Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Palestinian citizens 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 merge‎__EXPECTED_UNCONNECTED_PAGE__ to Arab citizens of Israel. While there's no consensus that the article is a POVFORK, all seem to agree that there's a fair amount of content overlap between the two articles, even if the two population groups are not identical. This is a key criterion under WP:MERGE. Once we discard the views that are based on the "not the exact same population group" argument, we are left with a policy-based consensus to merge. Owen&times; &#9742;  13:28, 21 March 2024 (UTC)

Palestinian citizens of Israel (PCI)

 * – ( View AfD View log | edits since nomination)

Request to redirect this article to Arab citizens of Israel Why?: Palestinian citizens of Israel (PCIs) are the exact same population group as Arab citizens of Israel (ACIs). In fact, "Palestinian citizens of Israel " is one of at least 14 terms that are used to describe ACIs: as well as see Arab_citizens_of_Israel. The list of demonyms/ethnonyms and the implication of each is extensively discussed in the main article for this population group, which is Arab_citizens_of_Israel Current article insists on an unsupported (and IMO false) thesis: There are no RS stating what the current article claims, i.e. that PCI is a different ethnoreligious group from ACI, because (supposedly) PCIs are those people who "self-identify" as Palestinian (implying that ACIs do not identify as Palestinian). The two sources given mention no such thing i.e. they WP:FAIL verification and I have been able to find no other resource supporting the self-identification theory. Furthermore I've been in extensive discussions with User:Selfstudier who defends that thesis and they have not provided any RS supporting the "self-identity" theory either. Organizations stating the same group (ACI/PCI) uses the different terms: Authors describing the use of ACI, PCI and other terms for the same ACI/PCI group: Press stating the same group (ACI/PCI) uses the different terms Press using the term "Palestinian citizens of/in Israel" for the same group (ACI/PCI) _______________________________
 * Palestinian Arabs,
 * Palestinian Arabs in Israel,  (see The Future Vision of the Palestinian Arabs in Israel)
 * Palestinian Israelis,
 * Palestinians in Israel,
 * Israeli Arabs,
 * Israeli Palestinian Arabs,
 * Israeli Palestinians,
 * Arab citizens of Israel,
 * Arab Israelis,
 * 48ers, and
 * '48 Arabs.
 * Inter-Agency Task Force on Israeli Arab issues which says "Arab citizens’ identities are more nuanced than either “Israeli” or “Palestinian.” Members of this population group describe themselves (and are described by others) with many terms. Some common terms include: Arab Israelis, Israeli Arabs, Palestinian citizens of Israel, Arab citizens of Israel, 48ers, Palestinian Israelis"
 * iCenter, which says "What are some names for Arab citizens of Israel? Palestinian citizens of Israel, Israeli Arabs, Israeli Palestinians, Arab Israelis, and Palestinian Israelis. Each of these names, while referring to the same group of people, connotes something different."
 * International Crisis Group which says "The Israeli National Security Council (NSC) has used the term "Arab citizens of Israel". Virtually all political parties, movements and non-governmental organisations from within the Arab community use the word "Palestinian" somewhere in their description – at times failing to make any reference to Israel. For consistency of reference and without prejudice to the position of either side, ICG will use both Arab Israeli and terms the community commonly uses to describe itself, such as Palestinian citizens of Israel or Palestinian Arab citizens of Israel."
 * Muhammad Amara (author): "Many identity constructs are used to refer to Palestinians in Israel; the Israeli establishment prefer Israeli Arabs or Arabs in Israel. Others refer to them as Israeli Palestinians, Palestinian Arabs in Israel, the Arabs inside the Green Line. Nowadays the widespread terms among Palestinians are Palestinians in Israel or the Palestinians of 1948."
 * Columbia Journalism Review: "Palestinian citizens of Israel—also called Israeli-Arabs, Palestinians in Israel, ’48 Arabs, or Palestinian Arabs—"
 * Foreign Policy (2021): "Only 16 percent of this population wants to be called “Israeli Arab,” according to a 2017 survey by the University of Haifa professor Sammy Smooha provided to Foreign Policy. 'The largest now and the most growing identity is a hybrid identity, which is Palestinian in Israel or a similar combination'"
