn't exist, for God's sake. If you think there should be articles for criticism of Saudi Arabia, Sudan, et al., create them. Roscelese (talk) 21:15, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * not entirely sure what god or arguing for the non-existence of Israel has to do with anything. -- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 21:42, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * You claim that it's a POV fork of Anti-Zionism, but they're not the same thing. Read WP:POVFORK - a POV fork is "another version of the article (or another article on the same subject)...developed according to a particular point of view." Your claim that it is one only makes sense if you believe that any criticism of any Israeli government policy is equivalent to suggesting that Israel should not exist, which is patently ridiculous. Roscelese (talk) 21:51, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * i never claimed Criticism of Israel is a POVFORK because its the same thing as Anti-zionism and i still have no idea what you're talking about regarding the non-existence of Israel.-- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 22:05, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Yup, you sure didn't advocate for the deletion of Criticism of Israel as a POV fork of Anti-Zionism. How could anyone even imagine that you would do that?
 * I've voted; I'm done here. Good luck. Roscelese (talk) 22:15, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * i advocated for the deletion of of Criticism of Israel as a POV fork of Anti-Zionism, but not because they are the "same thing."-- brew crewer  (yada, yada) 22:18, 26 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Redirect to Anti-Zionism, simply because this article is pretty one-sided and violates WP:SYNTH. BTW, Brewcrewer, you don't have to wikilink to Strawman for every single one of your comments. Erpert (let's talk about it) 22:54, 26 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Israel-related deletion discussions.  -- • Gene93k (talk) 23:52, 26 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Delete - it is a content fork and synth, and also an unprecendented article, insofar as the same kind of article could as well be made for most countries in the world. Avaya1 (talk) 03:18, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Delete - WP:Attack, one grows tried of political advocacy masquerading as "encyclopedic content". Any issue worthy of criticism already has its own article dealing with the specific issue at hand. Poliocretes (talk) 10:11, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep - The Anti-Zionism article is a mess as it includs a vast amount of material that should be in this article - the clearest examples are the 6 references to "criticism of Israel" within the AZ article. Anti-Zionism is about the ideology supporting the existence of the country, this is about the criticism the country has had to face in relation to policy decisions. This criticism is highly notable - as shown by ghits and all the facts shown on the page such as disproportionate UN criticism, PR against criticism a big political focus within Israel, innumerable WP:RS books and media articles written on the topic. The facts that other countries do not have such articles, that the article doesn't already exist, or that the article 'could' be used for advocacy are not valid arguments. WP has "Criticism of" articles for the three major Abrahamic religions - editors have worked hard and these have not become coatracks. This topic is highly notable and is needed in order to house a lot of information incorrectly placed within Anti-Zionism.Oncenawhile (talk) 15:13, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * Ghits, using the examples suggested by brewcrewer and the "find sources" tool at the top of the page, gives the following for {"Criticism of [ ]" -wikipedia}: Israel 2,260,000 / Saudi Arabia 30,900 / Sudan 4,940 / South Africa 37,000 / Germany 36,100. In other words, Criticism of Israel is twenty times more ghit-notable than the other four countries combined.
