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Latest comment: 1 year ago by A23423413 in topic quotes from arundhati roy speech on main page

I’ve deleted the quotes made by Hamas representative in Lebanon. I fail to see the relation between quotes from a terror organization spokesman to the state of Osrael. I believe quotes in the name of a country (if possible) should at least be from formal documents or politicians, hance I’ve deleted the quotes from the army Captain. Please do not change it back.

—This unsigned comment is by 89.0.55.186 (talk • contribs) .

More than half of the quotes on this page are irrelevant or very, very highly biased. I’ve tried taking them down. Sourcing “Israel: an Apartheid State” or quoting Hamas members or radical clerics numerous times, talking about Israeli soldiers emptying clips into children, should be sending up red flags. I’ve tried to take some of it down, but it keeps getting put up again. But this is ridiculous.

—This unsigned comment is by 68.198.99.236 (talk • contribs) .

Using MEMRI as a source is a bad idea. They are not the least bit reliable. I’ve kept the quotes, but moved them to unsourced. // Liftarn

yea this is pretty ridiculously biased against israel

Quote disputation

[edit]
Latest comment: 17 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

Just how seriously do we want this site to be taken? It cannot be taken seriously if it contains “quotes” of a controversial political nature that cannot be easily verified. Thus, the “quote”:

“This story about the danger of extermination has been a complete invention and has been blown up a posteriori to justify the annexation of new Arab territories. Mordechai Bentov, cabinet minister, cited in Le Monde, June 3, 1972”

…will be suspected of being pure propaganda, unless there is a reasonable way of verifying that it did indeed appear in Le Monde on the date specified. Otherwise anyone could add the following (fictitious) quote:

“We will fight the Zionist state in the media by fabricating quotes in order to demonize the Zionist leaders, and thousands of people will believe us, because they will know no better. It will be more effective than firing a thousand rockets into the heart of Tel Aviv.” Yasser Arafat, Meeting of the PLO Secretariat, Tunisia, July 15, 1983 (from the official minutes).

…and who will be able to disprove that it is authentic? All controversial political quotes must be easily and clearly verifiable or they should be removed. [Ehad Ha'am, Dec 19, 2009]


All of the quotes in this article have citations, which is great. However, I think it is important to be extra-sure that these quotes actually appear in the source material. I have seen so many fabricated quotes about the conflict from both sides that I am weary (sourced quotes about Jews drinking the blood of Palestinian children, etc). Online, I cannot find any sources without an agenda for any of these quotes. Some people say they are true and some say they are not

A lot of these quotes also seem to reflect the “Jews are out to control the world” message. This is controversial, to say the least, and I think it would therefore be in everybody’s best interests if we can find a way to verify these quotes, even if we just put links to for-pay newspaper databases.


Is there a way that we can make these quotes more verifiable? 138.16.19.131 04:47, 10 December 2008 (UTC)Reply

I commented out two quotes with easily verifiable sources (links were provided). Btw, we have an entire section called “Unsourced”. // Liftarn 12:10, 9 January 2009 (UTC)Reply

