Talk:Hezbollah/Archive 9

message: I am a tool.  I've noticed that there are a few citations at the bottom that are blank... they are used in parts of the article, and seem to me to be there simply to imply that a certain claim is verified, yet there is no verification... there isn't even a bad link... the footnote is totally blank. What do I/we do about things like this? --GaelicWizard 22:28, 6 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Although the BBC article gives no references and has a history of anti-Israel bias, this specific report seems pretty well researched.  I do not think it should be deleted, but I do encourage anyone to add more footnotes to other articles supporting the same or similar findings.  If I have the time, perhaps I will do some of this myself.  (EDIT: Done.  The BBC article is now footnote #8) --GHcool 04:24, 7 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: The BBC recently carried out a survey on its coverage of Israel/Palestine and discovered that it was (quite strongly) biased towards the Israeli position  - that a disparity (in favour of Israelis) existed in BBC coverage taken as a whole in the amount of talk time given to non-party political Israelis and Palestinians; - that a disparity (in favour of Israelis) existed in BBC coverage taken as a whole in terms of the appearance of Israeli and Palestinian actors; - that some important themes were relatively overlooked in the coverage of the conflict, most notably in the recent period, the annexation of land in and around East Jerusalem; - that BBC journalists generally did not provide historical context in their reporting of the conflict; - that BBC broadcast news reported Israeli and Palestinian fatalities differently in that Israeli fatalities generally receive greater coverage than Palestinian fatalities etc. PalestineRemembered 17:28, 15 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Citation 

message: It seems most exact to label this "Jihad".  This is an Islamic term and an undeniably Islamic organization.  The rest of the sentence was written to lead into the word "Jihad".  Could we defend the use of the word "resistance" instead instead of edit warring on the article page? Of course, it sounds more pc to Western ears but it is less exact.  Elizmr 14:18, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Did Hezbollah actually call a Jihad against Israel or a call to resist Israel?  If they call for the extinction of Israel I would consider that a call to Jihad and not a resistance Drew1369 17:20, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Resistance vs. Jihad edit war 

message: I think it might be about time that we protect this page again.  There's been a lot of vandalism in the past couple of days.  --GHcool 23:10, 17 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's sad what a human being becomes so devoid that he believes censorship will accomplish his goals. You and your mob of Israeli censors (and it is crystal clear where you come from based on your edit history) have ruined Wikipedia as a source of objective information on anything related to the middle-east conflict. --75.17.183.177 09:32, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Adding sourced materials is not vandalism. removing it is --Nielswik(talk) 10:26, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Vandalism 

message: This story from the BBC might be useful for this article http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/6085768.stm  Hypnosadist 23:50, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: New article created about this.Hypnosadist 04:32, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: New? The article is almost 3 years old... Mariano(t/c) 11:38, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Hezbollah charged over Argentina bomb

message: I propose to remove this part. I think it's not so important and just some minor quotations and analysises .
:However, Ali Mohamed, "a former U.S. Green Beret ... pleaded guilty to conspiring with [Osama] bin Laden to bomb U.S. embassies in Africa. ... Hezbollah, he testified, provided explosives training to al Qaeda."Priest, Dana and Douglas Farah. "Terror Alliance Has U.S. Worried." Washington Post. 30 June 2002. 18 September 2006. According to Middle East Quarterly and the Washington Post, "Al Qaeda members received advice and training from Hezbollah.""Iran's Link to Al-Qaeda: The 9-11 Commission's Evidence." Middle East Forum. Fall 2004. 18 September 2006.</ref> In a 2002 article, the Washington Post claimed: "The new cooperation ... includes coordination on explosives and tactics training, money laundering, weapons smuggling and acquiring forged documents, according to knowledgeable sources. This new alliance, even if informal, has greatly concerned U.S. officials in Washington and intelligence operatives abroad who believe the assets and organization of Hezbollah's formidable militant wing will enable a hobbled al Qaeda network to increase its ability to launch attacks against American targets." Some American newspapers have suggested a broader alliance between Hezbollah, al-Qaeda, and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
But if we want to maintain it , then we should maintain this part which I removed:
:Saint Petersburg Times and ABC News and MSNBC report that there exists no evidence of a connection between Hezbollah and al-Qaeda.Jane's World Insurgency and Terrorism.Group Profile: Hizbullah Accessed July 28, 2006. See:* Saint Petersburg Times:  (mirror by ABC News: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=2114525)  	 
:* MSNBC:  
--Count Iblis
:I agree.  It should be moved to a seperate article and linked to the Hezbollah article similarly to how Hezbollah political activities currently is.  --GHcool 17:33, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: When I said it should be moved to a seperate article, I meant that the entire al-Qaeda section should be moved in its entirety to a seperate article; not just the Ali Mohamed testimony.  As it currently stands, the Hezbollah foreign relations article is complete, but the Hezbollah section on Al-Qaeda either must be deleted in full to accomodate for the redunancy of the Hezbollah foreign relations article or not deleted at all (though I don't see much point in the latter).  --GHcool 19:59, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Please do it if you think there is enough information to make a new article.--Sa.vakilian 10:30, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: al-Qaeda