 * The clearest examples of WP:RS confirming this are the first three references in the article - the relevant quotes are shown clearly in the footnotes. The notability of the criticism is indisputable.Oncenawhile (talk) 16:22, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * In case helpful, here is another WP:RS - the American Jewish Committee called the term "criticism of Israel" a "ubiquitous rubric" - see the WP article which includes the quote here Progressive Jewish Thought and the New Anti-Semitism Oncenawhile (talk) 17:34, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * If the Anti-Zionism article is a mess, then fix it. We don't need two articles about the same topic.  Erpert  Who is this guy? 18:41, 27 December 2010 (UTC)
 * To be clear, there are three distinct topics - Criticism of Israel, Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism. They overlap like A, B and C in the picture on the right, but they each have enough content which doesn't overlap to be distinct topics.Oncenawhile (talk) 05:02, 28 December 2010 (UTC)[[Image:Venn diagram cmyk.svg|thumb|right|150px]]
 * Response to Keep To be clearer, the title, Israel, represents a country, which means a region within a sphere of influence of a government. If the government is wrong, then, criticizes the ruling party such as criticism of Israel government. If the practice of people in Israel is wrong then, criticize the practice. There is by far, no way to criticize Israel which is far more general term. Soewinhan (talk) 09:35, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Soewinhan, that is incorrect - the article title uses Israel in exactly the same way as the Israel article - i.e. as the commonly accepted shorthand for State of Israel. As you will no doubt be aware, a State is defined in WP as the formal institution on which a political community is organized under a government. Oncenawhile (talk) 09:57, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Re It is a state, but a state has many variations. Not only a government represents a state, but also people, culture, and so on. The title is not clear about what the article is criticizing. I will agree with Criticism Of Israel Government. For example, if you want to criticize Military Junta of Burma, you can't title criticism of Burma of course.Soewinhan (talk) 10:35, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Responded to this below Oncenawhile (talk) 10:52, 4 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep I basically agree with Oncenawhile aboutthe nature of the topics. There is sufficient justification for this article also.    DGG ( talk ) 05:34, 1 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep Concur with Oncenawhile. On the other hand,  I do see the point of the "oppose" editors, namely that this is a POV fork of the Israel article (I'm not why someone suggested that it is a POV fork of Zionism .. they are not even close).  And in an ideal world, perhaps they would be merged.  But the Israel article contains no mention whatsoever of alleged discrimination, racism, apartheid, or human rights issues.  None.  Yet criticism of Israel is a very, very widely discussed topic - both by primary sources (critics) and secondary sources (Dershowitz, et al).  So the absence of "criticism" material in the Israel article is a significant oversight.   That oversight, as a practical matter, cannot and will not be remedied by a merger.  Therefore, an independent "criticism of" article is appropriate.  The existing articles Anti-Zionism and Human rights in Israel are not replacments for a broader "Criticism of .." article, because they focus on narrower sub-topics.  --Noleander (talk) 02:02, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep - essentially Criticism has been around since ancient times as a discipline at one time taught as Rhetoric. I took the liberty of moving the article to International criticism of Israel, lest it require disambiguation from prophetic criticism of Israel provided in Tanakh. I'm not sure why Anti-Zionism got mentioned because that pre-existed the state of Israel. However, anyone who has access to the mass media, and Internet (a must for editing Wikipedia!) would be aware that criticism of Israel, and other states around the globe, is a fact. That no articles have been written for other states is perhaps indicative of the reception such articles are likely to receive from editors representing the states being criticised. I'll say nothing about criticism of Saudi Arabia, but criticism of Sudan has been so obvious, that to miss it would be inexcusable. South Africa has been criticised before and after the end of South Africa under apartheid, while Germany certainly had its share of criticism last century, and this, if only for its economic policy during the global economic crisis. Its just that these issues have not been brought together under same rubric because criticism of Israel has been so wide-ranging, and directed from so many different quarters. One can say that there is even an Israel-bashing industry.Koakhtzvigad (talk) 05:21, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment As per above, I am strongly supporting keep, and I agree with Koakhtzvigad's improvements to the article. However, I was just checking the 'what links here' to the article, and noticed that on 23:34, 29 December 2006 a previous version of the "Criticism of Israel" article was deleted by Mel Etitis (see ), but no further information is available and I cannot seem to find a copy of the deleted article or the AfD discussion. Can anyone provide further info here, as might be useful to ensure that when this discussion is closed, it really is closed. Oncenawhile (talk) 18:05, 2 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Note: Double "keep" !vote struck out.  