Unsourced

[edit]
  • Among ourselves, it must be clear that there is no place in the country for both peoples together. With the Arabs we shall not achieve our aim of being an independent people in this country. The only solution is Eretz-Israel, at least the west part of Eretz-Israel, without Arabs . . . And there is no other way but to transfer the Arabs from here to the neighbouring countries. Transfer all of them, not one village or tribe should remain . . .
    • Joseph Weitz, entry in his diary for 1940 (quoted in his article: ‘A solution to the Refugee Problem: An Israeli State with a small Arab Minority’, published in Davar, 29 September, 1967.
  • I gathered all of the Jewish mukhtars, who have contact with Arabs in different villages and asked them to whisper in the ears of some Arabs that a great Jewish reinforcement has arrived in Galilée and that it is going to burn all of the villages of the Huleh. They should suggest to these Arabs, as their friends, to escape while there is still time . . . The tactic reached its goal completely. The building of the police station at Halsa fell into our hands without a shot. The wide areas were cleaned . . .
    • Yigal Allon, Ha Sepher Ha Palmach, Vol. 2, p. 268, 1948.
  • …as uncontrolled panic spread through all Arab quarters, the Israelis brought up jeeps with loudspeakers which broadcast recorded ‘horror sounds’. These included shrieks, wails and anguished moans of Arab women, the wail of sirens and the clang of fire-alarm bells, interrupted by a sepulchral voice calling out in Arabic: ‘Save your souls, all ye faithful: The Jews are using poison gas and atomic weapons. Run for your lives in the name of Allah’.
    • Leo Heiman, Israeli Army Reserve Officer who fought in 1948. Marine Corps Gazette, June 1964.
  • Because we took the land this gives us the image of being bad, of being aggressive. The Jews always considered that the land belonged to them, but in fact it belonged to the Arabs. I would go further: I would say the original source of this conflict lies with Israel, with the Jews – and you can quote me.
    • Yehoshafat Harkabi, former Israeli Chief of Military Intelligence, in ‘Peace Won’t be a Plane Ticket to Cairo,’ International Armed Forces Journal, October 1973, p.30.
  • It is unacceptable that nations made up of people who have only just come down from the trees should take themselves for world leaders . . . How can such primitive beings have an opinion of their own?
    • Yitzhak Shamir, in reference to the black African nations who voted in support of the 1975 U.N. resolution, which denounced Zionism as a form of racism, in Yediot Ahronot, November 14, 1975.
  • The thesis that the danger of genocide was hanging over us in June 1967 and that Israel was fighting for its physical existence is only bluff, which was born and developed after the war.
  • Let us not today fling accusations at the murderers. Who are we that we should argue against their hatred? For eight years now they sit in their refugee camps in Gaza, and before their very eyes, we turn into our homestead the land and the villages in which they and their forefathers have lived.
    • Moshe Dayan, 1953, quoted by Uri Avneri in Israel without Zionists, p. 134.
  • I don’t understand your optimism. Why should the Arabs make peace? If I was an Arab leader I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country.
    • David Ben Gurion, 1956, quoted by Nahum Goldmann in The Jewish Paradox, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1978, p.99.
  • We take the land first and the law comes after.
    • Mr. Palmon, Arab affairs adviser to the Mayor of Jerusalem, quoted in The Guardian, 26 April 1972.
  • We must define our position and lay down basic principles for a settlement. Our demands should be moderate and balanced, and appear to be reasonable. But in fact they must involve such conditions as to ensure that the enemy rejects them. Then we should manoeuvre and allow him to define his own position, and reject a settlement on the basis of a compromise solution. We should then publish his demands as embodying unreasonable extremism.
    • General Yehoshafat Harkabi, Ma’ariv, 2 November 1973.
  • To maintain the status quo will not do. We have to set up a dynamic state bent upon expansion.
    • David Ben Gurion, Rebirth and Destiny of Israel, The Philosophical Press, New York, 1954, p. 419.
  • During the last 100 years our people have been in a process of building up the country and the nation, of expansion, of getting additional Jews and additional settlements in order to expand the borders here. Let no Jew say that the process has ended. Let no Jew say that we are near the end of the road.
  • Palestine is a territory whose chief geographical feature is this: that the river Jordan does not delineate its frontier but flows through its centre.
    • Vladimir Jabotinsky, at the 16th Zionist Congress (1929), quoted by Desmond Stewart in The Middle East: Temple of Janus, p.304.
  • Take the American Declaration of Independence for instance. It contains no mention of the territorial limits. We are not obliged to state the limits of our State.
    • David Ben Gurion diary, 14 May 1948, quoted by Michael Bar Zohar in ‘’The Armed Prophet’’, p.133.
  • The Achilles heel of the Arab coalition is the Lebanon. Muslim supremacy in this country is artificial and can easily be overthrown. A Christian State ought to be set up there, with its southern frontier on the river Litani. We would sign a treaty of alliance with this State. Thus when we have broken the strength of the Arab Legion and bombed Amman, we could wipe out Transjordan; after that Syria would fall. And if Egypt still dared to make war on us, we would bomb Port Said, Alexandria and Cairo. We should thus end the war and would have but paid to Egypt, Assyria and Chaldea on behalf of our ancestors.
    • David Ben Gurion, Diary, 21 May 1948, quoted by Michael Bar Zohar in The Armed Prophet, p.139.
  • I shall not be ashamed to confess that if I had the power, as I have the will, I would select a score of efficient young men – intelligent, decent, devoted to our ideal and burning with the desire to help redeem Jews – and I would send them to the countries where Jews are absorbed in sinful self-satisfaction. The task of these young men would be to disguise themselves as non-Jews, and plague Jews with anti-Semitic slogans such as ‘Bloody Jew’, ‘Jews go to Palestine’ and similar intimacies. I can vouch that the results in terms of a considerable immigration to Israel from these countries would be ten thousand times larger than the results brought by thousands of emissaries who have been preaching for decades to deaf ears.
    • Davar, 1952, Editor Sharan, quoted by Alfred Lilienthal in The Other Side of the Coin, Devin-Adair, New York, p.47.
  • We declare openly that the Arabs have no right to settle on even one centimeter of Eretz Israel . . . Force is all they do or ever will understand. We shall use the ultimate force until the Palestinians come crawling to us on all fours.
    • Rafael Eitan, Chief of Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces – Gad Becker, Yediot Ahronot 13 April 1983, New York Times 14 April 1983.
  • We must do everything to ensure they [the Palestinian refugees] never do return.
    • David Ben Gurion, in his diary, 18 July 1948, quoted in Michael Bar Zohar’s Ben-Gurion: the Armed Prophet, Prentice-Hall, 1967, p. 157.
  • I have the hope and a prayer that the State of Israel will flourish as a Jewish state within secure and recognized borders in peaceful co-existence with its neighbors and with all the Moslem States, and that this peaceful co-existence will bring security, prosperity and happiness to the people of Israel and to the people of the Middle East of all faiths.
  • We walked outside, Ben-Gurion accompanying us. Allon repeated his question, What is to be done with the Palestinian population?’ Ben-Gurion waved his hand in a gesture which said ‘Drive them out!’
    • Yitzhak Rabin, leaked censored version of Rabin memoirs, published in the New York Times, 23 October 1979.
  • There are some who believe that the non-Jewish population, even in a high percentage, within our borders will be more effectively under our surveillance; and there are some who believe the contrary, i.e., that it is easier to carry out surveillance over the activities of a neighbor than over those of a tenant. [I] tend to support the latter view and have an additional argument: . . . the need to sustain the character of the state which will henceforth be Jewish . . . with a non-Jewish minority limited to 15 percent. I had already reached this fundamental position as early as 1940 [and] it is entered in my diary.
    • Joseph Weitz, head of the Jewish Agency’s Colonization Department. From Israel: an Apartheid State by Uri Davis, p.5.
  • Everybody has to move, run and grab as many hilltops as they can to enlarge the settlements because everything we take now will stay ours . . . Everything we don’t grab will go to them.
    • Ariel Sharon, Israeli Foreign Minister, addressing a meeting of militants from the Tsomet Party, Agence France Presse, November 15, 1998.
  • Spirit the penniless population across the frontier by denying it employment . . . Both the process of expropriation and the removal of the poor must be carried out discreetly and circumspectly.
    • Theodore Herzl, founder of the World Zionist Organization, speaking of the Arabs of Palestine, Complete Diaries, June 12, 1895 entry.
  • We will establish ourselves in Palestine whether you like it or not . . .You can hasten our arrival or you can equally retard it. It is however better for you to help us so as to avoid our constructive powers being turned into a destructive power which will overthrow the world.
  • I’m a one-issue guy and my issue is Israel.
    • Haim Saban explaining how to make your political donations go further in NYT, September 5, 2004.
  • I will insist the Hebrews have [contributed] more to civilize men than any other nation. If I was an atheist and believed in blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations … They are the most glorious nation that ever inhabited this Earth. The Romans and their empire were but a bubble in comparison to the Jews. They have given religion to three-quarters of the globe and have influenced the affairs of mankind more and more happily than any other nation, ancient or modern.”
    • John Adams (From a letter to F. A. Van der Kemp [Feb. 16, 1808] Pennsylvania Historical Society)
  • I am in the West, but my heart is in the farthest East…Oh, how I would give up all the goodness of Spain, just to see the dust of Your ruined sanctuary!
    • On yearning for Israel, Yehuda Halevi, Spanish Poet, “Libi BeMizrach”
  • We would not become unworthy of the grace that God grants us to be able to die willingly and gloriously as free men, a happiness that those who cherished the hope of being invincible have never known.
    • Eliezer Ben Yair, commander of the last independent garrison in Israel on the eve of its capture, 73 AD. Quoted in F. Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, VII, 34
  • In Israel, in order to be a realist, you must believe in miracles.
    • David Ben Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister from an interview at CBS News on October 5th, 1956
  • It is permissible to destroy everything.
    • Haim Ramon
  • This story about the danger of extermination has been a complete invention and has been blown up a posteriori to justify the annexation of new Arab territories.
    • Mordechai Bentov, cabinet minister, cited in Le Monde, June 3, 1972