message: I think that the paragraph about this is extremely misleading. There should at least be a sentence explaining that this doesn't imply that there is any evidence for a link with Al Qa'ida, because in the US a plea doesn't have to be based on facts. In most other legal systems this is not the case, so people not familiar with the US system will think that there is strong evidence for a link between Hezbollah and Al Qa'ida.  Count Iblis
:Where does it say that Mohamed's testimony was a plea bargain? Not in the Washington Post article currently cited. --GHcool 17:39, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It was mentioned in the NGC documentary (I'll try to find the sources). And even just a plea in the US is not what it is in the rest of the world. It has to be mentioned that if you make a plea then the evidence is no longer reviewed. So, we cannot say that there is any evidence at all. Count Iblis 18:06, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Plea-bargain mentioned here.  Count Iblis 18:13, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Very well.  The information from the Pacific News source belongs in the article.  On the other hand, although the evidence may be relatively weak, to say that there isn't "any evidence at all" is also stretching the truth.  I think the way it stands now, that "There is no concrete evidence of Hezbollah contact or cooperation with al-Qaida" (emphasis added) is the most fair way to reconcile both viewpoints.  --GHcool 18:45, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ali Mohamed's testimony 

message: The 2nd introductory paragraph says "Hezbollah's supporters justify its violence against Israeli civilians[17] as reciprocal to Israeli war crimes and in retaliation of bombing of Lebanese civilians and occupation of Lebanese territory" I think it should be changed to "alleged Israeli war crimes" since there has been confirmation that Israel has committed war crimes against Lebanon.
:: See reports by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch for confirmation of Israeli war crimes in Lebanon Rm uk 21:10, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Israeli War Crimes 

message: The group Hezbollah does not exist. The name of the group is "Party of God" which is pronounced and spelled "HizbAllah".
Im not sure why Americans and Europeans have butchered and anglicized the name into a "gitmo"-type of word by using the "oll" in "all". It's "HizbAllah".
:Of course, you are correct.  "Hezbollah" is the most common English spelling I've seen, but I've also seen "Hizbullah," which is closer to the correct pronunciation.  I have never seen "HizbAllah." --GHcool 06:03, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think you might not really understand the concept of a transliteration. They are just about always imperfect, but thats not their real point, they exist so that one can put a proper noun of one language and writing system into something that makes sense to another language. Generally, the more different the languages the less accurate the transliteration.- Moshe Constantine Hassan Al-Silverburg | Talk 06:26, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Official article change from Hezbollah to HizbAllah 

message: There was written in the lead and intro: "The European Union acknowledges that Hezbollah uses terrorist tactics but for political and other reasons does not list it as a terrorist organization. " 
Apparantly this reference doesn't support the claim. There is just written:"Unlike the United States, the European Union does not list Hezbollah, a Shiite Islamic group that takes "its ideological inspiration from the Iranian revolution and the teachings of the late Ayatollah Khomeini," as a terrorist organization."
in addition "Malloch Brown" is U.N. Deputy Secretary-General and his opinion doesn't relate to EU.
So I removed this part.--Sa.vakilian 07:02, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Fair enough since the reference doesn't directly support the claim, but I think its safe to say that this is the real reason.  --GHcool 00:53, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Lack of reference

message: I believe this part is irrilated. I don't think that any channel is responsible for whatever may said  by non-official persons like Lebanese Cleric Fathi Yakan - head of the Lebanese Islamic Action Front "Lebanese Cleric Fathi Yakan: Whoever Disputes Hizbullah's Victory over the Descendents of Apes and Pigs Has Mental AIDS."--Sa.vakilian 07:20, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Irrilated part

message: I moved  Attacks against Western targets from this article to History of Hezbollah. As our previous consensus we don't want to put all of details in the main article because it's about 100 kb.--Sa.vakilian 07:35, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Moving some part of History

message: Is there anyone who can draw Hezbollah's structure in wikipedia on the basis of In the Path of Hizbullah . Then put it in this article or Hezbollah political activities.--Sa.vakilian 04:28, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Organizational Chart  of the party