Erpert  Who is this guy? 08:05, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I have received an answer to this: "The page was a word-for-word copy of this revision of Allegations of Israeli apartheid and was prodded and subsequently deleted with the rationale "unneeded fork of Allegations of Israeli apartheid". As such, there is no unique content to look at". The current article is clearly a different kettle of fish, being clearly focused on the criticism as a phenomenon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Oncenawhile (talk • contribs) 15:51, 4 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete. This is a very clear case of a POV fork, created following this discussion where a majority of editors felt that a similarly-titled article section was inappropriate. There does not appear to be any purpose to this article other than to give a different slant on information that is either contained or could be contained in the other two articles on the same topic (if you don't feel that this is the case, then please give an example of the type of information you think needs this article to exist). On top of which, the article would be an obvious drama-magnet. Keep votes here seem to be based simply on WP:ITEXISTS or on the argument that related articles are not good enough but for some reason can't be improved, which seems tanatamount to saying that you want to a new space to push a POV that has not so far prevailed elsewhere. Sincerely hope that a closing admin will see through this.--FormerIP (talk) 13:11, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Consensus is based on strength of arguments, not number of editors. Your comment looks more like gaming than logic - with respect to your challenge in brackets, many examples are cited above - as a dissenting editor you are welcome to provide specific examples of how the core info in the article could fit in to the other articles you reference. Your disparaging of the keep votes is absurd in light of the detailed commentary from supporting editors above - all the arguments have been set out clearly and are based on WP:N, and you have not attempted to counter any of them (nor have any of the other opposing editors). Your reference to the parallel discussion is helpful - there is consensus from both sides in that discussion that the topic is notable - the only (and ongoing) debate is with respect to how much focus it warrants within the main Israel article. Oncenawhile (talk) 20:41, 3 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Delete While I agree that Israel is often criticised in various documents, we have articles for the real substance of those arguments already - we have Human rights in Israel, Israel and the apartheid analogy and other places where these topics are covered in quite some detail. I don't see why "criticism" would be notable independently of the policies being criticised. --Dailycare (talk) 21:31, 3 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Daily care: Yes, you have a good point there - there are already three articles in WP that do describe the vast majority of criticism:    Human rights in Israel, Israel and the apartheid analogy, and Anti-Zionism.  But there are a few reasons why a dedicated article would be useful to readers: (1)  the Israel article has no mention whatsoever of those topics;  (2) there is no "criticism of Israel" category to link those various articles; and (3) there are several other topics that are not yet present in any article in WP, such as (a) Distinguishing legitimate criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism; (b) Criticism of Israel, manifested as comparisons with Nazi Germany;   (c) Criticism of Israel regarded as antisemitism (outside of New Antisemitism context); and (d) Criminalization of criticism of Israel.  What article would those four topics go into in WP, if not this article?   I supposes they could all be shoe-horned into the New Antisemitism article, but that seems like a stretch.  --Noleander (talk) 01:05, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * To add to this, there are at least 15 articles which contain information relevant to this page: (1) Anti-Zionism; (2) Human rights in Israel and Human rights in Israel; (3) Relationships between Jewish religious movements; (4) Israeli Settlements; (5) Economy of the Palestinian territories; (6) Israeli-occupied territories; (7) Palestinian refugees; (8) New antisemitism; (9) Israel, Palestine, and the United Nations and List of United Nations resolutions concerning Israel; (10) Public diplomacy (Israel); (11) Loyalty oath; (12) Israel and the apartheid analogy; (13) International law and the Arab–Israeli conflict; (14) Boycotts of Israel; (15) Disinvestment from Israel