Unsourced

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  • As a result of the historic catastrophe in which Titus of Rome destroyed Jerusalem and Israel was exiled from its land, I was born in one of the cities of the Exile.
    • Shmuel Y. Agnon
  • I have also written a book about the Giving of the Torah, and a book on the Days of Awe, and a book on the books of Israel that have been written since the day the Torah was given to Israel.
    • Shmuel Y. Agnon
  • Not only must Americans admire Israel, there can be no doubt that we have an interest in, and special responsibility for, that valiant nation.
    • George Ball
  • Israel is still the only country in the world against which there is a written document to the effect that it must disappear.
    • Menachem Begin, on the PLO Charter, which calls for the elimination of Israel.
  • No more wars, no more bloodshed. Peace unto you. Shalom, salaam, forever.
    • Menachem Begin, on signing the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, Washington, D.C., March 26, 1979.
  • But there is a difference here: When Jewish children are murdered, Arabs celebrate the deed. The death of an Arab child is no cause for celebration in Israel.
    • Theodore Bikel
  • I’ve always been supportive of the right of Israel as a state, and I’ve always fought against anti-Semitism, even in my own community.
    • Harry Belafonte
  • The Palestinian Authority refuses on an ongoing basis to take the necessary steps to prevent terrorists from getting into Israel.
    • David Baker
  • This resolution simply says Israel has the right to defend itself. This includes conducting operations both inside its borders and in the territory of nations that threaten it, which is in accordance with international law.
  • The United States and Israel have a unique relationship based on our mutual commitment to democracy, freedom, and peace. Therefore, just as our commitment to these principles must be steadfast, so must our support for Israel.
  • The aggressive, unprovoked acts of violence against Israel by Hezbollah and Hamas are revealing. It is clear they don’t want peace, but rather seek the ultimate destruction of Israel … Since its first day as a nation, Israel has lived under a cloud of aggression from militant extremists and hostile neighboring governments … Each and every day, Israel’s very existence is at stake.
  • We will stand up for our friends in the world. And one of the most important friends is the State of Israel. My administration will be steadfast in support Israel against terrorism and violence, and in seeking the peace for which all Israelis pray.
  • Our Christian conviction is that Christ is also the messiah of Israel. Certainly it is in the hands of God how and when the unification of Jews and Christians into the people of God will take place.
  • We would like to have friendly regimes with enough broad participation of their populations to maintain long-term stability, so that we would have not only access to the region’s wealth, but we would be able to ensure the security of our good friend Israel.
    • Frank Carlucci
  • America and Israel share a special bond. Our relationship is unique among all nations. Like America, Israel is a strong democracy, a symbol of freedom, and an oasis of liberty, a home to the oppressed and persecuted.
    • William J. Clinton
  • The State of Israel has faced obstacles and challenges to its very survival, with conventional military attacks leading the way to suicide bombers who have killed innocent Israeli men, women, and children.
    • Jerry Costello
  • Through these adversities, Israel has endured with continued strength, conviction, and faith.
    • Jerry Costello
  • I’ve always thought that if Israel really wanted to solve the problem, they’d just start tomorrow and push right to the Jordan River, and anything in their way goes. They don’t need America or someone else to help.
    • Bruce Dern
  • Iran has long sponsored terrorists who carry out homicide bombings in Israeli cities. However, it is a mistake to believe the danger Iran poses is directed at Israel alone.
    • John Doolittle
  • In 1975 I was among a group of blacks who formed the Black Americans in Support of Israel Committee.
    • David Dinkins
  • Our forces saved the remnants of the Jewish people of Europe for a new life and a new hope in the reborn land of Israel. Along with all men of good will, I salute the young state and wish it well.
  • My commitment to the security and future of Israel is based upon basic morality as well as enlightened self-interest. Our role in supporting Israel honors our own heritage.
  • I believe that the people of Israel are the chosen people of God.
  • I defend Israel’s right to exist, to defend themselves, to not let themselves be exterminated a second time.
  • Soldiers of Israel, we have no aims of conquest. Our purpose is to bring to naught the attempts of the Arab armies to conquer our land … Israel cannot afford to stand against the entire world and be denounced as the aggressor.
  • In Israel, in order to be a realist, you must believe in miracles.
  • Israel has created a new image of the Jew in the world – the image of a working and an intellectual people, of a people that can fight with heroism.
    • David Ben-Gurion
  • I have been defending Israel’s right to exist, and to defend itself against terrorism, for many years-on college campuses, in television appearances and in debate.
  • If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions.
  • Many of the Europeans who want Israel to go away don’t even know why they do. Nearly a third of those interviewed concede they have no idea what the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is all about. It’s enough to know that Israelis are Jews.
    • Suzanne Fields
  • You still can’t find Israel on a map of the Middle East in a Palestinian schoolbook.
    • Suzanne Fields
  • Let me tell you something that we Israelis have against Moses. He took us 40 years through the desert in order to bring us to the one spot in the Middle East that has no oil!
    • Golda Meir, at a dinner honoring West German Chancellor Willy Brandt, as reported in ‘’The New York Times’’ (10 June 1973)
  • Israel was not created in order to disappear – Israel will endure and flourish. It is the child of hope and the home of the brave. It can neither be broken by adversity nor demoralized by success. It carries the shield of democracy and it honors the sword of freedom.
  • I cannot conceive of Israel withdrawing if Arab states do not recognize Israel, within secure borders.
  • Americans admire a people who can scratch a desert and produce a garden. The Israelis have shown qualities that Americans identify with: guts, patriotism, idealism, a passion for freedom. I have seen it. I know. I believe that.
    • Richard Nixon, quoted in Quotationary - The A-Z Book of Quotations [still needs original sourcing]
  • I will continue to believe that Israel’s security is paramount.
  • Our society is illuminated by the spiritual insights of the Hebrew prophets. America and Israel have a common love of human freedom, and they have a common faith in a democratic way of life.
  • The only thing chicken about Israel is their soup.
  • 9/11 was a deliberate, carefully planned evil act of the long-waged war on the West by Koran-inspired soldiers of Allah around the world. They hated us before George W. Bush was in office. They hated us before Israel existed. And the avengers of the religion of perpetual outrage will keep hating us.
    • Michelle Malkin
  • Peace will come when the Arabs will love their children more than they hate us
  • I never thought I’d live to see the day that an American administration would denounce the state of Israel for rebuilding Jerusalem.
    • Mike Pence
  • And by the way, a piece of news, Israel is the one country in which everyone is pro-American, opposition and coalition alike. And I represent the entire people of Israel who say, ‘Thank you, America.” And we’re friends of America, and we’re the only reliable allies of America in the Middle East.
  • I think that a strong Israel is the only Israel that will bring the Arabs to the peace table.
  • First of all, Arafat is wrong. Jerusalem is Israel’s capital, will never be divided, and will remain the capital of the State of Israel, the capital of the Jewish people, for ever and ever.
  • But so far, you know who’s been violating the nuclear nonproliferation pact day and night? Those who signed it. Iran, Iraq, Libya and Iran violates it while calling for Israel’s destruction and racing to develop atomic weapons to that end.
  • So I think we should stay focused on the real problem in the Middle East. It’s not Israel. It’s these dictatorships that are developing nuclear weapons with the specific goal of wiping Israel away.
  • You know, I think, I think the Palestinians are trying to get away without negotiating. They’re trying to get a state to continue the conflict with Israel rather than to end it. They’re trying to basically detour around peace negotiations by going to the U.N. and have the automatic majority in the U.N. General Assembly give them, give them a state.
  • Well, this is an unfortunate part of the UN institution. It’s the – the theater of the absurd. It doesn’t only cast Israel as the villain; it often casts real villains in leading roles: Gadhafi’s Libya chaired the UN Commission on Human Rights; Saddam’s Iraq headed the UN Committee on Disarmament.
  • My first name, Benjamin, dates back a thousand years earlier to Benjamin – Binyamin – the son of Jacob, who was also known as Israel. Jacob and his 12 sons roamed these same hills of Judea and Sumeria 4,000 years ago, and there’s been a continuous Jewish presence in the land ever since.
  • I often hear them accuse Israel of Judaizing Jerusalem. That’s like accusing America of Americanizing Washington, or the British of Anglicizing London. You know why we’re called ‘Jews’? Because we come from Judea.
  • When the President of Iran talks about removing Israel from the face of the Earth and is building nuclear bombs with a range of 3000km, you have to be worried.
  • Growing up in Israel, how can I not be an optimist? When you remember what Israel was 50 years ago and you see Israel now, one of the most successful countries in the world, stable, democratic, with an enormously stable economy despite everything that has happened in the global economy in the last few years, how can I not be an optimist?
  • I never thought that Syria and Israel should engage in a violent confrontation because I don’t think that there is any particular interest for any of us to do it.
    • Ehud Olmert
  • Israel always has to be in a position to defend itself against any adversary and against any threat of any kind.
    • Ehud Olmert
  • Peace is important for Israel.
    • Ehud Olmert
  • Israel will not tolerate a situation in which Iran has effective control of non-conventional weapons that can be used directly against the state of Israel … Iran is a major threat to the well-being of Europe and America just as much as it is for the state of Israel.

