Revision as of 23:23, 4 January 2009 editGHcool (talk | contribs)Extended confirmed users13,356 editsm →Accusations vs. Reality: heading size← Previous edit | Latest revision as of 20:48, 1 December 2020 edit undoGHcool (talk | contribs)Extended confirmed users13,356 edits →Middle East | ||
(150 intermediate revisions by 13 users not shown) | |||
Line 1: | Line 1: | ||
{{Boxboxtop|About Me}} | |||
{{User Ashkenazi}} | |||
{{User Los Angeles}} | |||
{{User en}} | |||
{{user degree/BA subject|Film}} | |||
{{user Adult}} | |||
{{User American}} | |||
{{User serial comma:Yes}} | |||
{{User WP Israel}} | |||
{{User WikiProject Films}} | |||
{{User WikiProject Filmmaking}} | |||
{{User anti-anon}} | |||
{{User WP Palestine}} | |||
{{Boxboxbottom}} | |||
I am a ] native working in the film and television industry with eight years of ] experience in various fields of production. I have a degree in Cinema and Television Arts from ] where I have researched and written various film criticisms and historical analyses. I also have an interest in ]-related topics. | |||
==Misplaced Pages contributions== | ==Misplaced Pages contributions== | ||
I contributed substantially to the following articles. Articles marked with an "A" mean that, to the best of my understanding, they represent a reasonably complete picture of the issue. Articles marked with a "B" are incomplete and I encourage other Wikipidians to add or delete any information necessary. | |||
===Film production=== | ===Film production=== | ||
Favorite source: ''The Filmmaker's Handbook'' by Steven Ascher and Edward Pincus | Favorite source: ''The Filmmaker's Handbook'' by Steven Ascher and Edward Pincus | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
===Specific films=== | ===Specific films=== | ||
Favorite source: | Favorite source: | ||
====Feature films==== | |||
*] (B) | |||
{{colbegin}} | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] (A) | |||
*] | |||
*] (A) | |||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] (A) | |||
*] ( |
*] | ||
*] |
*] | ||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
{{colend}} | |||
=== |
====Documentaries==== | ||
*] | |||
{| style="border: 1px solid {{{border|gray}}}; background-color: {{{color|#fdffe7}}};" | |||
*] | |||
|rowspan="2" valign="middle" | ] | |||
|rowspan="2" | | |||
|style="font-size: x-large; padding: 0; vertical-align: middle; height: 1.1em;" | '''The Editor's Barnstar''' | |||
|- | |||
|style="vertical-align: middle; border-top: 1px solid gray;" | For excellent and creative work in editing ]. ] 19:26, 19 August 2007 (UTC) | |||
|} | |||
{| style="border: 1px solid gray; background-color: #fdffe7;" | |||
|rowspan="2" valign="middle" | ] | |||
|rowspan="2" | | |||
|style="font-size: x-large; padding: 0; vertical-align: middle; height: 1.1em;" | '''The Defender of the Wiki Barnstar''' | |||
|- | |||
|style="vertical-align: middle; border-top: 1px solid gray;" | I hereby award you the "Defender of the Wiki Barnstar" for your tireless effort and brilliant execution; (sometimes with both hands tied behind the back); in defending Misplaced Pages in maintaining a ] on the most contentious articles regarding the ]; (recently in ]). Let others learn from you (me included), how it can be done with class. ] (]) 18:45, 11 April 2008 (UTC) | |||
|} | |||
====Short films==== | |||
Favorite source (history): ''The Continuum Political Encyclopedia of the Middle East'' edited by ].<br /> | |||
*] | |||
Favorite source (contemporary commentary): ''The Case for Peace'' by ] | |||
*] |
*] | ||
**] | |||
*] (A) | |||
**] | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] |
**] | ||
**] |
**] | ||
**] | |||
**] (A) | |||
*] | |||
*] (A) | |||
*] | |||
*] (B) | |||
**] (A) | |||
**] (A) | |||
**] (A) | |||
***] (B) | |||
*] (A) | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] (A) | |||
*] (B) | |||
*] (A) | |||
**] (A) | |||
*] (A) | |||
== |
===Middle East=== | ||
Favorite source: ''The Continuum Political Encyclopedia of the Middle East'' edited by ]. | |||
I find that Misplaced Pages editors are a largely moderate bunch trying to find and publicize verifiable truth. However, there are some bad apples in every bunch who are trying to disseminate ] about Israel on talk pages and within articles. Those bad apples rarely succeed since Misplaced Pages is built on consensus and consensus is built on evidence from reliable sources. Rather than stand idlely by or commit the same ] committed by the people who are abusing this website, I prefer systematically debunking disinformation in a form inspired by two popular books on the subject: ]'s '']'' and ]'s ''Myths and Facts.'' | |||
{{colbegin}} | |||
*] | |||
One way that fair-minded Misplaced Pages editors could help is by not getting emotionally involved in an argument with an ], anti-verifiability, or ] Misplaced Pages editor and engaged in revert wars. They should simply let the evidence speak for itself and argue in favor of the evidence. Lastly, remember that not all criticisms of Israeli policy are anti-Semetic or necessarily wrong. Have enough courage to treat a true claim with respect, even if you do not agree with the claimer's conclusion. And keep informed on Israel and read about her history. | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