 * There is no article which connects them despite the fact that the sources provided prove the notability of the Criticism of Israel beyond any doubt (no editor has questioned or provided a challenge to the sources). Therefore there is no article which states that Criticism of Israel is a highly important topic, important to academics, the government of Israel and the people of Israel - as shown in the WP:RS, and not disputed by any editor. Oncenawhile (talk) 10:38, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I think creating the category to link those pages together sounds like a fair idea. As to Noleander's specific questions, I'd say that a) belongs to Antisemitism, b) may not be notable, c) is the same thing as a), and d) is not notable or (if this is the case in Israel) goes to Human rights in Israel. User Oncenawhile doesn't need to reply to every comment in this discussion (see WP:BLUDGEON) as editors' arguments can speak for themselves. (don't take this in an unkind way, I also occasionally have that tendency) --Dailycare (talk) 09:48, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Logan Talk Contributions 04:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Strong Delete Move to Criticism of Israel Government No country has article about criticism. People need to see Israel and Zionism are different. I mean Israel does not represent Zionism nor any other country does. If the practice is wrong, criticize the practice rather than a country. If the government is wrong, then, criticize the ruling party. Please note that by titling this article as criticism of Israel, you are criticizing not only a particular practice, religion, government or race, you are criticizing everything about Israel as a whole. Soewinhan (talk) 09:14, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * "No country has article about criticism" - see discussion above, this is not a valid argument, and even if it was, WP:RS suggest Criticism of Israel is highly notable compared to other countries
 * Re. I am not objecting notablility of criticism. I am objecting the general term, using only Israel to criticize just a ruling body of a country. You are criticizing a government of a country, and not entire country. So, the term is not definite. Soewinhan (talk) 10:48, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * "People need to see Israel and Zionism are different" - agree, hence Anti-Zionism is just a subsection in this topic
 * Re the rest of your comment, see above - the article title uses Israel in exactly the same way as the Israel article - i.e. as the commonly accepted shorthand for State of Israel, and a State is defined in WP as the formal institution on which a political community is organized under a government. The 20 million ghits referred to above confirm this is standard practice. More importantly though - no one is criticising anyone - the article describes the criticism as a phenomenon and no more. Oncenawhile (talk) 10:06, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Response. See above. You need to take note that the term State (Israel) is vaguely defined as ruling body. For example, if you want to criticize Burma junta, you can't title Criticism of Burma ,of course. Soewinhan (talk) 10:37, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * The 2 million ghits (now 2.5m if you hit the findsources button) would disagree with you. But since consensus is about compromise, perhaps your suggestion above is the right thing to do, but we would need a redirect from "Criticism of Israel". Oncenawhile (talk) 10:52, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree with that. Soewinhan (talk) 11:25, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Soewinhan: I agree that Criticism of Israeli government would be an okay title. It is certainly better than the current International criticism of Israel, because many significant critics are within Israel (peace movement, etc). Another variant would be Criticism of Israeli government policies, but maybe that is too verbose? --Noleander (talk) 21:08, 4 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I think if we add "policies", "government" is unnecessary since it is clear that a policy is from a government. How about Criticism of Israeli policy on Palestinian issues? Maybe it's much more verbose :) Or simply, Criticism of Israeli policy on Palestinians? But, 6 words. Soewinhan (talk) 21:35, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Noleander, Israelis criticize the Israeli Government for all the same reasons that any other citizens criticize their governments, but by far the greatest volume of criticism is international. However, since Israel is also a name of a people, and they are also criticized, it seems to me that there is no need to add government, but simply reflect this in the article. Koakhtzvigad (talk) 15:42, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Also, I agree the title should change to simply 'Criticism of the Israeli government'. Passionless (talk) 15:51, 6 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep Every nation state should have such an article. It could use some cleanup, but a noteworthy topic that can't be adequately covered just as a small section of the larger article. CarolMooreDC (talk) 22:21, 5 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Strong Keep With so much criticism of Israel appearing in so many articles it is very useful to have a page which organizes it all in one place. I see it like a disambiguation page in that it can and would be used to help people find all the other less formal criticism of Israel pages like, the 15 pages that Oncenawhile listed just above the relisting line.


 * Comment - Please note that the purpose for criticism in any case involving rights or property is a search to establish basis for accusative case, in this case against Israel as a legal person, by accumulation of evidence for initiating legal proceedings in the various international judicial procedural institutions. It is therefore not a trivial article of refuting what appears to both sides to be propaganda, but one that seeks to delegitimise some or all authority of the government of a sovereign nation. One such case is in arguing the case for Israel and the apartheid analogy‎, with apartheid being a recognised crime against humanity.