Ehud Olmert

  • The moral equation strongly tells everyone who understands freedom, who understands morality, that Israel is engaging in a just war in defense of its people and its freedom.
    • George Pataki
  • Israel is a country that respects freedom – freedom of assembly, freedom of speech and freedom of worship.
    • George Pataki
  • Christianity emerged from the religion of Israel. Or rather, it has as its background a persistent strain in that religion. To that strain Christians have looked back, and rightly, as the preparation in history for their faith.
    • Kenneth Scott Latourette
  • In fact, the Iraqi foreign minister admitted in March 2003 that Iraqi funds were sent to families of Palestinian suicide bombers who attacked and killed innocent Israeli citizens, and also 12 Americans in Israel in 2003.
    • Jim Gerlach
  • Under Hitler it was the entrepreneurial and professional classes who were the first victims of Nazi boycotts and exclusion. Today it is Israel, the most powerful symbol of Jewish national resurgence in two millennia.
    • Jack Schwartz
  • Israel has an important principle: It is only Israel that is responsible for our security.
  • Israel’s willingness to cooperate closely with the U.S. in protecting American interests in the region altered her image in the eyes of many officials in Washington.
    • Yitzhak Rabin
  • And if we are honest we have to make a distinction between a democratic Israel that wants to live in peace and the terrorists who want Israel wiped out. The Israelis were told to give up land for peace; they gave up the land, but got no peace.
    • J. D. Hayworth
  • If you live in Israel and you see the way life is there and then you go abroad and see the way Israel is reported on, the way that Israel gets reported on night after night is simply pictures of bombings or military actions.
    • Douglas Feith
  • If we pulled out of Iraq tomorrow, Islamic jihadism is on the rise. And they continue, as we see in Lebanon, to seek to destroy the State of Israel and seek to drive America back and bring us to our knees. We must stand tall and straight.
    • Zach Wamp
  • The Iranian regime gives financial support to terrorist organizations all over the world, denies the Holocaust, and calls for the wiping the state of Israel from the map, while developing long-range missiles and trying to obtain nuclear weapon.
    • Moshe Katsav
  • I am proud to be the president of the state of Israel.
    • Moshe Katsav
  • The United States is a strong and ardent ally of Israel. The fact of the matter is that friends can disagree. I think what’s important is that world leaders are able to sit down with one another, have frank conversations and move forward.
    • Valerie Jarrett
  • Most students have thoughts about emigrating to Israel. A significant number go on aliyah. We are proud of our Israel programs, which come at a considerable cost to the university.
  • Unprovoked attacks on Israel’s borders, murdering Israeli soldiers, taking Israeli hostages and showering rockets targeting and killing Israeli civilians are not furthering any legitimate goal.
    • Alcee Hastings
  • Israel is the canary in the mine. What happens to Israel will eventually happen to America itself.
  • There are plenty of opportunities for common grounds that we need to explore and strengthen. The Hispanic community has a strong affinity for our relationship with Israel.
    • Robert Menendez
  • The truth about Hamas and Islamic Jihad is that they don’t prevent Israel from existing or even flourishing, they prevent Palestine from coming into existence.
  • I’m absolutely convinced of that. Israel is the representative of the United States in that part of the world. Its policies are so integrated with American policies that they use the same language.
  • Israel is one of the easiest places to play ball. When I say easy I am referring to the easy lifestyle an athlete has while in Israel. It’s very easy to get around the country, because it’s so small.
    • Michael Kennedy
  • Israel is the only country in the Middle East where Arabs can be elected to the parliament in a democratic election.
    • Adam Michnik
  • The most important sign in Matthew has to be the restoration of the Jews to the land in the rebirth of Israel.
    • Hal Lindsey
  • Overwhelmingly, Israel’s political and military establishment want the rest of the world to act diplomatically or otherwise to stop Iran. But if that doesn’t happen, then the impulse toward the use of force will become quite strong.
  • Israel’s capital will never again be a divided city, a city with a wall at its center, a city in which two flags fly. This city, will, in its entirety, absorb immigrants, welcome pilgrims and be the eternal capital of Israel forever.
    • Yitzhak Shamir
  • We have said that Israel has had a very bad history with the United Nations, and whoever cares for himself in Israel distances himself from that Organization.
    • Yitzhak Shamir
  • The driving force for the Arabs is hatred of Israel. Hatred of the Jewish people.
    • Yitzhak Shamir
  • I’m always in favor of Israel responding strongly when it’s threatened. At the same time, a response to a response doesn’t really solve anything. It just creates a perpetual-motion machine.
  • As long as the Palestinians send terrorists onto school buses and to nightclubs to blow up people, Israel has no choice but to build the fence.
    • Charles Schumer
  • The central premise behind Oslo was that if Arafat were given enough legitimacy, territory, weapons and money, he would use his power to fight terror and make peace with Israel.
  • I had faith in Israel before it was established, I have in it now. I believe it has a glorious future before it – not just another sovereign nation, but as an embodiment of the great ideals of our civilization.
  • Harry S. Truman
  • But Hezbollah now has reared its ugly head in a way that threatens the entire free world. And they want, by their own charter and definition, the destruction of Israel and Christians. That is the truth. That is in their charter.
    • Zach Wamp
  • Hamas, also elected to governmental leadership in Palestine, includes the jihadists, people who have declared war on the United States of America and its ally, Israel.
    • Zach Wamp
  • The U.S. and Israel probably lead the way in terms of venture investment in technologies companies focused on the security paradigm. That is quite encouraging.
    • John W. Thompson
  • There is no truth which the prophets press more steadily upon Israel than that all their national life lies in the sight and on the care of God.
    • George A. Smith
  • Every dollar that we send in State Department aid or humanitarian aid that saves us from having to get involved with very expensive military actions is a good investment. And frankly, helping Israel fight terrorism in the Middle East is much cheaper than us fighting it here on our shores.
  • As Israel prepares to enter, my position is well known. It is one that I have taken at previous Olympics. It is wrong that the IOC refuses to have a minute’s silence for Israeli athletes that were slaughtered in Munich.
    • Brian Williams
[edit]
Latest comment: 2 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

People who visit WikiQuote come here for the quotes, those who want basic information go to Wikipedia. Every WikiQuote article is already connected via a link to Wikipedia.