===What are the origins of the current Israeli-Palestinian conflict?=== | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
To the best of my understanding, most of the present-day ] are decendents of Arabs (mostly Muslims) who lived in the area that is now known as Israel. These Arabs were mostly peasant ], called ''felaheen'', with an ] and sense of ] based largely on ]. Their identity as "Palestinians" was negligible. They thought of themselves as part of the larger Arab people or part of the smaller village they lived in. The Jewish ] started emigrating to Palestine ''en masse'' after waves of ] in ] in the early 20th century, during which time the wealthier Jews legally bought land from the ruling ] and gave jobs to fellow Jews. The ''felaheen'' could not compete with the ] system of land ownership that the Jews were using to their own advantage. By the time of the British Mandate, the economic disparities between the two populations in Mandate Palestine was perceived to be so large that ] Arabs frequently started riots against both Jews and Arabs in the ]. It was here, according to the ], that a specific Palestinian Arab identity became developed and adopted by the Palestinian leaders at the time, specifically by ], the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem. | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
In 1947, the U.N. partitioned the country into two states: one Jewish, one Arab. The Arabs rejected the ] while the Jews accepted. ] broke out in Palestine before the British left, and then ] against Israel by Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq broke out in 1948 directly following David Ben Gurion declaration of the independence of the State of Israel. The two results of the ] is the present-day ] and the present-day ] problem. | |||
*] | |||
**] | |||
===Are the Palestinians a "people?"=== | |||
**] | |||
*] | |||
I ordinarily don't write on this page about things that don't directly concern Israel, but I'm making an exception here because of a ] during July-August 2007 that resulted in no consensus. The debate is between a large group of people who believe that the ] article should be renamed "Palestinians" and a smaller group of people who believe that "Palestinian people" is the better title. The editors in favor of "Palestinians" as the title argue that the Palestinians are not an ethnic or racial people in the same way that the ] or ] are and have only been in existence for 90 years by the most liberal of reliable estimates, but closer to 40-60 years by most historians' estimates. The editors in favor of "Palestinian people" as the title argue that the Palestinians are a people in the sense that they are "a group of people," meaning more than one person that shares something in common. | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
Because nobody denies that the Palestinians are "a group of people," it is difficult for me to understand why certain editors are so determined to keep a title that includes a confusing and impercise term that breaks ], ], and ]. "Palestinians" is clearly the most common term used by the media and by academia to describe what is being described in the article. It doesn't deny the legitimacy of the Palestinian identity, the Palestinian right to statehood, or the plight of the Palestinian refugees. The argument for a title change is extremely strong. | |||
**] | |||
**] | |||
===What is U.N. Resolution 242?=== | |||
**] | |||
Ignorance about the content and interpretation of ] is perhaps the second most common reason for Israel's critics to be so critical (the first most common is ignorance over the genesis of the Arab-Israeli conflict). The ] can be read on Misplaced Pages. | |||
***] | |||
*] | |||
To the best of my understanding, Israel's achieved a major victory in the ] in which they gained control over the ], ], and the ] of Jerusalem from ], the ] and ] from ], and the ] from ]. These were then and still remain Israel's most valuable bargaining chips in the ]. Resolution 242 calls for Israel to withdraw "from territories" (the English version of the resolution was the one voted upon) in return for "ermination of all claims or states of belligerency." It also calls for " just settlement of the refugee problem." The resolution clearly implies a negotiation process as opposed to a "you do your part first and I'll follow" kind of a process. The resolution was an accepted by Israel not long after it was passed by the United Nations, but was rejected by the Arab nations at the time and remains so in many of the more radical Arab organizations such as ]. | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
===Is Israel an apartheid state?=== | |||
*] | |||
A fair comparison of Israel to ] could not reasonably be made given the facts on the ground in both 21st century Israel and the history of apartheid South Africa. The apartheid system of government in South Africa were marked by the following: | |||
*] | |||
*Segregation - In apartheid South Africa, black citizens could only run businesses in designated areas and were considered migrant workers in their own country. In Israel, Arab citizens can and do run their own businesses wherever they want. | |||