In a legal sense Israel has the same identity as Wikipedia, Federal Reserve, Jehovah's Witnesses (as a corporation), or any number of public personalities which at national levels are represented by the statutory corporation. By allowing the article, Wikipedia therefore seeks to allow a public setting out of the facts and legal reasons (see: cause of action) in any such process

That so few such articles exist in Wikipedia may suggest that although it is open for editing by anyone, the available material is not open for anyone to read, being subject to Wikipedia's own censorship Koakhtzvigad (talk) 02:08, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Delete as per Dailycare--just about every possible criticism of Israel's policies and history already has its own article. Why not a category or list to link them, if that is desired? There are very few "Criticism of xx"" articles in Wikipedia, although I notice that Criticism of Islam and Criticism of Islamism both exist. No Criticism of Iran exists, no Criticism of China, none for Libya, Saudi Arabia, or the Sudan; Criticism of the United States redirects to Anti-Americanism... If we are going to endorse creating articles about criticisms of all the world's nations, why start with Israel? betsythedevine (talk) 16:48, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Betsy:  Those are good points you raise.  The essential problem is that the article Israel does not (and - as a practical matter - will never) include a summary of the vast amount of criticism (human rights, etc).  Becuse the Israel article will not contain such a summary (there was one once, but it was deleted from the article) the second-best alternative is a stand-alone article such as Criticism of Israel.   You mention the possibility of creating a new category "Criticsm of Israel", and that is not a bad idea.  However, there is a large amount of textual material  on the topic, such as  Distinguishing legitimate criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism, Comparisons with Nazi Germany, and Criminalization of criticism of Israel.   If Criticism of Israel were deleted, into which article should   that material go?   And (whatever the answer is) is that best for the readers?  --Noleander (talk) 18:04, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
 * In case helpful, attached is a list of the currently existing articles entitled "Criticism of". Given the high notability (as set out with sources above and not challenged), "Criticism of the Israeli Government" would not be out of place amongst the existing precedents.Oncenawhile (talk) 18:53, 7 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Move to Criticism of Israel Government --Guerillero &#124; My Talk   18:43, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Minor usage note: There are three similar terms, and their usage (ranked form most-used to least-used) is:   (1) Israeli govenment; (2) Government of Israel; and (3) Israel government.  I think the latter is discouraged because Israel is primarily a noun, not an adjective.   (PS:  I would not object to the rename, as detailed above in the identical rename proposal by user  Soewinhan). --Noleander (talk) 19:26, 7 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Keep. International criticism of Israel is not the same as Anti-Zionism. Biophys (talk) 05:43, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep but Noindex/Nonsearchable until issues are resolved Really, something of the sort needs to exist, and admittedly, the deleting of an article with this name will make both Wikipedia and Israel look really bad (the media will eat this up.) That being said, the article is a mess, there are allegations of large sections being word for word copies (made at the undeletion request page,) and the article suffers from NPOV and organizational issues as well. Getting rid of this is bad, leaving it as is is just as bad. What I say we do find a couple of neutral editors with track records in good content creation, have them fix this mess, and in the mean time, noindex this so that it's not the top hit in a google search (as this clearly isn't up to Wikipedia standards.)  S ven M anguard   Wha?  06:49, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Sven: I think the "undeletion request page" you are talking about is here.  That discussion is about a 2006 version of an article with the identical name "Criticism of Israel".  That previous version was, apparently, a duplicate of some other article, and so it was deleted.  The comment about "large sections being word for word copies" is referring to that 2006 article, not to the current article being discussed here.  I don't believe this article has any duplicate text.  That said, I agree with your suggestion that this article would benefit from improvements to its content and organization.   --Noleander (talk) 07:17, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * This article is less than a month old, of course it needs alot more work done, but I'm sure the article will grow quickly with all the interest in it. Passionless (talk) 08:26, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Comment The article "will grow quickly" as POV-pushers from both sides descend, and any reader who stumbles upon it at moment X is likely to find it in some jumbled state with unbalanced WP:POV for one side or the other and content FORKs galore, since most sections of this article cover material already addressed at length in other places. This article should be dis-aggregated to existing articles; the SYNTH POINT of creating one humongous "criticism of israel" is to point fingers at how much criticism exists, not a valid Wikipedia goal. To clarify, I am NOT saying that is the goal of any people voting "Keep" here, but I fear that SYNTH will be the result of keeping this article. betsythedevine (talk) 13:49, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Betsy: You write  "most sections of this article cover material already addressed at length in other places".  