 * Mosaic: The question of how both Jews and Arabs in Israel should refer to the country’s Palestinian population has been a vexed one... these “minorities” have often spoken of themselves, and been spoken of in the Arab world, as “the Arabs of ’48” or “the Palestinians of ’48,”...It’s no accident that [Israeli] Jews have insisted on the usage “Arabs of Israel.” ...to erase the Palestinian component from the identity [of the country’s Arab population] . . . to create an artificial distinction between those Palestinians who remained within the borders of the new state [of Israel] and those elsewhere, and to suppress the formation [among Israel’s Arabs] of any kind of national identity. And for this reason, too, more and more Israeli Arabs have in recent years come to prefer the term “Israeli Palestinian” (filastini isra’ili, in Arabic) to “Israeli Arab.” This is a direct result of the Palestinian nationalism... “I am not just an Arab,” the term “Israeli Palestinian” says. “I am one who shares an identity with the Palestinians of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and who belongs to the same people that they do."
 * New York Times (2012): "After decades of calling themselves Israeli Arabs…most now prefer Palestinian citizens of Israel"
 * BBC, New York Times, Washington Post, NBC News Keizers (talk) 21:55, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Palestine-related deletion discussions. Keizers (talk) 21:55, 6 March 2024 (UTC) Note: This discussion has been included in the list of People-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 22:00, 6 March 2024 (UTC) Note: This discussion has been included in the list of Israel-related deletion discussions. CAPTAIN RAJU (T) 22:00, 6 March 2024 (UTC) ________________________________
 * Merge into Arab citizens of Israel. Most of the content currently within Palestinian citizens of Israel is already - word for word - in Arab citizens of Israel; as such, it doesn't make sense to have a separate article. BilledMammal (talk) 04:14, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That is in part because nom has partly undone the spinout, copying material from the article under discussion to the article Arab citizens of Israel, see this series of edits on 2 March, for example and in part because nom has created an entirely unnecessary new article, Terms for Palestinian citizens of Israel. Note that it is not Terms for Arab citizens of Israel. Selfstudier (talk) 04:52, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * There was no "spinout", i.e. there was no material in this article that uniquely supported a so-called PCI separate from ACI. All material to support this population group (PCI) supported ACI, as they are the same population group, so it made sense to copy the small amount of unique information over to the Arab citizens of Israel article.Keizers (talk) 13:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * That's precisely how the article was created, as a spinout from Arab Citizens of Israel, as described in my Initial comment below. Selfstudier (talk) 13:24, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Understood, but what I am saying is that literally all of the unique content in this article supposedly about "Palestinian citizens" as opposed to "Arab citizens",, applied to all Arab citizens of Israel, which is obviously going to be the case since ACI=PCI.Keizers (talk) 21:17, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Initial comment Since it seems possible that nom is unaware of the history behind the creation of this article and for the benefit of other editors, please see the RM of 27 October 2021 proposing the move Arab citizens of Israel → Palestinian citizens of Israel. The result was "Not Moved" with the closer commenting The main argument against was accuracy/precision, particularly as not all Arab citizens of Israel are of Palestinian origin. It is notable that this latter argument caused one of the support voters to change their !vote and as such was particularly persuasive.
 * Immediately following the RM closure, the discussion Talk:Arab citizens of Israel/Archive 8 concluded that the best way to proceed would be to create a new article, the closer of the RM opining "I think the best way to proceed may be just to write the damn article and then see which title fits best when you've got the first draft down. Or even just boldly create and leave perfecting the title to others." which led to the creation of the article under discussion here. Selfstudier (talk) 04:25, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * More history Following the creation of the article, there was a 6 week (!) RM discussion proposing Palestinian citizens of Israel → Palestinian identity in Israel which resulted in no consensus to move, with the closer commenting It appears to be undisputed that there are some number of individuals who are citizens of Israel, and who identify as Palestinians". The discussion, such as it was, covered the issue of the article being a POV fork as well but notably no-one at the time proposed AfD and the relevant facts have not changed since in that regard.Selfstudier (talk) 05:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * The numbers:
 * 2020 figures from Institute for National Security Studies (Israel) says:


