Talk:List of villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war

message: The villages historians have in mind when they write about villages depopulated during the 1948 Palestine War are the Arab villages, so that is what this page should redirect to. The addition of a small number of Jewish villages is tiny-minority POV and serves only to confuse the issue. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 21:01, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: What historians? Are you saying that the Jewish villages were not depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli war? I don't really understand the objection to redirect to all villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. What you are basically saying is that Jewish villages are somehow less important than Arab villages? How so? —Ynhockey (Talk) 23:50, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  If List_of_villages_depopulated_during_the_Arab–Israeli_conflict listed both classes of 1948 village, I'd agree with Ynhockey.  But it doesn't, it only has a wikilink to List of Arab towns and villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War.  So either way we have to visit two pages to see everything.  That being the case, we should link to the page which is by a very large margin the most populous.  So I'm with Slimvirgin on this. Zerotalk 05:45, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: The list should be re-merged anyway. There was a discussion about it with no consensus because it was only between SV and myself, and the merge proposal still stands. Feel free to comment on that as well. —Ynhockey (Talk) 11:09, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text:  One issue is the criterion for entry.  The criteria used for 1948-Arab list were very strict.  Only recognised villages that were permanently depopulated.  But the makers of the Jewish list included a military outpost and places evacuated for as little as 6 days. If uniform criteria can be agreed, two possibilities to consider would be (1) combine everything, (2) keep the existing general page but move the 1948-Jewish places to List of Arab towns and villages depopulated during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War with the word "Arab" removed.  I tend to favour (2). Zerotalk 12:09, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Number two is fine. However, I disagree about the rest of your argument. The only localities in that list that were resettled in the same location in the same time period were Masada and Sha'ar HaGolan, but they were not "military outposts", and were completely annihilated by the Syrian Army, which didn't leave any buildings intact. Extensive academic research was done on the causes and results of the depopulation, by Asaf Agin of the Haifa University, whose work is oft-cited, especially by Benny Morris. All of the other villages were completely depopulated in the long term, and were either founded in different locations (Nitzanim, Mishmar HaYarden), or after the Six-Day War (the others). Beit Yosef, which doesn't fit into these categories, was re-founded in 1951 by completely unrelated people, and only happenned to be in the same location so it got the name. I can't see any good reason to remove any of the entries, and since the Arab list now includes cities, it is completely appropriate that the Old City of Jerusalem, possibly the biggest single expulsion of the war, be added to the list of Jewish towns. —Ynhockey (Talk) 22:56, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

text: The depopulation of the Arab villages by or because of Jewish or Israeli forces is the subject of academic study in its own right, and the failure to allow the residents and their families to return or be compensated is one of the key disputes in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It would be very confusing to readers to merge that topic in with another topic. The point of a list is to illuminate, not to obfuscate. SlimVirgin talk|contribs 23:18, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: In that case, there is absolutely no argument for redirecting this to the Arab villages list. If you feel that the topics are different, and should not be part of the same article, then this title shouldn't assume that "readers" are looking for the Arab list. Certainly if I were a reader, I'd expect a list that includes both. However, if that's not an option, the simple solution is to create a disambiguation page. —Ynhockey (Talk) 22:13, 22 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Redirect