However, there is quite a bit of material in this article this is not covered in any other WP article, such as:   Distinguishing legitimate criticism of Israel from anti-Semitism, Comparisons with Nazi Germany, and Criminalization of criticism of Israel.   If this article were deleted,   which articles would that material go into?   And would spreading the material across several articles be better than a centralized article  that follows the WP:Summary style guideline?  And how can SYNTH be a concern, when notable authors such as Dershowitz explicitly discuss all of these topics in their widely read books on Israel?   --Noleander (talk) 16:13, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * The Anti-Semitism and Human_rights_in_Israel articles seem a much better home for the material you mention instead of creating a FORK with some stuff there and other stuff elsewhere. I would also urge interested editors to read the very thoughtful essay WP:CRITICISM. It is easy to find reputable authors writing in WP:RS who are strongly arguing for some particular POV, for or against Israel, so just about any laundry list can probably be found out in the wild. Just from my experience here in Wikipedia, it seems to me this article will be a WP:BATTLEGROUND, an embarrassment to the project, and a source of endless ANIs, SPIs, and other trainwreck wasting of the admins' time.  Anyway, I respect your different opinion Noleander and I am grateful for your WP:CIVIL expression of your arguments too. betsythedevine (talk) 16:31, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Hi Betsy,
 * In the WP:CRITICISM essay, there is an example provided relating to the 2008 Summer Olympics - this situation is a good corollary of that (albeit more extreme since no mention in the main article - see Noleander's comment at 02:02 / 2 January 2011 above), and therefore this article is required according to the essay
 * With respect to your use of the emotive word "embarrassment", the point that Sven Manguard makes above about this situation being interpreted as a whitewash poses a much bigger risk of embarrassment to us all
 * I would appreciate your views as to where explanation of the overall phenomenon of Criticism of the Israeli government would go without this article (a topic highly notable and important to academics / Israel Government / Israelis, as shown in the WP:RS, and not disputed by any editor)
 * Thanks also to you for your consistently WP:CIVIL and nice tone. Oncenawhile (talk) 17:37, 8 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Just a quick reply since I've already said so much -- I'd prefer a list. By the way, I came here via a link from Articles_for_deletion/Animal_conspiracy_theories_involving_Israel, in my opinion a POV problem of opposite sign--I'm also voting to delete that one. Funny, I see myself as an inclusionist more than a deletionist but what I like to see included is more information and less argumentation. betsythedevine (talk) 19:11, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Keep: and create articles on criticism of all sovereign nations. --Neptune 123 (talk) 15:08, 9 January 2011 (UTC)


 * Comment Just trying to think how that would work...wouldn't it be more manageable to have separate articles on specific policies being criticized? Such as "US policy on immigration", "US policy on nuclear weapons", "US policy on capital punishment", etc. with each article explaining the policy and also including criticism of the policy. (I use the US not Israel as an example because I know more about my own country's policies.) If you do the thought experiment of cobbling together the criticism sections of all the very different criticisms people make of US policy in just those 3 very different areas, it seems to me the result will be a less encyclopedic and less useful article. By analogy, the criticisms people make of Israel's policy on settlements are very different from the criticisms people make that Israel should not have been created in the first place. Surely it would be more informative to put the former criticisms into an article that discusses Israel's policy on settlements, and the latter into a different article that discusses the reasons Israel was created where and when it was. betsythedevine (talk) 15:31, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Neptune is the second person in this AfD that has suggested that it is a good idea for all countries to have a "Criticism of.." article in WP. That particular suggestion is interesting, but should probably be discussed at a more prominent location (village pump?) than this AfD.  Personally, I see some merit to it, because (1) WP's indexing/searching capabilities are very limited, and "Criticism of" articles that follow WP:summary style can help readers navigate; (2) Although categories and lists could provide a similar service, they do not provide for textual explanation, detail, or context; and (3) the main country articles should contain an overview of the criticisms, but instead tend to be puff pieces that read like Chamber of commerce brochures.  