 * "The Muslim residents of Israel are the largest group in the Arab population, which constitutes part of the Palestinian people. As of the end of 2020, this group numbered 1.673 million people—85.6 percent of all Arab citizens of Israeli' and 18 percent of Israel's total population. This figure includes the Muslim Arabs living in East Jerusalem, who are not Israeli citizens. It can therefore be concluded that there are 1.3 million Muslim citizens of Israel (author’s calculation based on the Central Bureau of Statistics, 2020c)." (my bolding)


 * while Amnesty states:


 * "As mentioned above, the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that "Arab citizens of Israel" is an inclusive term that describes a number of different and primarily Arabic-speaking groups, including Muslim Arabs (this classification includes Bedouins), Christian Arabs, Druze and Circassians. According to the ICBS, at the end of 2019, the Druze population stood at approximately 145,000, while according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Circassian population totalled 4,000 people. Considering the number of those defined as Muslim Arabs and Christian Arabs together, the population of Palestinian citizens of Israel amounted to around 1.8 million, that is some 20% of the total population in Israel and occupied East Jerusalem".


 * Taking the 1.67mm from first source section and adding the 0.14mm Christians gives 1.81mm reconciles the two sources. Selfstudier (talk) 05:56, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * ⇒That is all fine, it says that ACI are Muslim Arab, Christian Arab, Druze and Circassians – it doesn't say that any of those groups are not PCI. Keizers (talk) 13:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Notability Here are two scholarly books specifically about the Palestinian citizens of Israel:


 * a) Palestinian citizens of Israel : Power, Resistance and the Struggle for Space Sharri Plonski IB Tauris 2018


 * "Other choices were made regarding terms and language that should also be mentioned from the outset. Key among them is the terminology surrounding the main interlocutors of this research: the term ‘Palestinian Citizens of Israel’ is immediately contentious. It sits within a spectrum of labels for the community at the centre of this inquiry. On one hand, it potentially challenges the mainstream Israeli-Zionist conceptualisation of this group as ‘Israeli Arabs’; on the other, it misses the political complexity of the term ‘48 Palestinians’ (a term often used by Palestinian activists inside and outside Israel), which more clearly acknowledges the relevance of the 1948 Nakba (Catastrophe) to the identity and material experiences of this group of Palestinians. The use of the term ‘Palestinian citizens’ or ‘Palestinian citizens of Israel’ in this work is due in part to a desire for clarity."


 * b) Palestinian Citizens in Israel : A History Through Fiction, 1948–2010 Manar H. Makhoul Edinburgh University Press 2020
 * "There are many names for the ‘Palestinian citizens in Israel’, usually referred to as ‘Israeli Arabs’ or ‘Israel’s Arab minority’. However, most of these identifications are politically and ideologically charged (Makhoul 2018a). My use of ‘Palestinian citizens in Israel’ in this book aims to avoid, as much as possible, ideological or political references by being descriptive, that is, to refer to that portion of the Palestinian nation which remained in Israel after the 1948 war, and later obtained citizenship. Nevertheless, the term ‘Palestinian citizens in Israel’ itself can be misleading, because it suggests equality through citizenship. This confusion is a result of Israel’s distinction between citizenship and nationality, creating a hierarchy between the two. There is no Israeli nationality, but a Jewish nationality. This hierarchy has been legally established initially through the Law of Return (1950) and later corroborated through additional legislation and court rulings, aiming to ground Israel as a state for the Jews, according to which ‘[e]very Jew has the right to come to this country as an oleh [immigrant]’. This categorisation provides Jewish nationals civil and political rights that are higher than those holding Israeli citizenship"


 * Also, by the same author, Palestinian Citizens of Israel - Evolution of a Name (2018)
 * "In this essay, I will show how the terms used to refer to Palestinian citizens of Israel have evolved in the past six or so decades, and how this evolution mirrors the evolution of their identity."