So, why remove links to WikiQuote articles and replace then with with links to Wikipedia? Ottawahitech (talk) 15:13, 23 October 2023 (UTC)Reply

I agree that links to related Wikiquote articles are a good idea; the way to do that is to put such links under “See also.” The introductory section of an article is to give information about the topic, in this case, Israel. Links in the introductory section are to help clarify confusing aspects of the topic. HouseOfChange (talk) 20:33, 23 October 2023 (UTC)Reply
Actually, it has been standard practice to link to WQ pages if appropriate (meaning that we don’t need to link every word, but when there is a page worthy of linking, it is good to do so) and if they exist - if not, then link to WP pages. And there isn’t really a problem with having such a link in the intro as well as in a See also section - the use of one does not preclude the other. ~ UDScott (talk) 20:59, 23 October 2023 (UTC)Reply
@UDScott: Although I don’t think the one-quote WQ page Gaza is “a page worthy of linking,” I yield to consensus that a link to it in the lead should replace a link to the relevant en-wiki article. HouseOfChange (talk) 22:16, 23 October 2023 (UTC)Reply

Tangential/belong elsewhere

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Latest comment: 2 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion
  • The Hamas attack… shook the Middle East and shattered many assumptions and misconceptions about the region. It’s not that ‘’Israel’’ was shocked at the daring nature of the attack, but that Israel had long assumed that the Palestinian problem is dead and that there is no need to engage in a so-called peace process — even if managed by the U.S., the least neutral party in the Arab-Israeli conflict outside of Tel Aviv. Reflecting the belief in the death of Palestine as a question, the Biden administration was the first U.S. administration since Lyndon Johnson to not even attempt to launch a peace process regarding the Palestinian problem, demonstrating its belief that the issue is over.
    Joe Biden fully subscribed to the Jared Kushner school of thought and diplomacy, which believes Arabs don’t care anymore about Palestine and Israel can simply reach peace agreements with individual Arab states, after which Arab public opinion would follow. Little is being said about Biden adopting Kushner’s view of Middle East politics, which makes Palestine irrelevant in U.S. foreign policy in the region.
  • ’’’If you want to see the picture, you have to see whole picture, if you talked about violence, let’s talk about 4000 Palestinians killed during the last five years while from Israeli side a few hundreds killed.’’’ So, if you want to talk about the violence and you called this violence “terrorism“ Israel kills more, more Palestinian than Palestinian kills on Israel, Second, You have to see both sides. You talk about Hamas, what they did in Israel but don’t talk about Israel and what they did in Palestinian Territories, and they commit assassinations from time to time and in public, they said “we’re going to kill…” It’s the whole picture. Anyway, doesn’t matter what label we put, if you want to have the solution, we have to deal with the facts, not the terms. whether they are terrorists or not, this is not the problem. we have to deal with the facts, and the facts if you don’t have peace, you will have more blood-letting
  • As the Liberty sat within eyeshot of El Arish, eavesdropping on surrounding communications, Israeli soldiers turned the town into a slaughterhouse, systematically butchering their prisoners… This and other war crimes were just some of the secrets Israel had sought to conceal… An essential element in the Israeli battle plan seemed to have been to hide much of the war behind a carefully constructed curtain of lies… Into this sea of deception and slaughter sailed the USS Liberty, an enormous spy factory loaded with the latest eavesdropping gear… the ship was a tired old second world war vessel crawling with antennae, and unthreatening to anyone - unless it was their secrets, not their lives, they wanted to protect… the Israeli navy and air force had conducted more than six hours of close surveillance of the Liberty off the Sinai and must have positively identified it as an American electronic spy ship. They knew she was the only military ship in the area. Nevertheless, the order was given to kill her and at 12.05 pm, three motor torpedo boats from the port of Ashdod, about 50 miles away, departed. Israeli air force fighters, loaded with 50mm cannon ammunition, rockets and napalm, followed. Without warning, the Israeli jets - swept-wing Dassault Mirage IIICs - struck. On board Liberty, Lieutenant Painter observed that the aircraft had “absolutely no markings”, their identity unclear.
  • According to NSA documents - classified top secret… ‘’’some senior officials in Washington wanted above all to protect Israel from embarrassment’’’ over the USS Liberty incident. “Captain Vineyard had mentioned during this conversation,” wrote Tordella, “that consideration was then being given by some unnamed Washington authorities to sink[ing] the Liberty in order that newspaper men would be unable to photograph her and thus inflame public opinion against the Israelis… “
  • A lesson we ignore at our peril is that ‘’’oppression undermines not only the rights, dignity, and lives of the oppressed but eventually the security of the oppressors as well. The apartheid system that’s been suffocating Palestinians for so long is now also undermining the safety of Israeli civilians.’’’
  • Since 2007, Gazans have lived under siege, prohibited from leaving their open-air prison by a high-security militarized wall and platoons of Israeli soldiers. For the last 16 years, starting long before the latest escalation, access to most goods was banned. Gazans couldn’t even get construction materials to repair the homes, hospitals, water treatment facilities, and places or worship that Israel bombed repeatedly — in 2008, 2012, 2014, 2018 and 2021. Israel often denied emergency medical permits to leave the Strip, leaving many Gazans to die without care. Electricity was already limited. A 72-year-old woman in Gaza told a reporter last January, “It is hard to imagine, but we used to experience 24 hours of electricity each day in Gaza; now we are lucky if we get six.” Now there is none. Water was already unavailable except through expensive purchases from Israeli water companies. And food has long been scarce — by the age of two, 20 percent of Gaza’s children are already stunted. On October 9, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called for a “total siege” of Gaza. “No electricity, no food, no water, no gas — it’s all closed,” he said. ‘’’For Gaza’s already impoverished and malnourished population, that’s not just collective punishment — it’s genocide‘’’ … If we’re serious about preventing violence, we need to change the conditions from which this brutality sprang. ‘’’Sending more bombs, warplanes, guns and bullets won’t solve the problem.’’’
  • Israel has fought one battle after another, clinging to survival in the decades after its people were systematically murdered during the Holocaust. But the story of self-determination and Arab-Israeli conflicts spills out far beyond the borders of the Middle East. Israel wasn’t just the site of regional disputes—it was a Cold War satellite, wrapped up in the interests of the Soviets and the Americans.
    The U.S.S.R. started exerting regional influence in a meaningful way in 1955, when it began supplying Egypt with military equipment. The next year, Britain and the U.S. withdrew financing for Egypt’s Aswan High Dam project over the country’s ties with the U.S.S.R. That move triggered the Suez Crisis of 1956, in which Egypt, with the support of the USSR, nationalized the Suez Canal, which had previously been controlled by French and British interests.
  • What has been lost during these decades throughout the Islamic world is the view of the man and woman on the street and children in the madrasahs that United States is an honest broker for peace. Having worked throughout the Islamic world for over 35 years, it is a tragedy that this has occurred, but when successive Presidents and other high ranking officials ask Israel not to expand settlements yet hardly voice a “public squeak” of opprobrium let alone some real expression of disapproval (such as a curtailment of military assistance, rescinding favorable trade provisions, etc.) when Israel continues to do so, what is the Islamic World to think about the even handedness of U.S. policy?
  • Whereas Western figures consistently claim that the radical Right national-religious movement does not “represent Judaism“, the other, equally authentic side to the Judaic ‘story’ is the obverse.
What are the reasons for this shift? Part of it, has to do with the increased influence of national-religious sentiment as the Occupation grew into a broad-based subculture of Israeli society. ‘’’The settler movement’’’ is more than simply the aggregate of those living in settlement homes: It includes an intellectual and educational framework; a vision of Zionism as Greater “Israel” - or of what Chaim Gans calls, “proprietary Zionism” – i.e. one which ‘’’sees the land – from the river to the sea – belonging exclusively to the Jews.’’’
  • Israel is wrongly described as the Middle East’s only democracy — for whom? Diana Buttu, a Palestinian-Canadian attorney and citizen of Israel, spoke to “Democracy Now!” from Haifa, explaining, “about 16% of the people who are eligible to vote are Palestinians who are citizens of Israel. Look at the vast remainder of people that Israel controls … in the West Bank, in the Gaza Strip or in Israeli-occupied East Jerusalem. Close to 6 million individuals who are ineligible to vote in Israeli elections, and yet are being governed by Israel”…Justice and security for Palestinians will only enhance security for Israel. Stifling speech, blocking travel and violating human rights won’t bring peace. A negotiated settlement will.
  • (HC: What is your feeling about the current role of women in Israeli society?) SH: For myself, I have always done just what I wanted. I do have a sense that in Israel this is really less of a problem than in the United States. After all, in periods of emergency our women have always carried a heavy responsibility and functioned in most capacities in what still is, in some ways, a pioneer country. That makes it very hard to deny us appropriate roles. Moreover, it springs right from the Jewish family tradition of women serving as breadwinners while their husbands study. I know that Israeli society is famous for being rather macho. But my experience is that any woman who has something to say is listened to.