message: In the section Position on use of armed strength to achieve aims
This Quran qoute should be deleted:
The Qur'an states, "Fight in the cause of Allah those who fight you, but do not do aggression, for Allah loves not the aggressors. Fight in the way of Allah against those who fight against you, but begin not hostilities. Lo! Allah loveth not aggressors. And slay them wherever ye find them, and drive them out of the places whence they drove you out, for persecution is worse than slaughter. And fight not with them at the Inviolable Place of Worship until they first attack you there, but if they attack you (there) then slay them. Such is the reward of disbelievers. But if they desist, then lo! Allah is Forgiving, Merciful. And fight them until persecution is no more, and religion is for Allah. But if they desist, then let there be no hostility except against wrongdoers." (Al-Baqarah 190-193)[85]
The qoute is from a non Hezbollah-affiliated website and thus it is irrelevant to Hezbollah's stance on the use of armed strength. Hezbollah may also use this surah to legitimize the use of armed strength, but one would have to cite directly to a Hezbollah source to prove so. You can probably find some usuable qoutes in Naem Qassem's book Hizbullah: The story from within published in 2006 or from Hezbollah website.
-Lars
:Fixed. -- Szvest Ω Wiki me up ® 12:56, 1 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Quran qoute should be deleted

message: I want to nominate this article as a good article. Please write your ideas here on the basis of Wikipedia:What is a good article?--Sa.vakilian 17:59, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Strong Oppose - I respectfully oppose. This Article fails to meet the requirements of criterion No. 4 NPOV which is a pre-requisite for a Good Article Nomination.  This Article is dominated by ONE POV. Lcnj 03:48, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Weak Support - The article is sufficiently NPOV (as evidenced by the fact that there is no NPOV tag anywhere in the article), but it still could be "pruned." The article is currently 98 kB.  Wikipedia:What is a good article? says it should be closer to 25 kB.  On the other hand, I wouldn't go so far as to say that 74% of the article needs to be deleted before it is a "good article." I've already begun pruning the article so that it is more to the point, but without compromising the content.  --GHcool 05:14, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Nomination as a good article

message: From God:
This article discusses the term "God" in the context of monotheism and henotheism. See God (word) for the etymology and capitalization of the term. See deity, god (male deity) or goddess for details on polytheistic usages. See Names of God for terms used in other languages or specific belief systems. See God (disambiguation) for other uses. 
 
A classic conception of the Christian God: Detail of Sistine Chapel fresco Creation of the Sun and Moon by 16th Century painter Michelangelo.God is the deity believed by monotheists to be the supreme reality. Often characterized as a male figure, he is believed variously to be the sole omnipotent creator, or at least the sustainer, of the universe. [1]
From Allah:
Allah is the Arabic language word referring to "God", "the Lord" and, literally according to the Qur'an, to the "God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" in the Abrahamic religions. It does not mean "a god", but rather "the Only God", the Supreme Creator of the universe, and it is the main term for the deity in Islam. However, "Allah" is not restricted to just Islam, and used by Christians and Jews according to geographic region. 
Zeq 21:34, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Using the criteria of the Wikipedia definitions for the terms, the choice is clearly "Allah" since "Hizbullah" is clearly meant to mean "party of the God of Abraham" (as opposed to "party of a deity." On the other hand, if we were using the criteria that the phrase should be not definitional, but translational, than "party of God" (with a capital G, which in common usage refers to the God of Abraham) would be more appropriate.  Personally, I'm leaning towards "party of Allah" because it gives more information about the party's religious alliance(i.e. a "Party of God" could theoretically be a Christian or Jewish political party), but I don't really mind either translation since both "God" and "Allah" refer to the same deity and because both terms are understood by most English speakers.  --GHcool 21:49, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It's frequently translated into English as the Party of God and into French as the Parti de Dieu. I don't see why we should do anything different. Palmiro | Talk 17:42, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Because this is an encyclopdia and we have link. God goes to one article and Allah is another. Since Hizballa is Hizb of Allah and we have Allah as a value in wikipedia we  can avod the translation and use the source. Source is always more accurate than translation. Zeq 22:23, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Not necessarily, if the use of source language terminology without translation in the target language creates an entirely different effect on the target language reader from the effect on the source language reader. I think this is a clear case where this applies. Palmiro | Talk 22:27, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

text: I advise to use this form:God--Sa.vakilian 01:49, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Allah (Sub7anoohoo wa ta3aala) and God are the same for Arab Christians and Moslems.  Those who say that Allah is just a "Muslim God" are WRONG.   I somehow agree with Sa.vakilian about the of:God--Lcnj 03:36, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[God]] or [[Allah]] 

message: I did a significant amount of pruning.  I got the article from 98 kB down to 89 kB.  I hope I didn't delete anything vital.  Please don't hesitate to use this talk page if my pruning requires further discussion.  --GHcool 06:20, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pruning 

message: What has happened to the references section. It looks like a load of html text. What can we do about it? Emperor Jackal 10:02, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, I've just noticed that too as a new visitor to the article, A huge section of the references is displaying the wiki code, instead of regular linked text. As a new wikipedian, I'm unfortunately not that expert yet to solve the problem, can some one else please tend to it ?--Goarany 08:29, 16 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Yes, the references need some maintenance. There are 6 or 7 references with no text showing - the note defining them must have been deleted at some point. One of those refs is re-used a bunch of times too. Gimmetrow 16:16, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  References? 