**] | |||
*Forced relocation - There were several incidents of forced relocation of black citizens of apartheid South Africa from their homes to other designated places. There has not been a similar forced relocation of Arabs in Israel since 1948, and those Arabs were not Israeli citizens. | |||
**] | |||
*Unequal rights - In apartheid South Africa, black citizens did not have the same rights and freedoms enjoyed by white citizens such as voting, freedom of movement, employment opportunity, etc. In Israel, Arab and Jewish citizens enjoy the same rights (except in the case of the Law of Return, but that's not the issue advocates of the Israeli apartheid epithet are concerned about). | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
===Is Zionism a racist ideology?=== | |||
*] | |||
{{main|User:GHcool/Opinions on Zionism}} | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
===Was the goal of the first Jewish immigrants to disposes the Palestinian Arabs of land through armed force?=== | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
The claim that the goal of the Jewish immigrants to Palestine was to dispossess the Palestinian Arabs since the 1880s is simply fallacious and amounts to a bogus ]. The Zionists had not even collectively agreed upon which region of the planet to focus their dreams of Jewish statehood until 1905 (Uganda was still an option before that time). History is not done by taking an event and saying that all events that occurred before it must have been part of a brilliant conspiracy to lead to that event. This is a ] called '']''. | |||
**] | |||
*] | |||
===Has Israel ever committed anything that could be described as a genocide?=== | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
The ''Random House Webster's College Dictionary'' defines "]" as "the deliberate and ''systematic exterminization'' of a national, racial, political, or cultural group" (emphasis added). The term has been used inaccurately and with malicious intent to twist the facts about the reality of the ]. This may burst the bubble of ] propagandists, but Israel does not implement ] of Arabs (as the Turks did to the Armenians and the Nazis did to Jews), send Arabs to ] (as the Nazis did to the Jews), permit military roundups and execution of Arabs without ] (as the Nazis, Turks, and the Hutus of Rwanda did and the Janjaweed currently are doing in the Darfur region of Sudan), or any other action that could be described as the "systematic exterminization" of Arabs or Palestinians based solely on their "national, racial, political, or cultural" background. | |||
{{colend}} | |||
===Is Jerusalem the capital of Israel?=== | |||
] was the capital of Israel since 1948. It remains the capital today. The fact that Israel captured East Jerusalem from Jordan during the 1967 war has as much to do with Jerusalem's status as capital as Israel's capture of the Golan Heights or the Sinai or the Gaza Strip. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel despite any injustices Israel may or may not have committed against Palestinians. Furthermore, capitals don't require foreign embassies to be located within their borders. | |||
''The Continuum Political Encyclopedia of the Middle East'' is incredibly succinct on Jerusalem's status: "apital of the State of ] though not recognized as such by most of the international community" (491). This is the first sentence of the encyclopedia's entry under "Jerusalem." Other reference books that explicitly denote Jerusalem as the capital of Israel include ''The ] and Book of Facts 2007'' (p. 785), '']'' (2005 ed., p. 939), '']'' (p. 797), ''The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions'' (p. 285), '']'' (Vol. 11, p. 94a), ''Atlas of World Geography'' (]: 2000, p. 44), and . Many of the above state that most countries' embassies are in Tel Aviv, but most of them simply identify the capital of Israel as Jerusalem just as they identify the capital of the United States as Washington, D.C. | |||
Although Jerusalem's situation is unique, it is not so complex that we would have to ] facts. If a thing satisfies all of the requirements entailed in the definition of a word, then that word must be applied to that thing. As I said above, Jerusalem's complexities are such that it may be necessary to explain some of the more subtle details. | |||
===Is Israel to blame for the fact that there isn't peace today?=== | |||
===Antisemitism=== | |||
Israel has not failed to comply with United Nations ], which encouraged the principle of ] in resolving the ]. Israel accepted the resolution while the ] rejected it; not "mutually agreed upon" as Pco claims (read any reliable book on the Arab-Israeli conflict and you'll find the same information). The ] are the perfect example of both Israel and the PLO trying to abide by Resolution 242, and achieving some important milestones, but ultimately failing due mostly to the continuation of ] ] of Palestinian youths, the illegal arming of Palestinians not involved in law enforcement, and, of course, ] against Israeli civilians even though ] and the ] explicitly promised to halt all three. It is important to remember that Resolution 242 does not call for Israeli withdrawl from territories (or "the territories") ''before'' the Palestinians uphold their end of the bargain. | |||