 * It is not disputed that there exist Palestinians who self identify as Palestinian but this aspect is something of a red herring in regards to a deletion discussion, where the issue is whether the subject is itself notable, There is ample and sustained sourcing for the subject 394,000 results in Google scholar. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Selfstudier (talk • contribs) 07:07, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * ⇒ Palestinian citizens of Israel is the term preferred by the Arab citizens of Israel to identify themselves. You are simply giving examples where sources refer to ACI/PCI as Palestinian citizens of Israel. Again, those sources do not distinguish PCI as a separate people from ACI. Keizers (talk) 13:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Keep and it’s not even close, sustained significant coverage of this topic is found in reliable sources. And no, this is not the same group as Arab citizens of Israel. There are Arab citizens of Israel that are not Palestinian and we have articles on many of those sub groups. There are Druze in Israel, there are Lebanese in Israel there are Negev Bedouin, each of those, like this, is a sub topic of Arab citizens of Israel. The Palestinian population has its own challenges separate from the non Palestinian Arabs in Israel. And they are covered as their own topic in reliable sources.  nableezy  - 10:14, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * ⇒ 1) Of course there is a lot of coverage of PCI, that is increasingly the more common term for ACI, but nothing indicates that PCI are a separate people. PCI = ACI.
 * ⇒ 2) The example of Druze and Negev Bedouin don't support your argument, as I have never seen any RS say Druze or Bedouin are not Palestinian/PCI. Can you provide one? Lebanese in Israel are a couple of thousand and yes they would not have their origins in the people of Mandatory Palestine, so they would not count, but we are talking 0.1% of the ACI there, and even then we are making assumptions, no RS. Keizers (talk) 13:21, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Either merge or rename Palestinian identity in Israel. The current title makes it a WP:POVFORK. Number   5  7  11:20, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Maybe it is worth elaborating on your 'The current title makes it a WP:POVFORK' statement a bit. I'm not sure it's self-explanatory. Sean.hoyland (talk) 12:16, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Keep as a clearly distinct subject, per Selfstudier, Nableezy and in fact the hatnote at the top of the page, which notes "Not to be confused with Arab citizens of Israel". This page has previously been affirmed by multiple rounds of consensus, and for good reason: the subjects are separate. Not all individuals identified by Israel as Arab citizens self-identify as "Palestinian" – a subject that is both prima facie a separate topic and clearly worthy of a standalone page based on the sources already presented above. Iskandar323 (talk) 18:43, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * , can you find a single RS that says that not all Arab citizens of Israel are not Palestinian citizens of Israel? With the obvious exception of Lebanese, and the very weak argument for Druze & Circassians based on 1 RS, Amnesty, which isn't even explicit about the issue. Meanwhile, at the top of this discussion I provided 8 RS that define ACI=PCI (just different terms for same people) and 4 RS that use the terms interchangeably. I would like to also start a RfC that the ACI article be renamedPCI, but that is another fight. None of the editors named can come up with a single source. I just don't understand where this idea comes from. I get that people prefer the term PCI, as do I, but that is not a reason to Fork the article and have two articles about the same population groups according to every RS. Keizers (talk) 21:11, 7 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Merge with Arab citizens of Israel - as a WP:POVFORK of that article, and per compelling arguments by BilledMammal. Marokwitz (talk) 21:10, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * A source to support that ACI and PCI are two different peoples - somebody? anybody?  I just don't understand where this idea comes from that PCIs are a separate group from ACIs, as opposed to 8 RS cited at the top that say ACI=PCI (one people, 15 choices of demonym/ethnonym). I get that Palestinians and their allies (like me) prefer the term PCI, but that is not a reason to Fork the article and have two articles about the same population groups according to every RS. Can anyone provide even one source other than the weak Amnesty one, and the minor special case of the Lebanese? Keizers (talk) 21:11, 7 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep per nableezy. It has been shown both that the subject is notable and that it is not identical to an existing article's subject (hence cannot be a povfork). popo dameron  ⁠ talk  00:02, 8 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Merge into Arab citizens of Israel as a WP:POVFORK of the target. The name Arab citizens of Israel was decided by community decision. I can understand that someone would prefer Arab Israelis or Palestinian Citizens of Israel over the current name. I disagree that such a preference should lead to article multiplication. gidonb (talk) 06:15, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep the conditions that require this page are clear from talk:Arab citizens of Israel/Archive 8%23Requested move 27 October 2021, which was about renaming ACI to PCI. As the closer of that RM said: The main argument in favour of moving was WP:COMMONNAME. The main argument against was accuracy/precision, particularly as not all Arab citizens of Israel are of Palestinian origin. Note that some of the merge voters here made the opposite argument at that RM – if what they argued there is true, that "not all Arab citizens of Israel are of Palestinian origin", then clearly it is consistent to have a separate article focused on that subgroup. Onceinawhile (talk) 07:18, 12 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Comment - This seems like quite a strong argument. Perhaps someone could try to refute it to help clarify things. Sean.hoyland (talk) 05:14, 14 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep per Nableezy. Arab citizens of Israel and Palestinian citizens of Israel are certainly not "the exact same population group". Skitash (talk) 18:41, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Merge to Arab citizens of Israel. While, as Nableezy said, the two groups are different, the Palestinian Israelis make up the majority of Arab Israelis and the two articles have a lot of overlap. 三葉草 San Ye Cao 03:48, 20 March 2024 (UTC)

Relisting comment: I think opinion is divided enough to be worth at least one relist. Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 23:26, 13 March 2024 (UTC)
 *  Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.


 * Merge with Arab citizens of Israel – As mentioned above, the topics cover exactly the same ethnic groups, with the majority of the Arab population in Israel being of Palestinian origin. A single article can record all content. Svartner (talk) 01:59, 20 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Merge to Arab citizens of Israel per the nomination. Bookworm857158367 (talk) 02:59, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep. I do understand the merge impulse, and it is not unreasonable. However, I am persuaded that there is sufficient distinctiveness between the subjects as to warrant a separate article, generally per Nableezy. And pragmatically, the size of the parent article is such that the reliably sourced, non-trivial information required to provide proper context and treatment of the subject would warrant spinoff in the relatively near term regardless. While that subject, I disagree that this is a POVFORK, this title used by a number of reliable sources and other than a perfunctory mention above, I have not seen the neutrality of this article challenged. Xymmax  So let it be written   So let it be done  11:49, 21 March 2024 (UTC)
 * Keep Not a fork, a notable subset of Arab citizens of Israel, no reason to delete given other than asserting that identifiable subsets are all Arabs, which is false. Merging has made to look more like an option by editing so as to include material from the article into the parent and by creating an unnecessary additional article and transferring information from the article to it. These measures will be undone in due course.Selfstudier (talk) 12:06, 21 March 2024 (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.