  • On June 8, 1967, an Israeli torpedo tore through the side of the unarmed American naval vessel USS Liberty, approximately a dozen miles off the Sinai coast. The ship, whose crew was under command of the National Security Agency, was intercepting communications at the height of the Six-Day War when it came under direct Israeli aerial and naval assault…
    The Six-Day War between Israel and its neighbors Jordan, Syria, and Egypt was a conflict that the United States chose to stay out of… The countries directly involved were left to fend for themselves in what proved to be an overwhelming military and territorial victory for Israel — one that doubled the fledgling country’s size in less than a week.
    Though the United States refused to intervene on behalf of its ally, it was nevertheless eavesdropping on Israeli military communications during war. There, according to Bamford, lies the rub: Over the course of Israel’s remarkable territorial acquisition and military victory, it allegedly committed a war crime by slaughtering Egyptian prisoners of war in the city of El Arish in the northern Sinai.
  • In the end, Israel is destroyed by nuclear bombs.
    • Philip Lamy, Millennium Rage : Survivalists, white supremacists, and the Doomsday prophecy (1996)
  • That’s so astonishing that we are now the fifth day after the war, and you don’t see the government. They are still preoccupied with their own political careers, with all kind of political manipulations. Nobody takes care of the situation. The army is preparing itself for a ground operation. But except of the army — I was in so many homes which were bombed, so many people who lost their beloved one. Nobody came to them. Nobody offers them any assistance.
    ‘’’Israel is really falling apart, from this point of view. And the man who governed Israel for the last 15 years is the one, and the only one, to be blamed, before anyone else.’’’ This goes without saying. ‘’’And I guess at six after the war, as we say, million Israelis will go to the streets, and they will have only one demand: At least, Netanyahu, go home. If not, Netanyahu, go to court and be sentenced for this irresponsible policy that you have been committing.’’’
  • This vicious circle will not be solved by power, not be solved by tanks, and not will be — nor will it be solved by troops, only by political agreement and, above all and first of all, lifting this criminal siege, for God’s sake, after 17 years. This siege, what it was about, to guarantee the security of Israel. So, what happened out of the siege except of the suffer of — unbelievable inhuman suffer of 2 million people? What did it contribute to the security of Israel, this siege? You see the outcome.
  • The Balkans have had, in Winston Churchill’s marvellous phrase, more history than they can consume. New nations have worried that they do not have enough. When Israel came into existence in 1948, it was, despite the long connection of Jews with Palestine, a new state. With immigrants from all over Europe, and, increasingly, by the 1950s from the Middle East, building a strong national identity was essential if Israel itself were to survive. It was difficult to identify shared customs and culture. What did a Jew from Egypt have in common with one from Poland? Nor was religion a sufficient basis; many Zionists were resolutely non-religious. Although Hebrew was reviving, it had not yet produced a national literature. That gave history particular significance as a glue. In its declaration of independence, Israel called on the past to justify its existence. The land was the historic birthplace of the Jewish people: “After being forcibly exiled from their land, the people kept faith with it throughout their Dispersion and never ceased to pray and hope for their return to it and for the restoration of their political freedom.” More recent history became part of the story, too. The Jews had managed to return in great numbers: “They made deserts bloom, revived the Hebrew language, built villages and towns, and created a thriving community, controlling its own economy and culture, loving peace but knowing how to defend itself, bringing the blessings of progress to all the country’s inhabitants, and aspiring towards independent nationhood.”
  • In 1953, the Israeli Knesset passed a law to commemorate the Holocaust (Yad Vashem) and the State Education Law. Their author was the minister of education and culture, Ben-Zion Dinur, who had been active as a Zionist educator and politician long before Israel’s independence. His view of history was rooted in the need to build an Israeli consciousness. “The ego of a nation,” he declared in the Knesset, “exists only to the extent that it has a memory, to the extent that the nation knows how to combine its past experiences into a single entity.” For Dinur and those who supported him (and many both on the left and the right did not), that meant teaching Israelis that there was and always had been an Israeli nation, that it had survived the long centuries of exile, and that it had always been focused on getting back to its lost lands. Israel therefore was the heir and the culmination of a long historical process. Dinur’s view has been much criticized for leaving out religion, for example, in the definition of Jewishness and for presenting an oversimplified view of Jewish history, but it has been very influential in Israeli schools. A study of textbooks used between 1900 and 1984 found that, increasingly as time went on, Jewish history was presented in terms of the establishment of Israel, that, among Jews in exile, the Zionist dream of a Jewish state was “the strongest and oldest” movement.
  • Last year, Michael Lynk, the UN’s special rapporteur for human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories, said in a report that the treatment of Palestinians ‘’’”satisfies the prevailing evidentiary standard for the existence of apartheid“’’’. Israel has occupied the West Bank since the war in 1967. The territory is home to around 2.9 million Palestinians. Around 475,000 Jewish settlers also live there in Israeli state-approved settlements, which are illegal under international law.
  • Israel’s occupation of the West Bank is illegal under international law.... “The study concludes that Israel is in gross violation of these laws and that the administration of the occupation has become illegal,” Michael Lynk, the UN’s former special rapporteur on Palestine, told the committee, unveiling the study. ‘’’’’Because the occupation is illegal, the consequences should be the immediate, unconditional complete withdrawal of Israel’s military forces, the withdrawal of colonial settlers, the repeal of all discriminatory laws and dismantling of the military administrative regime,’’’’’ he said.
  • Whether by Sweden‘s foreign minister condemning Israel merely for defending its citizens from terror, or France‘s foreign minister threatening to recognize Palestine unless Israel participates in his conference to recognize Palestine, Europe seems obsessed with Jews. Unfortunately, that obsession, characterized by the singling out and demonizing Jews while embracing their murderers, keeps European anti-Semitism thriving.
  • Israel never strived for a decisive victory in Gaza. While it could militarily defeat Hamas, Israel could not overthrow Hamas without risking the possibility that a more radical organization would govern Gaza. Nor did Israel want to be responsible for governing Gaza in a postconflict power vacuum.
  • The report concludes by saying that some of the Israeli government policies and actions may constitute “elements” of crimes under ‘’’international criminal law’’’, including the war crime of transferring part of your own civilian population into occupied territory. ‘’’“The actions of Israeli Governments reviewed in our report, constitute an illegal occupation and annexation regime that must be addressed,”’’’ said Commissioner Chris Sidoti.
  • ’’I am deeply alarmed by developments in Gaza after Israel launched a military operation this morning targeting members of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement (PIJ)’’, said Tor Wennesland the UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process. Persistent drivers of conflict, including school demolitions, ‘’breed a climate of mistrust and tension between Palestinians and Israelis and undermine the prospect of achieving a political solution,’’ he said. … The demolition followed an Israeli court order citing safety concerns in response to a petition by a settler organization. Currently, 58 schools, serving 6,500 children, face the threat of demolition due to a lack of building permits that are almost impossible for Palestinians to obtain, Mr. Wennesland said. ‘’A child’s right to education must be respected’’, he said, calling on Israeli authorities to cease such demolitions and evictions, which are illegal under international law
  • The UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process on Wednesday expressed deep concern over the relentless expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem. During the last three months, more than 10,000 housing units were advanced..’’’.“Settlements further entrench the occupation, fuel violence, impede Palestinian access to their land and resources, and systematically erode the viability of a Palestinian State as part of a two-State solution”, the senior envoy said. “I call on the Government of Israel to cease all settlement activity and dismantle outposts immediately, in line with its obligations under international law,”’’’ he added.. Mr. Wennesland also expressed concern over escalating violence in the occupied West Bank and Israel, at levels not seen in decades.... Palestinians, including children, were killed or injured during demonstrations, clashes, security operations, and attacks, while Israelis, including members of the security forces, suffered casualties also.
  • ‘’’UN humanitarians expressed deep concern on Friday for all civilians in the Gaza Strip following Israel’s order for the entire population there to leave the north, amid ongoing airstrikes and a deepening humanitarian crisis.’’’ The development follows an announcement by UN Spokesperson, Stéphane Dujarric, just before midnight Eastern Standard Time on Thursday, that UN representatives in Gaza had been “informed by their liaison officers in the Israeli military” that everyone living north of Wadi Gaza should relocate to southern Gaza within 24 hours. Some 1.1 million people would be expected to leave northern Gaza, Mr. Dujarric said, adding that the same order applied to all UN staff and those sheltered in UN facilities, including schools, health centres and clinics. ‘’’The UN considers it “impossible” for such a movement to take place without devastating humanitarian consequences and appeals for the order to be rescinded, Mr. Dujarric said. Echoing that message, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) joined the call for Israel to rescind the relocation order, which amounted to a “death sentence” for many, said WHO spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic.’’’