Favorite source (academia): ''Anti-Zionism on Campus'' edited by ] and ] <br/> | |||
Favorite source (United Nations): ''A Lethal Obsession'' by ] <br/> | |||
Favorite source (general): '']'' | |||
{{colbegin}} | |||
*] | |||
**] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
**] | |||
**] | |||
***] | |||
**] | |||
**] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
**] | |||
**] | |||
***] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
{{colend}} | |||
===Judaism=== | |||
The Oslo peace process culminated in the ] and ] in 2000-2001 with Arafat leading the negotiating team for the Palestinian side, ] ] leading the negotiating team for the Israeli side, and ] ] leading a team of American mediators. The summits yielded few if any positive results; in fact, the ] began only days after the Camp David summit failed. Nearly all of the American diplomats present at the summit including ] and ] agree that Arafat was to blame for the failure of the Camp David and Taba summits to achieve a lasting peace in the ]. It goes without saying that most Israelis at the summit, including ] and ], agree with Clinton and Ross's assessment. ''The Continuum Political Encyclopedia of the Middle East'', a peer-reviewed historical reference book covering the entire region, clearly states, "In the weeks following the summit, most of the criticism for its failure was leveled at Arafat" (Eran, 145). Not "''some'' of the criticism," but "''most'' of the criticism" meaning that a majority of critics blamed Arafat. Even editorials critical of Israel admit that "ne thing nearly all pundits seem to agree on is that Yasser Arafat's rejection of the land-for-peace offer made by Ehud Barak at Camp David in the summer of 2000 was indefensible." | |||
Favorite source: ''Maimonides'' by Joel Kraemer | |||
{{colbegin}} | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
{{colend}} | |||
===Jewish fiction=== | |||
As for the ], in the opinion of many, many intelligent and informed people, the Israeli settlements are not an "obstacle" to peace. These people cite the proposed dismantling of 63 settlements as part of the Palestinian sovereignty over 97% of the West Bank and 100% of the Gaza Strip in exchange for peace in the ]. ] rejected this deal. Therefore, according to the logic of the argument, Israeli settlements must not be a significant obstacle to peace because Israel was willing to dismantle them in exchange for peace and the Palestinians rejected this offer. If Israel had offered to nullify all Palestinian parking tickets in exchange for peace, Arafat would have had the same response: rejection of the deal because Palestinian parking tickets are not an obstacle to peace. Of course, this metaphor is ] because Israeli settlements is a significant ''factor'' in Israeli-Palestinian relations while Palestinian parking tickets are not (and not even administered by Israel since the early 1990s). Its also possible that Arafat rejected the deal for other reasons, but the issue of the Israeli settlements was clearly not the reason the Camp David and Taba summits failed. The second argument against describing the settlements as "obstacles to peace" is the 2005 unilateral ]. The logic was that if the settlements were an "obstacle to peace," and because the maintenance of the settlements are costly and problematic for Israel, it would be best for all sides if Israel would remove this obstacle with the hope that doing so will foster trust on the Palestinian side and with the world that Israel is a reasonable partner for peace. The disengagement was carried out like ] in a cancer patient: bravely going forward with a process that hurts as much as it is intended to heal without any guarantees that this process will cure the problem. Unfortunately, the disengagement did not cure the problem. Palestinians in general (and ] in particular) interpreted the disengagement as a victory made possible through ]. As of this writing, more than 1,200 ] have been fired from the Gaza Strip into civilian areas of Israel proper. These attacks began before the disengagement and became more frequent after the disengagement. Therefore, it is plain to see that the presence or non-presence of Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip (and one can infer the West Bank as well) is nothing more than a contentious ''factor'' in Israeli-Palestinian relations unrelated to a final, lasting peace. | |||
Favorite source: '']'' | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
===American presidents=== | |||
===Was the 2006 Lebanon War a just war?=== | |||
Favorite source (Jefferson): ''Becoming Jefferson's People'' by ] <br/> | |||
{{main|User:GHcool/Opinions on the 2006 Lebanon War}} | |||
Favorite source (Trump): | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
===Philosophy=== | |||
===Are official Israeli sources reliable?=== | |||
Favorite source: '']'' | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
*] | |||
== Requiem for an Arab-Israeli conflict editor == | |||