For those reasons, Neptune's suggestion is sensible.  --Noleander (talk) 15:45, 9 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Note there is Category:Israel and Category:Politics_of_Israel one of which - whatever happens with this article - probably needs a "Criticism of Israel" subcategory for all criticism, external and internal. CarolMooreDC (talk) 21:08, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Keep - I'm looking forwards to Criticisms of Saudi Arabia and Criticisms of Syria. I might decide they're all cruft and vote to delete them all. Not for the moment, though. Templar98 (talk) 17:51, 10 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I see no reason for the creation of criticism pages for other nations, the case of a criticism of Israel page is akin to pages such as Common misunderstandings of genetics and Objections to evolution. These pages were created, and kept, because of the need for a page solely devoted to it. While the average scientific theory, such as gravity, may have objections/criticism the extent is not great enough to warrant a seperate page, though certain theories, like evolution do garner enough criticism to warrant a seperate page for criticism. As mentioned by Oncenawhile previously, criticism of Israel recieves a massively amount of ghits compared to similar searches of other nations. The extent of criticism of Israel certainly warrants its own page, while most other nations criticisms are either much smaller, that the page would be a stub, or a majority deals with one specific area, like the US and Criticism of American foreign policy. Israel has a large number of pages on specific criticisms of it, and does require a page to link them together in the same way that Objections to evolution is mostly just a collection of summaries of pages which criticize evolution. Passionless (talk) 00:24, 11 January 2011 (UTC)
 * And just so no one retails with this, I am not saying that the criticism of Israel article should exist because these others do, I'm just saying this article has the same function as these others. Passionless (talk) 03:25, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Courtesy Break and Reslist
''We are nowhere close to a consensus on this as far as I can see, so I'm breaking and relisting. Let's see if we can come to a conclusion this go around.''  Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks,  D u s t i *poke* 07:42, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * So why not just close as "no consensus"?  Erpert  Who is this guy? 18:39, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so a clearer consensus may be reached.


 * Strong keep - I feel that this article is very warranted, given the amount of controversy surrounding Israel. There is absolutley no good reason why an article of this quality should simply be deleted.-- Metalhead94 TC 14:19, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Keep&mdash;The article as it stands has a lot of problems to resolve before it reaches a satisfactory standard, but I think it is a valid topic that can be maintained separately from Anti-Zionism. The lack of existence of comparable articles is no reason to delete this article; it is a reason to create those other articles. Every country has some dirty laundry that needs airing, including those opposed to Israel. See also Category:Criticisms.&mdash;RJH (talk) 18:45, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Merge Put individual criticisms into articles where they are in context, so that for example arguments against Israel's settlement policies are in context with Israel's position supporting those policies. Create a list article Controversies about Israel to link to those criticism sections. Note that a list article can have introductory material to clarify what is in or out of it, but I believe doing it this way will create less of a WP:BATTLEGROUND. Also, we will avoid future problems of WP:FORK. Note, I changed my !vote, which was "Delete" above. betsythedevine (talk) 19:01, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Strong keep-for my reasons given just above the relist line, and the numerous other arguments in favour of the article given by others. Passionless (talk) 22:28, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * Request for Admin to Close Debate This debate has run out of steam. I'm not sure there are any meaningful new arguments either way - there has been substantive debate, with 22 editors presenting disparate opinions supported by policy:
 * First listing votes: 5 keep vs 6 delete/redirect
 * Second listing new votes: 8 keep/rename vs 1 delete (since changed to merge)
 * Third listing new votes: (so far): 2 keep
 * This is as close to consensus as we can ever hope to achieve on such a sensitive topic. And anyway, a quick look at the the other AfD discussions for "Criticism of" articles here shows whilst many such discussions have a mix of votes, no such "Criticism of" article has ever been deleted if it was well sourced with notable substance which could not all fit in the parent article (in this case Israel).
 * A second relisting is wasting time, and more importantly the AfD tag on the article is discouraging improvements - the article was only 10 days old when it was nominated for deletion and needs more work.
 * Oncenawhile (talk) 23:43, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * I second the motion to close and keep. CarolMooreDC (talk) 23:48, 12 January 2011 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.