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Press Release, quoted in Gaza: UN experts decry bombing of hospitals and schools as crimes against humanity, call for prevention of genocide, (19 October 2023)

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  • UN experts today expressed outrage against the deadly strike at Al Ahli Arab Hospital in Gaza City, which killed more than 470 civilians on Tuesday and trapped hundreds under the rubble. The strike reportedly followed two warnings issued by Israel that an attack on the hospital was imminent if people inside were not evacuated.
  • “The strike against Al Ahli Arab Hospital is an atrocity. We are equally outraged by the deadly strike on the same day on an UNRWA school located in Al Maghazi refugee camp that sheltered some 4000 displaced people, as well as two densely populated refugee camps,” the experts said.
  • There is an ongoing campaign by Israel resulting in crimes against humanity in Gaza. Considering statements made by Israeli political leaders and their allies, accompanied by military action in Gaza and escalation of arrests and killing in the West Bank, there is also a risk of genocide against the Palestine people
  • An estimated 50,000 pregnant women in Gaza, are in desperate need of prenatal and postnatal care. The number of internally displaced people across the Gaza Strip is estimated at around one million.
  • The unlawful denial of humanitarian access and depriving civilians of objects indispensable to their survival are also a violation of international humanitarian law, the experts warned.
  • ”The complete siege of Gaza coupled with unfeasible evacuation orders and forcible population transfers, is a violation of international humanitarian and criminal law. It is also unspeakably cruel,” the experts said.
  • Israel is not consistent in its new anti-apartheid attitude… they took Israel away from the Arabs after the Arabs lived there for a thousand years. In that, I agree with them. Israel, like South Africa, is an apartheid state.
    • H.F. Verwoerd, as quoted in ‘’The Empire’s New Walls: Sovereignty, Neo-liberalism, and the Production of Space in Post-apartheid South Africa and Post-Oslo Palestine/Israel.’’, by Andrew James Clarno (2009), pp. 66–67
  • The founding of the state of Israel and its startling rise to military dominance unsettled the Arab identity. In the low condition the Arabs found themselves in, they looked upon Israel and recalled the time when the Prophet Mohammed had subjugated the Jews of Medina. They thought about the great wave of Muslim expansion at the point of Arab spears and swords, and they were humbled by the contrast of their proud martial past and their miserable present. History was reversing itself; the Arabs were as fractious and disorganized and marginal as they had been during the jahiliyyah times. Even the Jews dominated them. The voice in the mosque said that the Arabs had let go of the one weapon that gave them real power: faith. Restore the fervor and purity of the religion that had made the Arabs great, and God would once again take their side.
    • Lawrence Wright, ‘’The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11’’ (2006), p 46
  • Israel has killed the two-state solution. That is why we must adopt a new strategy, and find a new partner for that strategy in Israeli society. We must kill the occupation and the [sense of] separation in the Israeli consciousness: The separation of people from one another is a question of consciousness. We must never return to this failed pattern of thinking. The future will not change if we continue to think with the same concepts of the past. The solution is a single state. If we believe we have a right to this land and the Israelis believe they are the ones who have a right to this land, we must build a new model. If both of us believe that God gave us this land, we must put history aside and begin to think about the future in different terms.

Categories

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Latest comment: 1 year ago12 comments4 people in discussion

Category:Countries in Asia: ‘’”This is a container category. Due to its scope, it should contain only subcategories. If you find a page here other than a subcategory, please move it to the appropriate subcategory, or create one if none exists.”’’ Ficaia (talk) 16:24, 12 November 2024 (UTC)Reply

Accordingly, I changed the category for Israel from “Countries in Asia” to “Countries in Western Asia,” its appropriate subcategory. Although I doubt many people think of Israel, Jordan, etc. as Asian per se. HouseOfChange (talk) 18:01, 12 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
…and I took it even higher and substituted Category:Countries, which is probably what I should have done originally. Ottawahitech (talk) 03:07, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
I wish you hadn’t Ficaia (talk) 03:27, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
@Ficaia, Not sure why you say that. Ottawahitech (talk) 13:10, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
@HouseOfChange: Not sure why you believe that moving the Category:Israel from Category:Countries in Asia to Category:Countries in Western Asia is a good thing. If you were looking for the article Israel by going through the category system where would you start and where would you go? Ottawahitech (talk) 13:17, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
For any member of nested categories, WQ uses not the largest supercategory but the smallest nested subcategory. HouseOfChange (talk) 19:49, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
@Ficaia: Have a look at the article Israel on enwp, You will see that unlike enwq it does clearly belong to the Countries in Asia cat on enwp directly and that the category itself is not a container cat on enwp. Am I making sense?
I value everyone’s points of view, Ottawahitech (talk) 13:24, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
Actually, this page doesn’t need any other categories besides Category:Israel. That category is appropriately part of Category:Countries in Western Asia (as well as Category:Middle East). ~ UDScott (talk) 17:53, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
Thanks, that is very helpful and clear. HouseOfChange (talk) 19:09, 14 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
@UDScott: I respectfully disagree. Why do you say that the page Israel needs only one category? This appears to be your personal opinion and not a convention in the enwq.
See for example: Philosophical pessimism Ottawahitech (talk) 15:35, 16 November 2024 (UTC)Reply
Just in case my previous post was too vague:
If you look at the bottom of Philosophical pessimism you will see that the it has both ‘’ Philosophical pessimism’’ and ‘’Philosophy’’ as parent categories? Ottawahitech (talk) 17:20, 27 November 2024 (UTC)Reply

Quotes requiring editorial work

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‘’Formatted incorrectly, relevance four years later is contestable.’’