message: the citations need help.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Tallus1 (talk • contribs)    06:15, 16 December 2006
: Yes, the references need some maintenance. There are 6 or 7 references with no text showing - the note defining them must have been deleted at some point. One of those refs is re-used a bunch of times too. Gimmetrow 16:16, 20 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  the citations need help 

message: I've found this part unclear. I suggest to replace it with this:
:Although UN Security Council Resolution 1559, calls for "the disbanding and disarmament of all Lebanese and non-Lebanese militia",, The UN actors have denied that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization and analogized it to anti-Nazi resistance movements..
:Hezbollah has close relations with Iran. It also has ties with the Alawite leadership in Syria, specifically with President Hafez al-Assad (until his death in 2000) and his son and successor Bashar al-Assad.Hezbollas has declared his support for the ongoing al-Aqsa intifada.
:There is no concrete evidence of Hezbollah contact or cooperation with al-Qaeda.   Hezbollah's leaders denies links to al-Qaeda, present or past. Also some of the al-Qaeda's leaders like Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and Wahhabists clerics consider Hezbollah to be apostate.  But United States intelligence officials speculate there has been contact between Hezbollah and low-level al-Qaeda figures who fled Afghanistan for Lebanon.[
--Sa.vakilian 04:54, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm fine with your proposal, except I think the statement about the denial that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization and it is analogous to anti-Nazi resistance movements is misleading because it represents a minority opinion and you cited an editorial.  I already improved the wording of this statement on the Hezbollah foreign relations article.  As long as you take out that statement, its fine.  --GHcool 21:31, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think this is Israeli viewpoint that UN is biased and it supports Hezbollah. What do you suggest instead to improve the article?--Sa.vakilian 04:47, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You're right.  The Jerusalem Post is an Israeli newspaper and the editorial was against the UN's unreasonable bias against Israel, but very few would describe Hezbollah as anaogous to any anti-Nazi resistance movement.  As for the denial that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization, I would prefer we word it differently such as "UN actors are hesitant to describe Hezbollah as a terrorist organization." I think this is more accurate since most member states seem to neither deny nor affirm that Hezbollah is a terrorist organization.  --GHcool 07:14, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

text: Or "UN actors have refused to describe Hezbollah as a terrorist organization."--Sa.vakilian 18:13, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: How about "Many UN actors have refused to describe Hezbollah as a terrorist organization." (because some have described Hezbollah in that way).  --GHcool 20:28, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree with you.--Sa.vakilian 03:30, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Foreign relations

message: Went back a checked the main article - what a joke. You forgot to mention their military capacity. Being able to fight the Israeli army to a stand-still with a minimum of modern equipment must be good for at least a line or two in wiki. How about an article on the war - maybe you have one already, yes no? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 159.105.80.219 (talk • contribs) 
:Yes: 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict.  --GHcool 01:43, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Military activities

message: A few months back I spent a lot of time getting the references in order. I applied the  template to them all and then organised the multiple reference so that the first reference were given a name, and the rest simply referred to that name.
The problem now is that many of the original references either have been simply deleted, or redone but without the name and the template. This has orhpaned a TON of references in this article. A shame really because this controversial article needs those references..
I can start redoing it all again, but it seems the problem is that many editors are not aware of the importance of the cite templates Name tag. 
One solution could be to take all references and give them names in their own section, and then refer to them name in the rest of the article. In case an editor removes a reference in the text, it would not remove the main reference and the other parts of the text would not be affected? I am not sure if there are better solutions. Thoughts? mceder (u t c) 09:36, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This article isn't so controversial at present, But it may be shortened. I suggest not to use this method in this article now. Unfortunately we(especially I)'ve made mistake by moving some part of this article to other articles like Hezbollah ideology without paying attention to the refrences. Please refer to other related articles and check whether they have similar problem or not.
  --Sa.vakilian 18:44, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: My bad, GHcool... I did not pay close attention to figure out that the context was about the "Party of God" and not God Almighty.  While my contribution above holds true, the correct translation of "Hezbollah" in English is "Party of God"  NOT "Party of Allah". So, I can no longer agree with  God Lcnj 05:33, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Agreed Striver.  In English, and specifically in an English language encyclopedia, the correct translation of "اللَّه" (Allah) is simply God. Lcnj 05:39, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

text: The logical conclusion is to leave it as it was.  We have two different cultures/religions that approach said God in different ways, even if it is the same deity. Tarc 01:19, 13 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reference problem again..