If Misplaced Pages did not quote the Israeli government on the issue of terrorism, the integrity of the encyclopedia would be severely compromised. Israeli government organizations, army, and elected officials are as reliable as any other country's government organizations, army, or elected officials. The Al Qaeda article cites the foreign affairs offices of the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada without any challenge to the reliability of those nations' foreign affairs office. Because Israel is a democracy and has a greater degree of ] than any other nation facing similar circumstances regarding its security, much of what the IDF and the government claim can be easily verified by independent research. Critics of Israel could easily do their own research into official Israeli claims rather than flat-out condemning them all as "unreliable." | |||
I have ] that may cause my early retirement on Arab-Israeli conflict articles on Misplaced Pages. Before I go on, I must say a word about my victor, ]. In my roughly eight years of editing, I had not come into contact with IRISZOOM very much, but in our brief encounters with him, I've found him to be someone respectful of Misplaced Pages guidelines and ruthless in his pursuit of editors he disagrees with, even slightly. This is what makes him a great editor, indeed, a greater editor than I when it comes to disagreement on talk pages; for I have the former quality, but not the latter. | |||
As for the claim that Hezbollah does not purposefully target Israeli civilian areas, there are countless sources documenting the opposite. {{see|Targeting of civilian areas in the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict}} | |||
I was in ] (Israel's third largest city) in the summer of 2006 and saw the aftermath of Hezbollah's wrath with my own eyes. As for the claim that Israel distorts collateral damage statistics, I challenge anyone to find definitive proof from a reliable source of a claim by any IDF or any Israeli government official or publication stating that "every male killed in Lebanon was a member of Hezbollah." | |||
In my eight years, I've made Misplaced Pages a less antisemitic, more intellectually honest place. I can go on and on about the animated discussions I've had, most of which I won, but instead, I'd rather discuss my major contributions I've made to articles: | |||
===Are Israeli historians as evil as Holocaust deniers?=== | |||
*Before I got to it, much of the ] article was a collection of anti-Israel half-truths cited only to a handful of sources. The article has been unstable for years, but its been much calmer in the past year or so. Its a great article. | |||
*I've written and rewritten articles about ] dozens of times. Believe it or not, there are Hezbollah sympathizers out there who try to stop any material unsympathetic toward Hezbollah to appear on Misplaced Pages! Once Hezbollah began fighting for Assad's Syria, those people largely disappeared. | |||
*Much of the ] article was written by yours truly. | |||
*Much of the ] article was written by yours truly. | |||
*I proved that ] was both unsuccessful and antisemitic. | |||
*Much of the ] article was written by yours truly. | |||
*I've helped to prove that ]. | |||
*I've told and retold the story of the 1948 war on numerous Misplaced Pages articles. | |||
*I defended Israel (where possible) and exposed Hezbollah in the ] article and related articles. | |||
*Much of the ] article was written by yours truly. | |||
*The ] article used to have a lot of anti-Israel hogwash in it. Now its a peaceful and respectable article. | |||
Thank you and you're welcome. | |||
] is the notorious English ] and pseudo-historian who was exposed as a fraud and a racist in a court of law. He associates with ] and served a prison sentence in Austria. ] is an American Holocaust denier and former ] leader. Not a single reasonable person takes Irving or Duke seriously as academics, historians, or even as responsible human beings. The comparison between Israeli historians and these racists is embarrassingly falsifiable at best and offensive and disgusting at worst. Being a professional, habitual racist is worse than being a professional historian. |
Latest revision as of 20:48, 1 December 2020
Misplaced Pages contributions
Film production
Favorite source: The Filmmaker's Handbook by Steven Ascher and Edward Pincus
- Assistant director
- Camera angle
- Cutting on action
- Film editing
- Filmmaking
- Intermittent mechanism
- Master shot
- Production sound mixer
- Shot (film)
Specific films
Favorite source: The Internet Movie Database (IMDb)
Feature films
- The Band's Visit
- Bulletproof Monk
- The Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys
- Dot the i
- Double Indemnity (film)
- Godzilla (1998 film)
- Happily Ever After (1993 film)
- Hard Times (1975 film)
- Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle
- Invincible (2001 drama film)
- The Invisible Man (1933 film)
- The Kid & I
- Los olvidados
- Manhattan (film)
- Maniac Cop
- Mary Shelley's Frankenstein (film)
- The Merchant of Venice (2004 film)
- Monster (2003 film)
- My Girl (film)
- Osaka Elegy
- A Place in the Sun (film)
- Psycho (1960 film)
- Pumpkin (film)
- The Seven Year Itch
- Small Time Crooks
- What's Up, Tiger Lily?