Addition of non-notable quotes

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Latest comment: 1 year ago14 comments5 people in discussion

Some of your recent additions does not seem to be widely repeated. See, for example, this one, which is not quoted on any book and only in 4 different websites, which all have the exact same articles. (Almost) all of your other quotes are repeated only in one or two sources. I don’t think they qualify for WQ:FAME. Additionally, they all seem to be quotes that support a narrative. I think they should be removed (alongside some other non-notable quotes that others have added). If you disagree, please explain NorthernWinds (talk) 12:07, 1 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

@Peter1c pinging NorthernWinds (talk) 12:39, 1 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
NorthernWinds (talk · contributions) — I have not bothered to do extensive searches on all the many quotes critical of policies of Israel which you seem primarily interested in removing from this and other pages, but noting that you here recently deleted quotes by such notables as Bella Abzug, James Baldwin, Jimmy Carter and António Guterres, I reverted them on this page, and in just now doing a google book search on one quote, I saw the statement by Abzug you had removed had been found notable enough to be republished later in Jewish Currents- Volume 27 (1973) Page 36. There definitely seems to be a specific bias in the quotes you are intent on doing your "purgin" on. ~ ♞☤☮♌︎Kalki ⚚⚓︎⊙☳☶⚡ 13:17, 4 August 2025 (UTC) + tweaksReply
hello Kalki,
I delete all non-notable quotes. No bias... see quotes beginning with: "I myself tell people that Israel is the only place that".. "Some of the students".. "Israel has fought one battle after".. "Nowhere was the failure of the U.S.".. "Israel is wrongly described".. "Israel will never find peace"..
It does seem like there are more unnotable quotes which are critical to Israel, but that is beyond me.<be>
Being quoted in one place is not enough to make a quote notable per WQ:FAME. If it was repeated in a substantial amount of sources and I still removed, I have probably removed in error.
Please reinstate my changes (except for any errors, if there are any), they took a while to make.
Best, NorthernWinds (talk) 13:37, 4 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
1:
2:
3:
4:
5: (this one also falls under WQ:ENDURANCE)
Feel free to check the rest, I will not check everything like I did on Zionism since that would take time which I prefer to spend on other things. If still unconvinced, I will link proof for the rest. It's worth noting that some of the unnotable quotes were added by A23423413, some were added by Peter1c and some by others. António Guterres's quote does not seem to be repeated anywhere when not in the form of a full speech His quote was repeated once as a quote and not a full speech . It is recent with only one quotation, I don't think this qualifies as notable. Please revert your changes.
I hope this clears it up, please be more careful when accusing of bias. NorthernWinds (talk) 14:52, 4 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
Hello @NorthernWinds. Thank you for "pinging" me. I agree with some of your deletions. I suggest that they be discussed individually rather than summarily as a group. I will add back some of the quotes I consider to meet WQ:QUOT with justification and we can discuss further. If you have a different interpretation of WQ:QUOT we can also discuss that here. Thank you for your contributions to Wikiquote. Best regards, Peter1c (talk) 20:11, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
Hello @Peter1c,
I am pretty sure that Kalki has restored everything. I discussed my understanding of notability here, and would like to hear from you what is your interpretation so we can reach an understanding. I will soon double check all quotes removed against sources and then we should discuss which should be removed and which are notable.
Best, NorthernWinds (talk) 20:26, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
6:
7:
8:
9:
10:
11:
12:
13: 16
14: unsourced
15:
16:
17:
18:
19:
In my opinion, none of these are quoted enough to be notable. What do you think? NorthernWinds (talk) 20:42, 6 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
i reverted their mass subtractions because to follow good faith principles towards all of the editors that have added quotes here over years including me this should happen in the other direction, the editor that's new to the page would write the names of the individuals they judge to not be notable here on the talk page and see if other editors agree or disagree over time before we all decide whether to delete or move them. for people they agree are notable but think a different quote would be better for the page, they would just add the other quote to the page. for quotes they judge to be a better fit for other pages than this one they would be removing quotes one at a time with explanations and adding them to the other pages instead of trying to delete them from the site - A23423413 (talk) 13:31, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
@Koavf notifying you since A2 forgot.
@A23423413, I could respond to this with criticizing your claim of good faith, but am choosing not to because I assume good faith. I did not judge the individuals but rather the quotes themselves, as noted in the edits were I linked WQ:Q (the old version). It is impossible to discuss all quotes with all editors, this is very tedious work you are talking about. I invited you and Peter for a discussion because you have contributed recently. Me and peter talked and reached a middle ground (though I am still not sure what does it mean that a university press is a "notable source". WQ:WQ clearly says notable work), while you have rejected discussion. I do not think you understand the reason behind their removal. In my opinion, these quotes are not notable at all and should not be on Wikiquote. This does not mean anything about the individuals, however great or notable they may be. The reasons, guidelines and (later) the proof was/were listed. If you find a significant coverage in secondary sources/proof of notability, which I have not been able to find, you are more than welcome to lay them down here and I will change my mind. Ultimately, the removal boils down to the lack of repetition in secondary sources.
Best, NorthernWinds (talk) 15:48, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
as i wrote on their talk page, i will tag both of you when i repost the vandalism report with updates. i was taught to wait a day or more before writing messages describing conflict A23423413 (talk) 17:52, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
You are going to... report me again? Justin suggested making a comment about the content and try to reach a consensus, not to report me... But go ahead I guess. May I remind you that so far we have had zero interactions where you have assumed good faith. NorthernWinds (talk) 18:01, 14 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I do think that not reporting and not continuing to remove quotations at least for the immediate term and for at least Israel/Palestine-related topics would be helpful, please. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 00:02, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply
I have disengaged to prevent edit wars, but I must say that it is very annoying that I am trying to improve pages but am getting ignored in discussions and reverted on the page, as well as am getting reported for vandalism. See w:WP:FRUSTRATE. For now, I will restore the deleted quotes that were removed due to the revert going to a pretty old version. NorthernWinds (talk) 08:28, 15 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

quotes from arundhati roy speech on main page

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Latest comment: 1 year ago1 comment1 person in discussion

could someone look through the arundhati roy speech and choose what paragraph they think is the best fit for the main page from there or one of her books, and move the rest to the talk page? A23423413 (talk) 13:10, 18 August 2025 (UTC)Reply

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