Documentaries
Short films
Middle East
Favorite source: The Continuum Political Encyclopedia of the Middle East edited by Avraham Sela.
- Abdullah I of Jordan
- Arab League boycott of Israel
- Arab nationalism
- Borders of Israel
- Camp David Accords
- Causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus
- Hamas
- Hezbollah
- History of the Arab-Israeli conflict
- Israel and the apartheid analogy
- Israeli-Palestinian conflict
- Israeli military action in the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict
- Israel lobby in the United States
- Kafr Saba
- Kiryat Gat
- List of Qassam rocket attacks
- Mahmoud Abbas
- One-state solution
- Operation Pillar of Defense
- Palestinians
- Pan-Arabism
- Siege of Jerusalem (1948)
- Targeting of civilian areas in the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict
- 2011 Jerusalem bus stop bombing
- United Nations General Assembly Resolution 194
- United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701
Antisemitism
Favorite source (academia): Anti-Zionism on Campus edited by Andrew Pessin and Doron Ben-Atar
Favorite source (United Nations): A Lethal Obsession by Robert S. Wistrich
Favorite source (general): The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles
- Antisemitism in Europe
- Antisemitism in the Arab world
- Antisemitism in the United States
- Anti-Zionism
- Boycotts of Israel
- Criticism of the United Nations
- List of conspiracy theories
- Supersessionism
Judaism
Favorite source: Maimonides by Joel Kraemer
- Ashkenazi Jews
- Book of Judges
- Capital and corporal punishment in Judaism
- Elul
- Jewish eschatology
- Jewish views on slavery
- Jews as the chosen people
- Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy)
- Maimonides
- Light Unto the Nations
- Repentance in Judaism
- Women in Judaism
Jewish fiction
Favorite source: Moment
American presidents
Favorite source (Jefferson): Becoming Jefferson's People by Clay S. Jenkinson
Favorite source (Trump): reporting by Jacob Kornbluh
- Donald Trump presidential campaign, 2016
- Donald Trump on social media
- Jeffersonian democracy
- Religious views of Thomas Jefferson
Philosophy
Favorite source: Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
Requiem for an Arab-Israeli conflict editor
I have committed an act of hubris that may cause my early retirement on Arab-Israeli conflict articles on Misplaced Pages. Before I go on, I must say a word about my victor, User:IRISZOOM. In my roughly eight years of editing, I had not come into contact with IRISZOOM very much, but in our brief encounters with him, I've found him to be someone respectful of Misplaced Pages guidelines and ruthless in his pursuit of editors he disagrees with, even slightly. This is what makes him a great editor, indeed, a greater editor than I when it comes to disagreement on talk pages; for I have the former quality, but not the latter.
In my eight years, I've made Misplaced Pages a less antisemitic, more intellectually honest place. I can go on and on about the animated discussions I've had, most of which I won, but instead, I'd rather discuss my major contributions I've made to articles:
- Before I got to it, much of the Causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus article was a collection of anti-Israel half-truths cited only to a handful of sources. The article has been unstable for years, but its been much calmer in the past year or so. Its a great article.
- I've written and rewritten articles about Hezbollah dozens of times. Believe it or not, there are Hezbollah sympathizers out there who try to stop any material unsympathetic toward Hezbollah to appear on Misplaced Pages! Once Hezbollah began fighting for Assad's Syria, those people largely disappeared.
- Much of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict article was written by yours truly.
- Much of the Israel lobby in the United States article was written by yours truly.
- I proved that Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions was both unsuccessful and antisemitic.
- Much of the Arab League boycott of Israel article was written by yours truly.
- I've helped to prove that Hamas uses children and women as human shields.
- I've told and retold the story of the 1948 war on numerous Misplaced Pages articles.
- I defended Israel (where possible) and exposed Hezbollah in the Allegations of war crimes in the 2006 Lebanon War article and related articles.
- Much of the 2011 Jerusalem bus stop bombing article was written by yours truly.
- The Kiryat Gat article used to have a lot of anti-Israel hogwash in it. Now its a peaceful and respectable article.
Thank you and you're welcome.